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The Alpinist

162 votes

Marc-André Leclerc, an exceptional climber, has made solo his religion and ice his homeland. When filmmaker Peter Mortimer begins his film, he places his camera at the base of a British Columbia cliff and waits patiently for the star climber to come down to answer his questions. Marc André, a little uncomfortable, prefers to return to the depths of the forest where he lives in a tent with his girlfriend Brette Harrington. In the heart of winter, Peter films vertiginous solos on fragile ice. He tries to make appointments with the climber who is never there and does not seem really concerned by this camera pointed at him "For me, it would not be a solo if there was someone else" . Marc-André is thus, the "pure light" of the mountaineers of his time, which marvel Barry Blanchard, Alex Honnold or Reinhold Messner, interviewed in the film. An event film for an extraordinary character.

Status: Released

Released Date: 2021-02-07

Runtime: 93 mins

Director: Peter Mortimer, Nick Rosen

Spoken language: English

Genres: Documentary, Adventure

Original title: The Alpinist

Production Companies: Roadside Attractions, Universal Pictures, Dogwoof, Red Bull Media House

Production Countries: United Kingdom, United States of America

Cast

Marc-André Leclerc

Brette Harrington

Alex Honnold

Reinhold Messner

Self (archive footage)

Ueli Steck

Self (archive footage)

Dean Potter

Self (archive footage)

Derek Hersey

Self

Jon Walsh

Self (archive footage)

Tommy Caldwell

Austin Siadak

Peter Mortimer

Barry Blanchard

Michelle Kuipers

Will Stanhope

Reviews

Geronimo1967

Rarely can I have seen a documentary with so much recent, and active, participation from a man about whom I knew nothing beforehand but for whom I actually cared by the middle of the film. The term "free-spirit" is entirely suitable to describe the young Marc-André Leclerc, a man who spends his time travelling the globe ascending sheer cliffs of rock that would give an eagle acrophobia. The film could also have been called "the Individualist". The young man wasn't a loner, in any social sense, but he preferred the exhilaration of climbing - and enduring all the hostile conditions that accompanied that - on his own. Only reluctantly, I thought, did he agree to allow the photographers to accompany him - and boy, what photography they have created. We really get a sense of not just the peril as the young man climbed these monumental pieces of rock (without a rope), but of the sense of adventure, of determination and of purpose that drove him to tackle these toughest, and frequently beautiful, of obstacles that nature could put in his path. There are a few, poignant, contributions from fellow climbers, the photographers, his mother and his girlfriend - but somehow we don't really need them - this is a story about a young man determined to live his life on his own terms. Got to be an Oscar contender.

2022-03-28

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