Meru

Mount Meru (aka “Sharks Fin”) makes Everest look like a glorified treadmill.

Three elite climbers. No sherpas.

One guy is doing a comeback climb after getting his skull crushed.

If you like climbing docs, check out “The Best Everest Documentaries” (my colleague Rob and I have rated 17 docs there!).

Thanks to Nancy Jong for pushing this one up in our queue.

Trailer for “Meru”

You Can’t Make This Sh*t Up

• Renan Ozturk suffered a traumatic brain injury, spinal fractures, and arterial damage in a filming accident…then attempted Meru 5 months later.
• Jimmy Chin was nearly killed in an avalanche just four days after Renan’s accident, then went back to finish the shoot like it was just another Tuesday.
• During their 2008 attempt, the trio was stranded on a wall for days with only 7 days of food. They turned back just 300 feet from the top.

Watch “Meru”

You can stream “Meru” on Amazon Prime Video, fuboTV, OVID, Plex, Kanopy, and Hoopla. Or rent/buy it on Apple TV, Fandango, and Amazon Video.

For the latest streaming options, check JustWatch.

Ratings:

• My Rating: 92/100
• IMDB Rating: 7.7/10
• Rotten Tomatoes Ratings: 88/100 (Users); 91/100 (Critics)

Director’s Note: Co-directed by climber-filmmaker Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi (“Free Solo“), this 90-minute doc won the U.S. Audience Documentary Award at Sundance 2015. Chin also directed The Rescue, a doc about a missing Thai soccer team and their coach in Tham Luang cave.

Release Date: August 14, 2015 (limited theaters); premiered at Sundance in January 2015

My Review of “Meru”

The Setup

The Shark’s Fin on Meru Peak is 20,700 feet up in the Indian Himalayas, and it’s one of the last unclimbed “holy grails” in alpinism. In 2008, Conrad Anker, Jimmy Chin, and Renan Ozturk tried to climb it, and failed just 300 feet from the summit after 19 days in a tent, surviving on one-third rations.

Three years later, they return. This time, Renan is climbing with fractured vertebrae and a cracked skull. Jimmy Chin is fresh off surviving a massive avalanche. And all three know that they might not get another shot.

More Highlights from the Doc

• Conrad Anker had tried Meru before with his mentor Mugs Stump, who died before ever reaching the summit. This climb becomes part tribute, part redemption arc.
• Renan’s recovery includes relearning how to walk and use his hands again. He does high-altitude yoga on the climb to regain balance.
• Jimmy Chin balances filmmaking with mountaineering. He captures world-class shots with one hand on the camera and the other gripping an ice axe.
• They rely on portaledges, nylon tents bolted into vertical rock, to sleep hundreds of feet off the ground, dangling over empty air.
• The summit shot is earned. You feel every frostbite blister, every failed attempt, and every friendship forged in frozen hell.

Lesser-Known Details from the Doc

• Jimmy Chin was shooting a commercial when he got buried by the avalanche—he only survived because the snow funneled around a rock outcrop he’d just passed.
• Renan’s injury happened while filming a paragliding-skiing project in the Tetons. He lost nearly a third of his blood supply during the rescue.
• After their failed 2008 attempt, Conrad Anker left a note in a waterproof bag pinned to the wall. They find it again in 2011.
• Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi wasn’t on the mountain, she co-directed the film from afar using Jimmy’s footage and Renan’s sketches.
• The Shark’s Fin was considered more technical than Everest or K2, because it combines alpine, big wall, and ice climbing in one.

Wrap Up

“Meru” is the doc to watch if you think “Free Solo” was intense. It’s colder, riskier, and somehow more emotional.

Thanks for reading!

Heather Fenty, Guest Writer, Daily Doc