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Of Ice and Men: Canmore's Will Gadd subject of new ice-climbing documentary at Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival

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Will Gadd was slowly scaling part of the Taihang Mountains of China when he noticed some commotion below.

It was February 2019 and the renowned Canmore-based climber had brought a 10-person crew, including filmmaker Calixte LeBlanc, to northern China to chronicle his attempts at finding new ice climbing routes on the mountain range. On this particular day, he was rock climbing because it was too warm to ice climb. He was also above an area bustling with Chinese tourists.

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Gadd admits he was moving slowly, but says he was never in danger. Nevertheless, a group of well-meaning rescuers thought the veteran ice climber, record-breaking paraglider pilot and man the United Nations once dubbed a “Mountain Hero” was in dire need of saving. So they sprang into action.

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“All of a sudden, the whole tourist area below us was filled with emergency vehicles,” Gadd says, in an interview with Postmedia from his home in Canmore. “An hour later, this guy pops over the top of the wall above me. He didn’t speak a word of English and I speak about six of Chinese. So it was quite the conversation. We eventually worked out that I was doing fine. You could tell by his gear and his use of it that he was very well-trained. It was a very well-organized rescue team. I didn’t need rescuing, as it turns out. I was going slow but not that slow!”

At first, Gadd was a bit nervous that there could be some negative consequences in having a rescue team come to his aid, even if it was unnecessary. Instead, he ended up celebrating Chinese New Year with the team.

“You hear these horror stories about China’s government and you wonder what’s going to happen when there are all these flashing lights,” Gadd says with a laugh. “Am I going to jail? No, I’m going to a dumpling party with the head of the rescue crew.”

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Canmore ice climber Will Gadd in the documentary Will Power, showing at the Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book festival. Courtesy, Pete Hoang
Canmore ice climber Will Gadd in the documentary Will Power, showing at the Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book festival. Courtesy, Pete Hoang jpg

It’s all there in a new documentary, Will Power, making its world premiere Nov. 2 at the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival. Directed by LeBlanc, a veteran camera operator and mountain climber, the 40-minute film will no doubt offer some spectacular, drone-shot climbing sequences. Gadd credits LeBlanc for negotiating not only the tricky filmmaking requirements on the mountain but also the financing required for bringing a 10-person entourage to China. Gadd says the Taihang Mountains offer some of the best ice routes in the world, and he should know since he has literally travelled the world in search of them. China offers more ice climbing than anywhere else, he says.

But Gadd also says that it’s the Chinese people and culture that steal the show in Will Power. For now, the ice climbing community is small but is about to explode as the growing middle-class has more time for recreational pursuits, Gadd says.

“For me, that was the best part of the trip, just the human connection that we made over there. It went a lot deeper than the government posturing.”

Still, the government posturing was a bit of a concern before Gadd, LeBlanc and the crew arrived in China. Weeks before they left, Canada had arrested Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou in Vancouver. Later that same month, China arrested Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig, which many believed was in retaliation.

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“And we’re going over there to make a film,” Gadd says. “It was not an auspicious start. A couple of the crew actually pulled out; they didn’t want to go there and risk that and I respect that. There certainly looked like there was a lot of additional hazard. China is not famous for being welcoming to foreign media, which we are. We were definitely nervous going over there. If we had based our trip on what our governments were saying, we probably wouldn’t have gone. But I’ve got friends in China who said ‘Hey, this is all just government posing. It’s fine. Come on over.’ ”

In fact, there was no interference or bureaucracy. Gadd said it was the fastest trip through customs he has ever encountered. In fact, rules and regulations, particularly involving things like drones, are actually much more relaxed in China than they are in Canada. While Will Power is ostensibly about ice climbing, Gadd says it is also a film about culture and connection.

He hopes it will be a pilot for a television series that would see the veteran climber visiting various countries, engaging with local climbers and climbing cultures. Gadd is no stranger to film and television. He directed the 2001 TV documentary Paragliding Across America and the 2019 short Beneath the Ice. In 2007, he hosted the globe-trotting Discovery Channel series Fearless Planet. The Last Ascent: Will Gadd’s return to Kilimanjaro by British documentary filmmaker Tom Beard was released earlier this year and focuses on Gadd’s return to Tanzania six years after he last climbed there. His trip received a good deal of media attention, including a spot on CNN that found Gadd talking about how climate change had caused giant chunks of Kilimanjaro to disappear in the past six years. It was an emotional experience for Gadd, who says he is now determined to find a way to operate differently and limit his carbon footprint while on globe-trotting adventures.

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“I don’t know if it was eye-opening or more like a slap in the face where you realize your eyes had been closed and you have to wake up,” he says. “It was really clear how much things have changed in such a short period of time. I’m seeing that acceleration of change in the Rockies, in the Himalayas, in the Alps — everywhere I go around the world. I think for a while I could ignore this: I’m an athlete, I’m not an environmental scientist. But it’s just so obvious now. Things are changing so quickly.

“From the Athabasca Glacier to the Argentiere Glacier in France, everywhere in the world and especially in the higher latitudes that we live in in Canada. When you realize that even in Africa things are changing radically, I can’t ignore that. I’m very actively trying to live life differently now.”

The Banff Centre Mountain Film and Book Festival will be held virtually from Oct. 31 to Nov. 8. Will Power will screen Nov. 2 to Nov. 8. Visit banffcentre.ca for more information.

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