Past screening

Psycho Vertical

Directed by: Jen Randall
Runtime: 1hr 15min Year: 2017
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Details

Directed by: Jen Randall
Runtime: 1hr 15min Year: 2017
Country: United Kingdom
Last Screened: Mon 18th Jun 2018

Based on his best-selling auto-biography Psycho Vertical, this is a raw and emotive study of the complex life and motivations of writer, funny-man and Britain’s unlikeliest hero-mountaineer, Andy Kirkpatrick, woven into an 18 day solo ascent of El Capitan, Yosemite.

Beautiful and emotive, Psycho Vertical explores the intricate mind of Andy Kirkpatrick, a world-class climber and alpinist who lives a life of conflicting desires, identities and responsibilities, inspired by his best-selling autobiography of the same name.

Firmly grounded by his impoverished upbringing in 1970s Hull, from a young age Andy’s head has been in the clouds, filled with grand ideas of discovering who he is and what exactly he’s made of, spurred on by his father’s absence and translated into ascents of some of the world’s most dangerous alpine routes.

By exploring his past, his present and his motivation for pushing his limits to the absolute extreme, we follow Andy on an 18-day, solo ascent of El Capitan, where life on the wall is precarious, tough and ‘crushingly lonely’, creating a raw and intimate portrait of one of climbing’s most controversial, unpredictable and adored figures.