Attempting to Free Climb a Patagonian Bigwall
2010 · 35 min · Trad, Big Wall · Mason Earle
In 2010, Mason Earle went to Patagonia with George Ullrich and Peter Rhodes to try the first free ascent of Cerro Catedral. The three of them cut this film themselves as soon as they got off the wall, and Earle only posted it to his own channel fifteen years later, dated look and all. That provenance is the appeal. There is no distributor, no narration written after the fact, no tidy arc imposed on the trip once everyone knew how it ended. It is a big wall attempt filmed by the people making it, in the register climbers actually use with each other. Worth watching if you like your expedition footage first-hand and unpolished rather than scored and graded.
Review
The provenance is the appeal, and I mean that as a recommendation. In 2010 Mason Earle went to Patagonia with George Ullrich and Peter Rhodes to try the first free ascent of Cerro Catedral. They cut this film themselves as soon as they got off the wall, and Earle posted it to his own channel fifteen years later, dated look and all.
This is for anyone who likes expedition footage first-hand and unpolished. There is no distributor, no narration written after the fact, no tidy arc imposed once everyone knew how it ended. The register is the one climbers use with each other, and that is rare on camera. Skip it if the production values of a 2010 home edit will bother you. They are what you would expect.
What works is the lack of hindsight. Every decision on the wall is filmed before anyone knew whether it was right, and the film does not correct for that. What it leaves out is the outcome as history: it would help to know, fifteen years later, what became of the line and whether anyone freed it.
Coconut Connection, the Belgian and Italian film from Baffin, is expedition footage with a director and a plan. This is expedition footage with neither. Both are honest. This one is rougher and, for that reason, closer to what these trips actually feel like.
