When Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay finally reached the summit of Mount Everest in 1953, the world greeted the news with almost as much excitement as it lavished on the first moon landing 15 years later. Everest may be the tallest peak, but as the documentary Meru reminds us, it’s not the most dangerous climb.
Directors Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi accompanied a team of climbers on two separate attempts to ascend Meru, the Himalayan mountain dubbed the “Shark’s Fin” for its pointed shape. While Everest has become an adventure vacation destination for physically fit rich people who can hire an army of Sherpas for the heavy lifting, the locals won’t climb Meru. The peak tops a granite spire etched with snow and ice. The ascent poses a set of obstacles and involves scaling rock, ice and a sheer face of stone. The hard part doesn’t even begin until after a week of climbing steep hills to reach the mountain. By that time, the air is thin and much of the food has already been eaten. The small team followed in Meru was responsible for hauling hundreds of pounds of provisions on their backs.
And yes, it’s cold; snowfall and avalanches are an ever-present danger.
Often resembling home videos from the roof of the world, Meru captures the exhilarating exhaustion of the climb, conveying the sense of being hooded and bundled against freezing winds and records the tapping, pounding and tweaking of picks and pulleys as the mountaineers make their way skyward. Meru conveys the geographic context—not only the mountain itself but also the lowlands below, the source of the Ganges sacred to the Hindus. The expedition visits a temple for a much-needed blessing before their ascent.
Meru also investigates the camaraderie of climbing, the mentor-student relations and the absolute trust essential on a dangerous expedition. It doesn’t really seek to explain the obsession of the climbers with reaching the top, despite the pervasive danger of death, crippling injury and the emotional toll charged on loved ones.
Opens Friday, Sept. 4 at the Oriental Theatre.
Meru
3 and a half stars
Directed by Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi
Rated R
