July 2022. Two high mountain guides, Frédéric Dégoulet and Benjamin Ribeyre embark on a journey around the Mer de Glace via the most legendary peaks of the Mont-Blanc massif.
It is a fact that our winters are less and less cold. Therefore it is harder and harder to get the conditions for ice-climbing. Fortunately, man adapts to his environment and makes progress: this is how dry-tooling was born. This movie will make you discover this discipline: its history, its evolution and the current practice. You will also see how much excitement dry tooling can bring. Dry-tooling now allows to free-climb some routes which were impossible to climb without aid in the past.
In the austere "Horseshoe Cirque", attempts on ice are so impressive and require such a high degree of skill, that after a discrete beginning in 1976, there was a wait of twenty years before new pioneers dared the challenge. Each has returned, marked for life by the extraordinary experience. The opening of The White Witch in January, 2006 by Philippe Batoux, François Damilano and Benoît Robert was the occasion to revisit this emblematic site. Here is an exceptional panorama where incredible ice formations give way to challenging rocky climbs and vibrant testimonials...
Unique shapes, no two the same, formed by the action of water and frost. The water that once ran from the summits in torrents and waterfalls is immobilized for a few weeks. The thing is to be there, in time, just at the moment when they become solid, just before they return to water. A question of balance. Around seven top-level climbers who represent all the richness of the activity, these images will highlight different techniques and different approaches. Although the athletic performance is impressive, it is there only to emphasize the dazzling shapes, the warmth of friendships, the stories of teamwork.
François Damilano is a French mountaineer, mountain guide, writer and filmmaker, born December 30, 1959 at le Mans in France. He is known for his many ice climbing openings in the 1980s and 1990s. On May 9, 2008, after climbing Putha Hiunchuli, a 7,242m peak, he made the first solo ascent of a 6,182m virgin peak in the Dhaulagiri group. He named it in honor of Elizabeth Hawley, Pic Hawley. On May 25, 2014, he climbed Everest (8,850 m) via the north ridge. Hyperactive and gifted, François Damilano was the forerunner of ice climbing in the 1980s with his friend Godefroy Perroux. It was his way of stepping into the spotlight, he, the young boy from Le Mans, nourished by the stories of his elders and the outings of the French Alpine Club organized by his parents. He invented a destiny, even seven lives, to fulfill his exclusive passion for the mountains, writing down the names of the most beautiful peaks in his race diary very early on. François Damilano never hesitated, declining the possibilities around this dream life of adventurer. If he became a guide, to measure himself against others and himself, his acute sense of action led him to explore the mountain in all its forms, combining a high level, solid and demanding practice, between solos and expeditions, between the Alps and the Himalayas, with the desire to make his universe better known and “think” about it. In icefall We owe him several reference topos in particular: François Damilano, Mont Blanc 4808 m: 5 Routes for the summit, JMEditions, 2004, François Damilano, Snow, ice and mixed – Volume 1, JMEditions, 2006, François Damilano, Snow, ice and mixed – Volume 2, JMEditions, 2006... He now mainly devotes himself to making films. In particular, he has written extensively in the media, participated in the “Ushuaia” program alongside Nicolas Hulot, hosted the Grenoble Mountain Cinema Meetings and accompanied certain equipment manufacturers in their research. Today, if he is also an editor, filmmaker, author of topos, he remains faithful to his vocation as a guide. François Damilano had seven lives. Not one less, with a beating drumbeat, in addition to the one everyone is experiencing.
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