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Review: Free Solo (2018)

Free Solo (2018)

So, I'm not going to lie here... at no point last night was I comfortable watching this year's Best Documentary winner, Free Solo. Yes, it is an incredible documentary, but I personally do not do great with heights and so this documentary was a bit of an endeavour for me to get through. Throughout the entirety of my watching experience my hands were doused in a perpetual layer of sweat and my stomach wrenched tightly in my chest. Unlike Alex, my amygdala was very much being stimulated, perhaps to a dangerous degree, as I watched him free climb a number of mammoth and unrelenting sheer rock faces including the plat du jour, El Capitan.
Free Solo really is an utterly remarkable documentary though. It is an adrenaline-pumping, majestic and fascinating look at one man, Alex Honnold, an interesting character himself, and the limits he must push himself to in order to conquer El Capitan, a mountain that has never before been free soloed. The training, both mental and physical, that Alex must attain and the effects it has on all of the people around in him in his life is a very compelling watch. I do not remember the last time I watched a doc where the film crew itself was being continually interviewed through its duration. This was because, in this case, there was an inherent ethical question that came with making such a film because of the possible motivation the doc may have been having on Alex to go and attempt the extremely dangerous climb that carried with it more than a slight chance of resulting death. An ongoing theme throughout was the people and other professional climbers telling Alex that he simply did not have to attempt it... But, alas, when someone with a personality and an interminable lifetime goal such as Alex's, the world should realize that, at the end of the day, nothing and no one is going to stand in the way of their dreams.
Free Solo is very much a celebration of the achievements of what the human body and spirit can reach and the remarkable individual who managed to get there. As you see in this doc, it takes a certain type of character to be able to attain such a feat, one that many of us simply may not be wired to be able to become. As such, Free Solo is as much a character study as it is about extreme sports and achievement. It is an absolutely engrossing story and film and one that everyone (who isn't wary about heights and potential bodily injury/death) should take some time to watch.
9/10
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