The Dawn Wall - No Spoilers

[rachelmanija]

A documentary about Tommy Caldwell's attempts to climb the Dawn Wall of Yosemite, and also about a whole lot of other fascinating things, all of them better encountered unspoiled. I highly recommend not looking up anything about this movie, Tommy Caldwell, or anything related to either of them.

I liked this even better than Free Solo, and I loved Free Solo. It makes a good companion piece to Free Solo because Alex Honnold does his big climb without ropes; if he falls, he dies. Tommy does his big climb with ropes; if he falls, he goes back to the beginning and starts over again. And those climbing methods and outcomes are also the central metaphors of their respective movies. Tommy falls, and falls, and falls; he starts over, and over, and over.

Free Solo inspired me to take up bouldering, where you climb without ropes; if you fall, you fall. (But on to a mat, so you don't get hurt. Usually.) I watched The Dawn Wall after, in the SAME WEEK and in fact a three-day span, I broke three bones in my foot falling badly while bouldering, and was wrongly diagnosed with having had a heart attack while on what I thought was a routine checkup, and didn't find out that it was a test error for over two weeks. (Those were completely unrelated incidents; it's a long story). It was the perfect time to watch a movie about falling, and surviving, and going on.

I'll put up a spoiler post separately. Please don't spoil the movie in comments.

The Dawn Wall is available on Netflix and possibly other places as well.

Comments

[minoanmiss]

I'm really glad you had this movie, especially now, as you point out.

[scioscribe]

I'll have to watch this! I just watched Free Solo because of your post about it and am definitely in the mood for more stunning vistas and acts of human strength and achievement. And I'm very glad you had this movie in the middle of a particularly hellish week.

[rachelmanija]

YESSS. Now watch this one and come back to discuss!

[rydra_wong]

A documentary about Tommy Caldwell's attempts to climb the Dawn Wall of Yosemite, and also about a whole lot of other fascinating things, all of them better encountered unspoiled. I highly recommend not looking up anything about this movie, Tommy Caldwell, or anything related to either of them.

I was SO THRILLED when I realized that non-climber friends (or friends who are climbers but not yet fully-fledged climbing geeks) would be able to encounter this story unspoiled.

[rachelmanija]

It just had SO MANY twists!

[rydra_wong]

I KNOW RIGHT? There's so much stuff which I wouldn't buy in a Hollywood movie on grounds of implausibility and OTT-ness and piling yet another SHOCK TWIST onto the huge pile of SHOCK TWISTS. *g*

[rachelmanija]

That "Oh BTW, about that trip Tommy and Beth took way back when..." coda absolutely blew my mind. I mean COME ON.

[mildred_of_midgard]

Holy fuuuuuck! I just finished, and I yelled at the screen, "No he DIDN'T!!"

Omg, unreal. Okay, off to read your spoiler post.

[rachelmanija]

RIGHT??? I now really want to know WTF Tommy thought about that!

[rydra_wong]

Link to (spoilery, obviously) comment in which I fill in some background on that:

https://rydra-wong.dreamwidth.org/665726.html?thread=8224126#cmt8224126

[rachelmanija]

But I still want to know if/how it changed Tommy's feelings about it.

[ivy]

Did "The Dawn Wall" make you think about top-roping as a hobby? (I like it better than bouldering, though bouldering is a lot more accessible to me.)

[rachelmanija]

Nah. I used to a bit, but it really set off my social anxiety. Especially since it seemed impossible to find a group of beginners, so I was always the only person who didn't know how to do stuff, AND I'm absolutely terrible at knots. I used to regularly forget how to tie my belt when I'd been doing karate (and thus tying my belt) 4 times/week for six years.

[rydra_wong]

Yeah, my knot-phobia and difficulties with social interaction kept me away from roped climbing for years; discovering that bouldering existed and didn't require those things was what enabled me to get into climbing at all.

(It is therefore hugely ironic that I ended up being partly a trad climber. I CAN TIE SEVERAL WHOLE KNOTS NOW.)

[rachelmanija]

SISTER.

People who are already good at something when I'm the only one who isn't being held up while they all watch me try to tie a knot they've already taught me multiple times and still can't do combines a multitude of my worst anxieties into one big tangle. So to speak.

[rydra_wong]

Also the whole IF YOU TIE THIS KNOT WRONG YOU CAN DIE thing. I figured there was no way that wouldn't send my anxiety and compulsive checking stuff through the roof.

And now here I am cheerfully taking leader falls onto trad gear which I placed myself while being belayed by another human being. This is not a scenario I ever thought was possible.

[rachelmanija]

That is amazing. Well, who knows, maybe I will come to that point yet.

I forgot to mention IF YOU DO THIS WRONG SOMEONE ELSE COULD DIE AND IT WILL BE YOUR FAULT.

[rydra_wong]

YUP. I found learning to lead-belay FAR FAR more stressful than learning to lead climb.

No spoilers

[mildred_of_midgard]

First I wanted to say that yes, I liked this one better than Free Solo, even though the actual climb in Free Solo was intrinsically more exciting to me. Dawn Wall felt more like a professionally made action film, while Free Solo felt more like a home video. I liked the way DW handled the media circus, just enough brief clips to keep the pacing exciting, without making you sit through too many long excerpts of of socially awkward climbers stammering. ;)

I had put the book on my "maybe" list a while back, but now that I've seen the movie, I'm going to have to buy the book and start reading.

I also want to say that I'm not much of a watcher of things, but the two climbing documentaries I've watched recently, both at your suggestion, have left me in a substantially better mood after watching them while wretchedly sleep-deprived and unable to enjoy most of my usual activities. Thanks!

Re: No spoilers

[rachelmanija]

Excellent! I will probably have more to rec shortly.

Re: No spoilers

[rydra_wong]

I also want to say that I'm not much of a watcher of things, but the two climbing documentaries I've watched recently, both at your suggestion, have left me in a substantially better mood after watching them while wretchedly sleep-deprived and unable to enjoy most of my usual activities.

I've already been reccing this at Rachel, but I will add my rec for A Line Across The Sky, a medium-length film in which Tommy and Alex go on an adventure in Patagonia which is one of my favourite climbing films ever, and which is currently watchable free online:

https://www.redbull.tv/video/AP-1MQAPEZX91W11/a-line-across-the-sky-part-i
https://www.redbull.tv/video/AP-1M8AK3VKD2111/a-line-across-the-sky-part-ii

(Content note: passing use of "r****ded" as an insult and "ghetto" to mean scrappy improvisional stuff.)

Gorgeouus scenery, amazing climbing, and most of all, delightful character comedy. Totally accessible to non-climbers -- pre-Dawn Wall and Free Solo, this is the one I was most likely to show non-climbing friends because I thought they'd enjoy it.

(I hope the sleep-deprivation lets up soon.)

[cadenzamuse]

Watching this unspoiled was SO GOOD!

Also, having watched both films and read both books, I enjoyed "The Dawn Wall" more as film but Alone on the Wall more as book.