The Shark’s Fin route of Meru Peak in the Himalayas is considered one of the most challenging climbs in the world. The ascent to the almost 21,000 foot summit has defeated dozens of professional mountain climbers. Meru, one of the films at this weekend’s True False Film Festival, documents three climbers’ trip to the top of the peak where so many others have failed.
Director Jimmy Chin, a professional mountain climber was one of the three climbers to reach the peak. Co-director and Chin’s now wife, Chai Vasarhelyi, helped produce the film from outside the climb.
Chin and Vasarhelyi spoke with KBIA’s Emerald O’Brien about what it takes to make a film and climb a mountain at the same time. Chin says that the film concept didn’t come until three years after he and his team decided to make the climb.
“It was about climbing first for sure. I hadn’t had any sort of plans to make a feature documentary when we first left in 2008. When we actually climbed the route in 2011 I started thinking about making a longer form film,” Chin said.
Why Meru? What about the mountain drew you to it?
Chin: “Meru has kind of been this long-standing project for a certain type of climber – high altitude, big wall climbers – and it had quite the reputation based on how many teams had failed.” Vasarhelyi: “And to just give you some context Meru is one of the most sought after first ascents in the Himalayas because of how difficult it is.”
While you were climbing, how much were you thinking about needing to be shooting film? Were you first a climber while you were on the mountain or were you first a filmmaker?
Chin: “On the climb you are always first a climber, just because you have to carry your weight as a climber first. I think for me, the rules of that type of shooting are that you try never to hold up the climb and you try to shoot whenever you can, essentially. And then, of course, don’t drop the camera.”
Chai, what’s it like to direct something that you aren’t on set for.
Vasarhelyi: “It’s funny, this is the first time I even did that and it was incredibly liberating – much more than I had anticipated. In my other films, I always felt it was very important to have another editor who knew nothing about the story. Because they can bring an objective gaze to the material you bring back, because you always think you’ve shot something but you may not have. And for me as a director in the edit room, not having been present on the climb itself, it was easier, in a way, to grapple with the reality that we can’t go back and reshoot something and that we didn’t miss something. It was just presented the way it was and I think I was able to bring a certain amount of objectivity to the story, and also as a non-climber, bring that perspective as well.”
What kind of meaning are you hoping your audience leaves the film with?
Chin: “Certainly the idea of friendship was at the core of this story and loyalty but the ideas of mentorship. I just love that idea of that kind of legacy in a mentorship. How one mentor passes down the knowledge and wisdom from their mentor, and I just think that’s a beautiful thing.” Vasarhelyi: “My feeling is more that it’s very easy to let the scale of the mountain itself overwhelm the story, because the challenges are formidable. But at its core, Meru is really a story about friendship.”
That was KBIA’s Emerald O’Brien talking with Meru directors Jimmy Chin and Chai Vasarhelyi.
