See daring feats and beautiful cinematography in five new climbing films this fall
By Chris Beswetherick
Ascend. You aren’t strapped in, you are slightly uncomfortable to begin with, and you are looking at your opponent: the climbing wall. For years, Western has been a school for climbers.
The Outdoor Center makes its return to the school year with a showing of Reel Rock 11, the newest Reel Rock film compilation. The screening takes place in Arntzen Hall 100 at 7 p.m. October 6. Tickets cost $5 for students with an ID, and $7 for the general public. Tickets can be purchased from Western’s Box Office, or at the door. Doors open at 6 p.m. This newest episode of Reel Rock features five new climbing films from their team of selected athletes. The screening includes “Young Guns,” “Boys in the Bugs,” “Brette,” “Rad Dad” and “Dodo’s Delight.” The Reel Rock team found powerful subjects to include in this year’s festival.
Four members of the Reel Rock team, Nico Favresse, Olivier Favresse, Ben Ditto and Sean Villanueva, set out on a three month recording spree in which they recorded the content for Reel Rock 11. Now, their films are being shown all around the world by universities and theaters.
The climbing scene is perfect for networking, and the filmmakers take advantage of their connections to the community and find their film subjects through word-of-mouth. They say their friends tell them about climbers they believe should be filmed.
After hearing about a climber, the Reel Rock crew meets with the person or people and begin shooting footage. Each climber is featured in a short film with excellent direction.
In one of the Reel Rock 11 films, “Brette,” they focus on Brette Harrington’s journey as a climber. They compose their stories to engage and connect with the audience. Most impressive is their investigation and presentation of their subjects in the films. The team thoughtfully strings together the story into a natural progression to create interesting work, but their footage itself would be breathtaking even without the thoughtful direction. In “Brette,” for example, the audience gets to know the climber as if she is a close friend. She screws her support into boulders with just her hands and looks so unfailingly cool doing while doing it.
The filmmakers intended to make their show appealing for everyone, not just climbers, and anyone can surely find themselves enthralled by these films.
The concept of the show is to excite the audience about climbing through live and recorded elements. Since 2006, the two founders continue to innovate the nature of their performances.
Reel Rock functions in a couple of ways: it tours and it has screenings. The Western performance will simply be a screening of the Reel Rock 11 films. However, the content of the movies will engage an audience of any kind due to the feats of the athletes as well as the cinematography. The organization expertly knows how to compose these films. The group has completed 22 projects since their founding in 2006 and has traveled the world for their showings.
Typically, at a live Reel Rock event, the members involved organize the performance with athletes and the crew involved, which shows the audience the authenticity of the team effort. Often times, Reel Rock performances create a party atmosphere as a result of the energy of the team. They bring these notable climbers on stage to connect with the audience in a different way, allowing the audience to experience another level of the film.
During shows, the organization creates an atmosphere of sharing and excitement. They have given away prizes to audience members, thrown a party during the performance and spurred donations from their audience to the nonprofits that they support.
The Reel Rock organization intends to release more content in the future, but is currently on tour with their movie screening. At the end of September, Reel Rock performed and screened a show in Seattle where they actually sold out. Clearly, people like the stories they produce.
