10/24: Free Solo
I've fallen a couple days behind, but ya know... it's that part of the Binge. Here's my film from a couple days ago:
10/24
Today's decidedly un-horror film was the documentary Free Solo. Now before you freak out: yes. I am completely aware that Free Solo is not a horror film. I ain't no dummy son. This year, though, I wanted to offer myself a challenge, something that I've done in a similar way previously (with Bill Murray's What About Bob): watch a movie that is not a horror movie but review it as a horror movie.
Free Solo follows professional climber Alex Honnold as he strives for the impossible: to free solo, that is climb without ropes or support, El Capitan, one of the hardest and most coveted climbs in the world. The film explores Honnold as a person, with all the difficulty that comes with being a free solo climber. It culminates in his free solo of El Cap, a dizzying and unbelievable human feat. As this is a horror blog, let's be honest here: what could be more horrifying than the stark reality of Free Solo?
Want to know real terror? Look at this:
F. That.
As a person who can experience pretty wicked vertigo, Alex's climb had me literally squirming in my seat. Forget ghosts, vampires, demons, werewolves, pirahnas, serial killers, and Shia LeBoeuf, this is the makings of real nightmares: one tiny misstep, one tiny fault in the rock, and Alex is dead. There is not even the smallest of margins for error. As a fellow climber as well (albeit not a very good one), I understand the true, horrifying feat this is. To quote Tommy Caldwell, a fellow climber friend of Alex's and the star of another incredible climbing documentary The Dawn Wall, "People who know a little bit about climbing, they're like, oh, yeah, he's totally safe. And then people who know exactly what he's doing are freaked out." This is real life, nauseating, squirm-in-your-seat horror. When the only thing between you and death is literally less than an inch of touch on a rock thousands of feet off the ground, you better believe that's real terror.
Well, at least for the viewer, and that's the remarkable thing about Alex: he has no fear, of death or otherwise. As a person, Alex is, well, different from most normal human beings. He has a drive that is something I don't have within me (I think few of us do); he's not in it for the glory, but rather for himself. He has a personal drive that no one, not even his long-term girlfriend, can stand in the way of. It's a drive that only free soloing can seem to fill, something that even Alex seems to have a hard time explaining. It seems that only by being near death can Alex be truly alive.
This documentary is as unbelievable as Alex's feat and is something that, whether you know climbing or not, needs to be seen. Of course, it's not a horror film, but it's my blog, I do what I want.
The horror behind Alex's free solo climb is real, and thus more terrifying than anything an actual horror film could conjure up. Want to know real fear? Go watch breathlessly as Alex Honnold free solos El Cap.
10/10
As a person who can experience pretty wicked vertigo, Alex's climb had me literally squirming in my seat. Forget ghosts, vampires, demons, werewolves, pirahnas, serial killers, and Shia LeBoeuf, this is the makings of real nightmares: one tiny misstep, one tiny fault in the rock, and Alex is dead. There is not even the smallest of margins for error. As a fellow climber as well (albeit not a very good one), I understand the true, horrifying feat this is. To quote Tommy Caldwell, a fellow climber friend of Alex's and the star of another incredible climbing documentary The Dawn Wall, "People who know a little bit about climbing, they're like, oh, yeah, he's totally safe. And then people who know exactly what he's doing are freaked out." This is real life, nauseating, squirm-in-your-seat horror. When the only thing between you and death is literally less than an inch of touch on a rock thousands of feet off the ground, you better believe that's real terror.
Well, at least for the viewer, and that's the remarkable thing about Alex: he has no fear, of death or otherwise. As a person, Alex is, well, different from most normal human beings. He has a drive that is something I don't have within me (I think few of us do); he's not in it for the glory, but rather for himself. He has a personal drive that no one, not even his long-term girlfriend, can stand in the way of. It's a drive that only free soloing can seem to fill, something that even Alex seems to have a hard time explaining. It seems that only by being near death can Alex be truly alive.
This documentary is as unbelievable as Alex's feat and is something that, whether you know climbing or not, needs to be seen. Of course, it's not a horror film, but it's my blog, I do what I want.
The horror behind Alex's free solo climb is real, and thus more terrifying than anything an actual horror film could conjure up. Want to know real fear? Go watch breathlessly as Alex Honnold free solos El Cap.
10/10
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