Oculus climbing movie The Soloist VR is utterly breathtaking

There’s an old adage in mountaineering that you’re in the most danger when you start to feel safe. I’ve heard stories about climbers, wildly accomplished and in their physical prime, who died falling off relatively easy routes. A good friend of mine ‘decked’ on something comfortably within his grade early on in his climbing career. When I asked him what went wrong, he told me bluntly: ‘I didn’t respect the route.’

That story weighed a lot on my mind when I was watching The Soloist VR, a two-part series following the ups and downs of Alex Honnold, who carved himself into history in May 2017 with his solo ascent of El Capitan. What makes Alex Honnold interesting is the very same quality that keeps him alive: he has a deep, profound respect for the route. For every route. He’s not a Point Break style adrenaline junkie whooping off to his doom, nor does he seem super interested in glory. Honnold has formed a pact with the natural world. In return for humility and preparation, the mountains give him a sense of pure, freewheeling experience that most people could only experience – well, in a video game.

The Soloist VR is not a game but an immersive film, essentially a mini-documentary brought to us by the good folks at Meta and brought to me personally by my mate who agreed to lend me her Quest for an afternoon. As my first time in a VR headset it was compellingly strange, but I adjusted pretty fast. They’ve basically captured the experience of perching on a steep ledge while a man five feet away from you does the most insane thing you’ve ever seen in your whole life.

Immersion-wise, it feels almost stranger to be inside Honnold’s house, which is where the film teleports you after a hair-raising cold open on the cliffside. You hover silently above his kitchen counter like a ghost (or maybe a tall, cripplingly awkward rock climber), watching him cook breakfast with his pregnant wife. They’re doing that weird play-acting that people do on reality TV, chatting through the things they’ve been asked to chat through and trying hard not to look at the camera (you). Honnold is endearingly bad at this. Later on a peppy journalist shows up to conduct a faux-interview that acts as a framing device for the next couple scenes, and her coached friendliness seems fake next to Honnold’s soft-spoken responses. In her defense, everyone seems pretty fake next to Alex Honnold. He’s the realest son of a bitch alive.