.A Reel Rocky Ascent

This year's Reel Rock Tour shows the greatest, scariest rock-climbing stunts in the world.

Hardcore rock climbing can be a lonely sport, given that most of it
happens in remote wilderness areas where nobody else goes. It’s also
tremendously dangerous, especially when you get up in the big leagues.
Enter Alex Honnold, a wiry, tanned 23-year-old from Sacramento, who is
now well-established as one of the best free solo rock climbers in the
world. Honnold began scaling rocks in Yosemite as a teenager and kept
pushing himself to do harder and higher climbs without a rope. Last
year, he decided to try two extremely risky stunts without warning
anyone. The first, a ropeless ascent of Moonlight Buttress in Utah’s
Zion National Park, had Honnold hoisting himself up 1,200 feet of
sharp, precipitous rock in 83 minutes, with only a few tiny cracks in
which to place his fingers. The second was even more compelling. That
September, Honnold braved Yosemite’s Half Dome, a free climb about
twice as long and only slightly less steep than Moonlight Buttress.
Then he repeated both climbs for a film crew.

The resulting footage comprises one half of Peter Mortimer’s film
First Ascent, a profile of two exceptional climbers made in
collaboration with National Geographic Adventure Series. (Mortimer runs
a small Colorado-based film company with fellow climber Nick Rosen.)
The other half focuses on Sean “Stanley” Leary, who was known for
climbing steep Alpine slopes with this Brazilian girlfriend Roberta
Nunes, until she died three years ago in a car accident. Last year,
Leary and two friends traveled to the southern tip of Argentina to
spread Nunes’ ashes. (Nunes had said that should she ever die on a
climb, she wanted her remains scattered in Patagonia.) Leary decided to
base-jump from El Mocho Mountain, carrying his deceased lover in a
parachute. He landed on a glacier 3,000 feet below. To Mortimer, it was
an extremely moving performance. It’s also just plain extreme.

First Ascent screens at the 2009 Reel Rock Film Tour,
which also features Josh Lowell’s film Progression (Big Up
Productions), about climbers getting right to the edge of their limits.
Kevin Jorgeson scales the vertical wall of a 45-foot boulder in the
California Buttermilks. Tommy Caldwell takes on the east face of El
Capitan, Yosemite, completing several routes — one of which might
be the hardest free ascent in the world. Santa Cruz-born climber Chris
Sharma climbs what might be the world’s hardest “sport route,” a
250-foot behemoth on Clark Mountain, called Jumbo Love. The climbers in
Progression take extreme measures to accomplish such feats, from
jumping several feet to the next hold, to hanging off one little
finger. As Mortimer assures, “the level of difficulty is really
astounding.” The 2009 Reel Rock Film Tour graces Albany Twin
Theatre
(1115 Solano Ave.) on Thursday, Oct. 1. Also featuring the
winners from last year’s Reel Rock filmmaking competition, the event
kicks off at 8 p.m. $12. Purchase tickets at Bridges Rock Gym or
Ironworks. ReelRockTour.com

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