Free Solo

Free Solo is a 2018 American documentary film directed by Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin that profiles rock climber Alex Honnold on his quest to perform the first-ever free solo climb of a route on El Capitan, in Yosemite National Park, in June 2017. The film premiered at the Telluride Film Festival on August 31, 2018, and also screened at the 2018 Toronto International Film Festival, where it won the People's Choice Award in the Documentaries category. It was released in the United States on September 28, 2018 and grossed over $28 million. The film received acclaim from critics and numerous accolades, including winning Best Documentary Feature at the 91st Academy Awards. Synopsis Climber Alex Honnold has been dreaming of free-soloing the rock wall of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, a feat no one has performed. His choice of big wall climbing route on El Capitan is called Freerider, a route that was created by Alexander Huber in 1998, and which is graded at in difficulty. No climber has ever completed a big-wall free solo at such a grade of difficulty in rock climbing history. Honnold, who has completed Freerider several times with protection equipment, is a shy loner, who lives in his van with then-girlfriend (now wife) Sanni McCandless.