Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi Quotes

The cinematography and the conditions in which 'Meru' was filmed drew me to the project. It's remarkable to think that everything in the film is real; these three men set out to attempt this impossible climb and to film it at the same time.

I was never comfortable with the risk of climbing in the Himalayas, or the amount of time in idleness that is involved in the Everest expedition.

I climb mountains.

The way to Everest is not a Yellow Brick Road.

Right now, I'm just focused on the 8,000-meter peaks. I don't know what's next. I don't think I will get tired of climbing.

The true alpinist doesn't want any infrastructure, he wants to go into the wild. And the odds of getting killed there are relatively high. And most people are sensible enough not to want that.

At its heart, 'Meru' is a personal story.

I suppose making documentaries is like doing journalism on film.

I always wanted to try Mt. Everest since I was a kid. I never thought I would be able to do anything like that.

I became famous for the fact that I would break many, many limits. People said, 'He does all these crazy things.' But oddly it was a crazy thing only because scientists and climbers said, 'Everest and the 8,000-meter peaks without oxygen - impossible. Messner is becoming sick in his head.'

There's something about 'Free Solo' that I look at the craft around it, and I'm really proud.

I don't need to come back to Everest.

I think climbing deserves to be an Olympic sport, as it is one of the few natural movements - like swimming or running, things that people have been doing for a thousand years.

The Nose is a beautiful route. The best thing is that, in one day, you get to climb so much. You climb and climb and climb the whole day.

I'd rather climb Everest than go for a walk in the park.

I do not climb really dangerous stuff.

My first film was very static.

I'm kind of obsessed by Everest and all those men that mountaineer and take themselves to extreme limits. Having gone back to Scotland to work on Outlander, I've been climbing a lot and getting out in the Highlands.

For us the mountains had been a natural field of activity where, playing on the frontiers of life and death, we had found the freedom for which we were blindly groping and which was as necessary to us as bread.

Unlike the book, with a documentary, you get a chance to show much more texture and color. Film gives you get a chance to focus on much more individuals who are pivotal in changing the landscape of American culture.

It's all movies for me. And besides, when you say documentaries, in my case, in most of these cases, means "feature film" in disguise.

Kilimanjaro is a snow-covered mountain 19,710 feet high, and is said to be the highest mountain in Africa. Its western summit is called the Masai 'Ngaje Ngai', the House of God. Close to the western summit there is a dried and frozen carcas of a leopard. No one has explained what the leopard was seeking at that altitude.

There is probably no pleasure equal to the pleasure of climbing a dangerous Alp; but it is a pleasure which is confined strictly to people who can find pleasure in it.

I've documented a lot of things myself as a filmmaker. If you want a rockumentary, that's in there.

I needed to go . . . the pull of Everest was stronger for me than any force on earth.