My brother Brett and I have been filming climbing for a decade now. What started as a whimsical pastime has grown into an obsession and a career, and climbing films have come of age. Meanwhile the realm of possibility in climbing has continued to expand, and Chris Sharma has been at the forefront of progressing standards for just as long. We've shot together for years and have always dreamed of making the ultimate climbing film.
For the past year and a half we've been working on making this dream a reality. Chris has been travelling the world on a quest to find the most outrageously hard and beautiful climbs - the King Lines. He's more dedicated than ever to pushing climbing as far as he can take it, and we've been right there with him, also trying to push the genre of climbing films to a new level.
For the first time, we teamed up with co-producer Peter Mortimer to combine his trademark storytelling and humor with our emphasis on spectacular visuals and action. We've shot bouldering, sport climbing, deep water soloing, competition climbing and big wall trad climbing in California, Nevada, Utah, France, Spain, Mallorca, Venezuela, and Greece. And we've woven it together into an epic portrait of the world's greatest rock climber at the peak of his game.
It has been an incredible journey. Here are some behind-the-scenes highlights from along the way.
Our first shoot for KING LINES was in the Greek Islands. Prana honcho Beaver Theodosakis rented a small plane and flew us around to search for deep water soloing crags. We hired a fast boat for two days, and zipped to the island of Amorgos, where Chris had spotted the most promising caves.
Massive unclimbed limestone walls were everywhere. At the end of the first day we found a gorgeous red wall with a hard looking line of stalactites through a roof. This would be our King Line if it went. The second day was windy and gray. Deep water soloing is much more intimidating when the sky is dark, the waves are big, and the water is cold. Chris figured he had one go - after a fall he'd be too cold and drained to get psyched again. I hung with my camera from a spiderweb of ropes at the lip of the roof, and Brett shot from a spit of land opposite the wall. Chris stepped from the bow of the boat and set off into virgin territory, cleaning the holds with his hands as he climbed. He worked his way through the maze of stalactites in the roof, and dynoed between slopers at the lip, with Sam Whittaker and Melissa Lacasse cheering him on from below.
"It was one of the most incredible bits of climbing I've seen," Sam said later. "He was just going for it, onsight, facing a 50 foot fall."
On the boat ride home half the team got seasick, but Chris was basking in the after-glow of an intense climb on a random wall in the middle of the Aegean sea where noone has ever climbed before and noone may ever climb again.
In 2001, after four years of on-and-off efforts, Chris made the first ascent of Realization, in Ceuse, France, a climb that epitomizes the concept of a King Line. It was a legendary project up a striking blue streak of velvet rock on the proudest sport cliff in the world, and it became the first consensus 5.15.
Six years later Chris returned to Ceuse to bolt new routes. It was the first time he'd been there without the pressure of trying to do Realization. "It's great to be back here," he said, " and look up at the route, and just say 'Yeah! I don't have to climb you!' and then move on to something else..." Brett had spent six weeks jugging up fixed lines to shoot every attempt Chris made, eventually capturing the first ascent for Dosage Volume 1. This time we shot some footage of Dave Graham trying the route, and interviewed both of them about the significance of Realization, and the idea of being so captivated by a line that nothing else matters until it has been climbed. Dave later completed the route for its fourth ascent, and we filmed Chris on his wild new climb, Three Degrees of Separation (5.14d), which has three huge dynos in it.
Venezuela Photos: Brett Lowell, Jorge Visser, Lev Pinter
Anything goes in South America. Chris, Pete, Brett, Lev Pinter, and Jorge Visser went to Venezuela in search of adventures and found plenty. After a couple weeks of partying, cragging, and exploring, they hooked up with Venezuelan climber Igor Martinez, who brought them on an expedition to the tepuys - giant mysterious plateaus of rock rising straight from the jungle. After a harrowing plane flight with two duelling stunt pilots (one plane later crashed, but everyone was fine...) they began a trek to the top, where the rumors of fantastically bizarre boulders turned out to be true. It rained for days and they ran out of food, but their native guide showed them which plants to eat, and when the sky cleared they climbed some of the wildest looking boulders on the planet.
United States - Clark Mountain Photos: Jorge Visser
After several years of bouldering and deep water soloing, Chris has turned his attention back to sportclimbing. Last year he spent some time working on Chilam Balam, a route in Spain that is 240 feet long, and was graded 5.15c by Bernabe Fernandez, who may or may not have actually climbed it. Chris was turned off by the controversy surrounding the questioned first ascent, but was excited about the concept of climbing a very long, very steep, very hard pitch.
Back in the States he checked out an old project at Clark Mountain, CA that had been bolted by Randy Leavitt in 1991, before Chris even started climbing. It turned out to be exactly what he was looking for. A majestic line out the center of a huge white limestone cave with hard bouldery moves the entire way. The business is a 100 foot long 45 degree wall. There is one hold good enough to shake out on, about a third of the way up. To get to that hold would be about 5.14d on its own, involving a crazy crux sequence past a one-finger pocket. Then it just keeps going and going, with dynos between slopers and long sections where clipping is impossible. On redpoint burns Chris skips three bolts at a time and takes 60 to 80 foot falls. We got a helicopter and filmed several days of attempts before the weather got too hot and Chris had to move on. The footage is off the hook - it's clearly a glimpse of what the future holds for difficult climbing.
The orange limestone cliffs of Mallorca, off the coast of Spain, are the world's best venue for deep water soloing. We first went there in 2001 with Austrian Klem Loskot, to shoot for Dosage Volume 2. When Chris saw the footage he freaked. A few months later we were back, and he was quickly hooked on the freedom of movement, the sense of adventure, and the aesthetics of the rock/sea landscape. Since then he's returned several times a year, always searching for the ultimate project. "Ever since I started deep water soloing," he said, "I've been wanting to find something like Realization, but over the water."
Eventually he found it - a free standing arch of rock rising straight from the Mediterranean, with a sparse line of holds out the underbelly of the arch. We made four trips to Mallorca to shoot Chris' attempts on the arch, each of which ended with a huge dyno and a splash. We kept coming back because we all had the sense that this would be one of the most spectacular routes ever climbed, and if we were able to do it justice on film it would be the best piece of footage we'd shot.
We brought a 20 foot crane and a waterproof camera housing for the dope angles. We swam to the arch before sunrise and got stung by jellyfish, then dangled from ropes all day while Chris hurled himself at the dyno over and over. There were many frustrating days when the rock was inexplicably wet and unclimbable, and other days when huge waves made it too dangerous to try. But eventually it all lined up, Chris climbed his first mega-project since Realization, and we captured the first ascent of Es Pontas (The Big Bridge). A few months later the footage aired on NBC, and we won an Emmy award for outstanding camerawork, beating out shows on The Olympics and NASCAR. After all the years of working hard to document and celebrate our passion for climbing, it was incredibly gratifying to see our sport, and our vision of it, appreciated on such a big platform.
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KING LINES is featured on the 2007 Reel Rock Film Tour, with over 60 screenings across the US and Canada in September and October. Check www.reelrocktour.com for schedule.
KING LINES DVDs are shipping October 1. Watch the trailer and order DVDs at www.KINGLINESMOVIE.com
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