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FILM SPECIAL FEATUREThe Dawn Wall is a film about
Tommy & Kevin’s awe-inspiring
climb of El Capitan. The film
toured in 2018 and has recently
been aired on Netflix, providing a
gateway for the world to witness
the story behind this amazing feat.
The following is the film Director
Josh Lowell’s account.My fascination with Tommy Caldwell
began in 1989. I was 16 years old
and took a climbing lesson from
his father, Mike, a guide in Estes
Park, CO. During a hailstorm we
retreated to his family’s cabin, and
he bragged about his 9 year old son
Tommy who could do 50 pullups.
A few years later I started entering
climbing competitions, and 14 year
old Tommy won them all.By 2003 I was making climbing
movies, and I filmed Tommy for the
first time in Smith Rock, OR. I knew
that in the intervening years he had
been kidnapped by terrorists while
on an expedition in Kyrgyzstan,
and had cut off his index finger
in a home remodeling accident.
His maniacal passion for climbing,
aw-shucks humility, and unflagging
optimism were an inspiration to
me. We began filming together
year after year, documenting thechapters of his life and some of his
greatest climbs.In 2008 Tommy first told me about
The Dawn Wall, a theoretical route
up the steepest, most daunting
section of the 3,000 foot tall El
Capitan, in Yosemite National Park.
He’d spent years re-defining the
limits of big wall free climbing on
other El Cap routes, but The Dawn
Wall represented a quantum leap
forward in difficulty.Our first foray shooting footage on
The Dawn Wall was a revelation.
Tommy was in the early phases
of exploring the wall, searching
for a line that might someday
be possible, if not for him, then
perhaps for future generations of
climbers. He was a thousand feet
up, taking huge falls, trying insane
moves, like an 8 foot sideways leap
through the air from hold to hold.
He seemed like a man possessed,
on a mission that was obviously
impossible. I had the sense that for
Tommy, the idea of The Dawn Wall
was about much more than the
climb itself.For the next six years Tommy
and his partner, Kevin Jorgeson,
returned to Yosemite to try theclimb every spring and every
fall, and we had camera crews
documenting the entire process.
Tommy and Kevin failed repeatedly.
There were times I considered
pulling the plug on filming since
the chances of success seemed so
remote. But as I learned more about
Tommy’s past and the complexities
of his motivation, I became
convinced the saga of The Dawn
Wall climb, whether he eventually
succeeded or not, would be the
perfect backdrop for telling the
fascinating story of Tommy’s life.In January, 2015, after 9 days
of living on the wall, Tommy
completed one of the hardest
sections of the route, reaching a
new high point in his effort to do
the whole climb from bottom to
top. It was a thrilling moment for
those in the climbing world who
had been following his journey.
For the first time, there was a
real chance of success. The next
morning Tommy and Kevin did
an interview via phone with John
Branch, the Pulitzer Prize winning
sports reporter from The New York
Times. When the story ran, it ignited
a media frenzy, with ongoing
coverage of the climb from every
major media outlet in the world.
Suddenly, Tommy’s deeply personal,
quixotic quest was elevated into a
global phenomenon.Over the next 10 days, high drama
unfolded as Kevin got stuck on
the hardest section, while Tommy
forged ahead. How would the two
partners, who had toiled together
for years to solve this puzzle,
reconcile the conflict between their
relationship and their individual
desires to succeed? While the press
speculated breathlessly from a
distance, our camera team, living on
the wall with the climbers, captured
every intimate moment.Finally, after 19 days of climbing,
Tommy and Kevin reached the
summit, surrounded by cheering
friends and family. President
Obama congratulated them. Tommy
seemed almost stunned that his
impossible dream had actually
become reality. And I realized that
we couldn’t have scripted a better
final chapter to this story that I’d
long been wanting to tell.