The Great Wide Open is a different climbing video than I am used to because it discusses history, culture and American identity. It speaks about the American Independence day and watching fireworks from “Devils tower“, a laccolithic butte. This is an interesting rock formation. The rock has vertical cracks that are impressive to see.
There are many aspects that I like and enjoy about this video. I like the visuals and I like the discussion of history and opportunism and passion. The segment that I like less is about death. I associate death with scuba diving rather than climbing. Recently I have watched quite a few documentaries about climbing and death. The film Sherpa and one other explored the themes both of mountain professionals and the risks they take and the other looked at climbers and the risks they take. They’re interesting topics but exploring the lives of people who live their passions is more pleasant. One person said “I think too many people live their lives, five days looking forward to the two day weekend and they don’t look forward to their life on the small amount of time we have on this earth.” That’s why I enjoy watching documentaries about this topic. For brief instants we get to dream and to aspire to new things.
There is a lot of attention in the media today about how women look and how they are perceived. The focus needs to shift away from how women look and focus instead on what they can do. Climbing news and videos are one way to achieve this goal. We see women who excel at their chosen sport and this has a positive effect. It takes us away from the superficial and presents us with the concrete. In climbing we notice women for their prowess rather than their looks and this is positive. I appreciate them for their ability  to challenge and overcome their fears. I frequently climbed with someone who was afraid and I would not hesitate to do it again. Enabling others is a good quality to have.
Ever since I saw fingerboards in web videos and in person I have wanted to get one but at first didn’t know where to get one and then didn’t find one at an acceptable price. When I saw it at one of the climbing gyms where I go the price was unreasonable so I lost interest. The one at Décathlon is at a better price so I was tempted. For the fingerboard I need to buy a drill, some screws, and place it. This is easy to do but the costs mount up.
I want to strengthen my finger strength with the rubber band. They have several levels of resistance and I chose the one with 35kg of resistance. They have higher resistance ones but I didn’t like the higher prices. The next step is to find videos showing how versatile these are for strength training.
The Rubber Egg as I call it is great because you can strengthen fingers individually or all at once. You can easily carry it with you and strengthen your fingers at any time of the day. I have played with it for two or three days now and I can feel the different muscle groups that are being recruited.
The alternative to the fingerboard, the training band and the egg is to go bouldering two to three times a week for an hour or two at a time. The drawback is that these gyms cost from 21 CHF per training session to 600+ francs per year. With the Rubber Egg and training band I will train on a daily basis, and see gains when climbing with the group on a weekly basis. Ideally both of these toys will allow me to climb beyond 6a and enjoy the overhanging routes.
Reverso Four wear and tear is normal. I have been using mine for years and it was used most heavily during an IFSC World Cup climbing event two or three years ago. Over the years I have grown in proficiency with the device and I trust it.
The beauty of the Reverso 4 and similar climbing devices lies in the simplicity of use. Pass the rope through, clip the carabiner through and attach it to the harness.
Years ago when choosing a belay device I was tempted and curious about the Grigri device but at four times the price of the Reverso 4 I thought I would wait until I gained belaying experience. Three years later and this is the state of my Reverso Four
In the image above you can see that the left side is still intact, having almost never been used. This is because as a right handed person I always use the right side. You can see that ropes have worn away at the two front teeth. In the featured image you can see that two of the teeth are worn smooth. I have not noticed a difference in braking ability.
Although I have used this device for lead and top-rope climbing I have also seen it used for rappel by some people when at a climbing gym in Lausanne. If you pass both sides of the rope through the device you are able to control your descent using a single rope. It can also be used for climbing with two ropes.
I have two Reverso 4. The bottom one has been used every time I have been climbing and the top one is almost new, having only been used for climbing a few times. You can see the shape that the teeth should have and the shape these same teeth have after hundreds of metres have rubbed along them.
The reason for which I got a Grigri 2 is not that either of these Reverso 4 need replacing. I was not even considering replacing them until a conversation Wednesday night. Someone with more climbing experience was speaking about the safety advantages of the grigri so I decided it was finally worth the investment.
In scuba diving when you upgrade your equipment you can easily spend thousands of francs. In this case it was around 70 CHF for something that lasts for years. Contrast this to diving equipment where you spend hundreds of francs for every new toy. In theory this is a device that I will use at least once a week for several years.
Two days ago I watched Nanook of the North, a documentary about an Inuit man and his family. This isn’t a documentary in the conventional sense. This documentary dates back to 1922 when the Documentary film was a brand new genre. This is one of the first documentaries, if not the first. I read about it for years, until, when I was watching Northern Exposure I did a search and came across the documentary on Filmin.
No Voice Over
The documentary has no voice over because it’s a silent film. You get intertitles instead that explain what you’re seeing. For many decades the documentary genre existed hand in hand with anthropolgy, the idea that the documentary could be used to document old ways of life, fascets of life and more. Nanook of the North was an early experiment
The Setback
At first Robert Flaherty filmed when he had time during an expedition. He would take the free time he had to document the lives of the Inuit. Eventually, the rushes burned due to a fire. He had shot 70,000 feet of film, almost twelve hours of 35 mm film. Hee was left with just the edit print. He showed it around before deciding that he didn’t like it, so he reshot Nanook of the North. (source: A New History of Documentary film, Jack C. Ellis and Betsy A. McLane, p12, 2005)
The content
Nanook of the north is a series of static shots that show an inuit family living their lives. We see them at a trading post, discovering the gramophone tasting it and more. We read about the children enjoying some sweets, to excess, and then taking castor oil, and smiling. We also see a seal hunt, a walrus hunt and the trapping of a fox, among other scenes. We see some traditional forms of doing these various activities.
At the start of the documentary there is an amusing moment where the Kayak comes to shore, and you see the entire family climb out of it, including a dog.
If not for Nannok of the North then such a scene would be read or heard about, but never seen.
The Interior Igloo scene
Nanook of the North did some controversy because it was seen as setup, as not really illustrating inuit life, especially the igloo scene. It’s interessting to see how clear ice was used as a window, with the adding of a block of snow as a reflector to get more light inside. I mention this because at least two or three times we see scenes that are supposed to happen within the iglood.
Due to how cramped an igloo is, and due to the lack of light, and film stock of the time, it would have been impossible to film within the igloo, so they faked it, outdoors. It illustrates the morning ritual. At one point we read, and see, the wife chewing a shoe, to defrost it in the morning, due to the cold night freezing it over. If the Igloo scene had not been faked outdoors, then the interior layout of an igloo would have been lost. By taking a small liberty we preserve history.
Watchability
Although the film is 101 years old, at the time of the writing of this post it is still easy to watch today, and it is pleasant. It shows various moments of inuit life, without being boring. At moments it even feels more like a home video than a documentary. I found myself thinking that anyone with a family could watch it and enjoy it. It has survived the test of time.
The Man With the Movie Camera
For historical context, the Man with the Movie Camera would be shot seven years later, in 1929.
The Digital Age
One of the luxuries of the Digital Age is that many of these films have been digitised, and in so doing they have been made easier to access. When I was reading about these documentaries I had to imagine them. I had to rely on frames of the film and descriptions. Now with a quick Google or other search we can find and watch these documentaries. They may be old, and they may be part of history, but students of the genre don’t need to search through university libraries to find VHS copies of old films like I did. Within seconds you can find content that took me years, or even decades to find. Nanook of the North is a key film, so to understand documentary we must watch it.
A short fiction by Jean Rouch. Mobile camera thanks to technological advances that made sound equipment portable. This new technology would be used for documentary production.
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