Little Monster Films
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi (co-founder)
Jimmy Chin (co-founder)
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Little Monster Films burst onto the scene in 2018 with “Free Solo,” a documentary that captured rock climber Alex Honnold’s death-defying ascent of the 3,000-foot El Capitan without a rope. The film stunned audiences and ultimately won the Oscar for best documentary feature.
The husband-and-wife filmmaking duo of Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin were behind the project, which in some ways was the culmination of years spent chronicling unprecedented achievements in adventure sports. The pace of their work has only increased since the success of “Free Solo,” and recent years have seen the releases of mountain climbing documentary “14 Peaks: Nothing is Impossible” for Netflix, NWSL docuseries “Angel City” for HBO and “Wild Life,” a National Geographic doc about the decades-long efforts of conservationist and former Patagonia CEO Kris Tompkins.
“We’re interested in these stories about individuals who push the boundaries of what’s possible,” said Vasarhelyi. “They’re just great stories, and we kind of created our own type of genre where these are stories that have incredible achievements, but they’re actually stories with very rich character journeys as well as emotional journeys.”
Little Monster now has 10 staffers working across a slate of more than 35 projects. Next month, the company’s first scripted feature, “Nyad,” will debut on Netflix. The film, starring Annette Bening and Jodie Foster, recounts swimmer Diana Nyad’s years-long quest to swim from Cuba to Florida and is receiving early Oscars buzz. Though a departure from Little Monster’s unscripted background, Chin and Vasarhelyi are once again aiming to stun audiences with another story of the once-unthinkable.
“Our goal is always to translate that world for a broader audience, because in the past I think it was very difficult to access for people,” said Chin, who himself is a world-class climber. “It’s difficult to understand the motivations and why these people do what they do, and our goal is always to bridge that gap and bring these really universal stories to broader audiences.” — Chris Smith
