Rotpunkt. If you don’t speak German, it means Redpoint.  Believe it or not, the transition from aid climbing being “climbing” to free climbing being “climbing” is only four-ish decades in the making.  Kurt Albert would paint a red circle at the bottom of aid routes to show all the moves had gone free, and fill it in once it’d seen a full bottom-to-top ascent.  Who could have imagined where we’d end up?

German Alex Megos wants to be the best, fanatically. Insanely powerful physically, but his mental game is a work in progress.  You and I might feel bummed if we can’t link the moves on our project within a few sessions – this guy seemed genuinely bothered he hadn’t made large links on Jumbo Love (5.15b) in his first afternoon on it. If someone can do a route and he can’t, he feels like a failure.  Can he break through his expectations and impatience to send at his absolute potential?

Rotpunkt is a film of these two subjects.  Its largely a profile of Megos, covering the span of his career from childhood through his work on Perfecto Mundo.  It also devotes an ample amount of time to the history of hard sport climbing, especially the early days driven by legendary figures like Albert and Wolfgang Gullich.  Much time is spent looking at the parallels between Alex and Wolfgang, and its clear Gullich is an idol in Alex’s eyes. By timeshare, it doesn’t have a ton of climbing in it, skewing towards the biopic side of the scale.

The film has a lot going for it.  First and foremost, it’s free on YouTube, so there’s no excuse not to check it out, and at just 50 minutes, its not a huge time commitment either. It interviews a lot of the who’s-who of the early free-climbing era, as well as modern voices, like the always well-spoken Sonnie Trotter. The footage is well shot and high quality, and even the archival stuff looks great.  The soundtrack is spot on in that it contributes to the mood when needed, but isn’t overpowering or distracting.

I frequently poo-poo character-driven climbing films, but there’s something about this cast of characters that I can’t find my usual fault with it. Megos comes across as incredibly human, relateable, and funny – not stereotypical “German” traits. He has gloriously high expectations, and makes no excuses for failure beyond complete personal ownership.  “There are no bad conditions, there is only weakness”

Verdict:  Watch It

CastShown:
Alex Megos
Sonnie Trotter
Norbert Sander
Wolfgang Gullich
Kurt Albert
Russ Clune
Thomas Ballenberger
Patrick Matros
Dicki Korb