Everyday Activist - Meru

Posted on Monday, January 04, 2016 at 09:00 PM

Meru

Movie Review by Everyday Activist X CalgaryMovies.com

I’ve taken my time reviewing this film partly because I wasn’t sure if it would screen again. Now that it’s made the Oscar long list we may see it in theatres, hopefully soon. At the very least you can purchase a copy from the website. If you follow my blog you know I tend to hang out in Banff, especially during the Mountain Book & Film Festival in October/November. I had the pleasure of talking to Jimmy Chin this year, mostly about the National Geographic take over by 21st Century Fox and listened to him talk about the film. Despite all his success in climbing and photography, he remains a down to earth individual. Conrad Anker whom I briefly met in 2013, has the same spirit. Since I haven’t met Renan Ozturk yet to confirm, but it’s safe to say since he hangs out with these guys, he’s probably of the same ilk.

Meru tells the tale of these three men and their bids to have a first ascent on Meru, a mountain in the Himalayan range. Given we’re in Banff, most films are about that. Climb the unclimbable and in some cases ski down it. What makes it different is that it also gives us a peek into the private lives of these public individuals. Without this human component, exposing people at their most fragile and vulnerable, Meru would not have captured the attention it did. It helps that they had some incredible stories about battling the odds to get to the top.

The events they faced in between their two attempts definitely give the sense of a higher power at work. Most stories that include people being swept away in bad avalanches usually end in body recovery, not the person sitting on top of the avalanche talking. Not quite sure how Jimmy escaped post-traumatic stress from that experience, though people who spend a lot of time in the mountains have bad things happen. They have lots of practice dealing with stress. If that story wasn’t unbelievable enough, his team mate Renan split his skull open; which in most people would kill them or best case scenario end their career in anything, forget elite mountaineering. Maybe because his body was in such great shape from mountaineering, he recovered and trained hard to go back to Meru.

In all this turmoil, Conrad battled thoughts of fatherhood and his deepest desires to summit. His family (wife and step children) had already lost one father to the mountains. Mountaineering is dangerous. Many people I know stopped when they had children. It’s hard to explain what keeps people going out to dangerous places. Part of it is that it’s not dangerous in their minds. They have trained and prepared the best they could. The other part is curiosity. What is it like up there? Or can we do this? Because this movie had a big push since 2013, I knew the story, but watching unfold and listening to Jimmy talk about it in person is something else entirely. While I know it’s not a favorite to win or even be shortlisted I hope it’s at least shown again in Calgary.

Calgary Showtimes: Meru >