"The idea of falling off . . . It's, like, kind of O.K. if it's just by myself, but, like, I wouldn't want to fall off right in front of my friends,"
"The fewer people know anything, the better, really."
"I've always been conflicted about doing a movie about free soloing because it's so dangerous,"
"It's hard to not imagine your friend, Alex, soloing . . . and you're making a film about it, which might put undue pressure on him to do something and him falling through the frame to his death."
Alex Honnold often prefers secrecy when free-soloing, saying fewer people knowing reduces pressure and preserves the personal nature of the risk. Free soloing is framed as an individual test of courage and mastery rather than a pursuit of fame or money. Bringing cameras and crews into high-risk climbs raises ethical concerns among fellow climbers about inducing pressure and altering the climber's motives. Crew members who are climbers themselves express conflict over whether documenting extreme risk is appropriate. The presence of cameras intensifies viewer anxiety and transforms private acts of risk into public spectacle.
Read at The New Yorker
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