The Crew
Josh Lowell
Josh Lowell is the founder of Big UP Productions and has been producing and directing climbing and outdoor adventure films for nearly 20 years. Along with co-director Peter Mortimer, Josh’s feature documentaries including King Lines (2007) have won dozens of festival awards, garnered two Emmys, and aired on Discovery, NBC, Netflix, and other global platforms. A passionate climber himself, Lowell and his brother, Brett Lowell, spent seven years documenting Tommy Caldwell’s quest to climb the Dawn Wall, including over 60 days of filming while living on the wall with the climbers.
Peter Mortimer
Peter Mortimer is the founder of US-based production company Sender Films. Since earning his MFA in film from University of Southern California, Peter has made documentaries, TV series and commercials in the adventure and climbing space, including the Emmy-winning King Lines(2007), The First Ascent Series (2010) and Valley Uprising (2014). Peter is a lifelong rock climber and a fan of the sport’s history and characters. With The Dawn Wall, he brings one of the greatest climbing tales of a generation to an audiences across the world, and shines a light on Tommy Caldwell’s exceptional life journey and tenacious drive.
Brett Lowell
Brett Lowell is an award-winning cinematographer based in New York. He specializes in outdoor adventure photography and high-angle camera work, and has nearly 20 years experience documenting some of the planet’s most outrageous ascents. He’s served as Director of Photography on numerous documentaries, commercials, and TV projects, earning a Sports Emmy for outstanding camerawork.
Director's Statement
My fascination with Tommy Caldwell began in 1989. I was 16 years old and took a climbing lesson from his father, Mike, a guide in Estes Park, CO. During a hailstorm we retreated to his family’s cabin, and he bragged about his 9 year old son Tommy who could do 50 pullups. A few years later I started entering climbing competitions, and 14 year old Tommy won them all.
By 2003 I was making climbing movies, and I filmed Tommy for the first time in Smith Rock, OR. His maniacal passion for climbing, aw-shucks humility, and unflagging optimism were an inspiration to me, so we began filming together year after year. 5 years after I first met Tommy, he told me about The Dawn Wall, a theoretical route up the steepest, most daunting section of the 3,000 foot tall El Capitan, in Yosemite National Park. He’d spent years re-defining the limits of big wall free climbing on other El Cap routes, but The Dawn Wall represented a quantum leap forward in difficulty.
Our first foray shooting footage on The Dawn Wall was a revelation. Tommy was in the early phases of exploring the wall, searching for a line that might someday be possible, if not for him, then perhaps for future generations of climbers. He was a thousand feet up, taking huge falls, trying insane moves, like an 8 foot sideways leap through the air from hold to hold. He seemed like a man possessed, on a mission that was obviously impossible and I had the sense that for Tommy, the idea of The Dawn Wall was about much more than the climb itself.
Another 7 years and countless attempts later, Tommy and his climbing partner Kevin pursue on another push on The Dawn Wall. Tommy managed to complete one of the hardest sections of the route, reaching a new high point in his effort to do the whole climb from bottom to top. It was a thrilling moment for those in the climbing world who had been following his journey and for the first time, there was a real chance of success.
~Josh Lowell
