
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi
Directing
Biography
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi is an American documentary filmmaker. She was the director, along with her husband, Jimmy Chin, for the film Free Solo, which won the 2019 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. The film profiled Alex Honnold and his free solo climb of El Capitan in June 2017. Their first scripted film venture was Nyad, a biopic chronicling Diana Nyad's quest to be the first person to swim from Cuba to Florida. Vasarhelyi grew up in New York City, and is the daughter of Marina Vasarhelyi, a college administrator, and Miklós Vásárhelyi, a college professor. Her father is a Hungarian-born Brazilian and her mother is from Hong Kong. Vasarhelyi is a graduate of The Brearley School. She holds a B.A. in Comparative Literature from Princeton University.
Known For

Some of this year's most talked about talent open up about the challenges and triumphs of creating critically acclaimed series and performances.
Close Up with The Hollywood Reporter

An annual American awards ceremony honoring cinematic achievements in the film industry. The various category winners are awarded a copy of a statuette, officially the Academy Award of Merit, that is better known by its nickname Oscar.
The Oscars

Follow Alex Honnold as he attempts to become the first person to ever free solo climb Yosemite's 3,000 foot high El Capitan wall. With no ropes or safety gear, this would arguably be the greatest feat in rock climbing history.
Free Solo

The enthralling, against-all-odds story that transfixed the world in 2018: the daring rescue of twelve boys and their coach from deep inside a flooded cave in Northern Thailand.
The Rescue

Athlete Diana Nyad sets out at 60 to achieve a nearly impossible lifelong dream: to swim from Cuba to Florida across more than 100 miles of open ocean.
NYAD

Take a look inside the minds of elite adventure athletes through transformative stories about facing fear, personal loss, and Mother Nature.
Edge of the Unknown with Jimmy Chin

A gripping docuseries that goes behind the scenes and onto the pitch of the groundbreaking Los Angeles-based professional women’s soccer team, Angel City Football Club.
Angel City

Photographer will tell the intensely personal stories of the world’s greatest visual storytellers and artists, from how they found themselves behind a camera to how they dedicate themselves to the endless pursuit of perfecting their craft.
Photographer

From Oscar-winning filmmakers Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin, "Wild Life" follows conservationist Kris Tompkins on an epic, decades-spanning love story as wild as the landscapes she dedicated her life to protecting. After falling in love in mid-life, Kris and the outdoorsman and entrepreneur Doug Tompkins left behind the world of the massively successful outdoor brands they'd helped pioneer like Patagonia, The North Face, and Esprit, and turned their attention to a visionary effort to create National Parks throughout Chile and Argentina. "Wild Life" chronicles the highs and lows of their journey to effect the largest private land donation in history.
Wild Life

After a deadly plane crash strands four young siblings deep within the Colombian rainforest, a dramatic rescue mission unfolds, uniting Indigenous trackers and the military in a race against time. For the first time ever, this documentay offers the exclusive account of this incredible true story directly from the children themselves and the rescuers who scoured the Amazon rainforest for a grueling 40 days and nights to find them.
Lost in the Jungle

Meru is the electrifying story of three elite American climbers—Conrad Anker, Jimmy Chin, and Renan Ozturk—bent on achieving the impossible.
Meru

A century after Shackleton's Endurance sank beneath the ice, explorers uncover the legendary shipwreck and an amazing tale of survival.
Endurance

Pulitzer Prize-winning conflict photojournalist Lynsey Addario reflects on a career working in some of the world's most dangerous war zones, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Love+War

The inspirational rise of SpaceX as well as Elon Musk's two-decade effort to resurrect America’s space travel ambitions.
Return to Space
"Enhanced" raises questions about the characters, power struggles, and breakthrough innovations that are driving the greatest athletic performances on the planet.
Enhanced
Takes audiences inside the minds of elite adventure athletes as they recount transformative stories of confronting fear, devastating personal loss and Mother Nature at her harshest.
Into The Unknown

Gino Bartali became a national hero after winning the Tour de France in 1938 but whose career was put on hold for a decade following the outbreak of World War II. In 1948, ten years past his prime, he would attempt to reclaim his title despite years without competitive racing.
Bartali

An environmental nuclear crisis threatens Utah. Two scientists and a politician urgently work to prevent an unprecedented catastrophe in their home state.
The Lake

Senegalese pop sensation Youssou Ndour has spent the last 20 years in the spotlight as a world-renowned musician and the iconic representative "voice of Africa." At the height of his career, Youssou became frustrated by the negative perception of his Muslim faith and composed Egypt, a deeply spiritual album dedicated to a more tolerant view of Islam. The album's brave musical message was wholeheartedly embraced by Western audiences but ignited serious religious controversy in his homeland of Senegal. The film chronicles the difficult journey Youssou must undertake to assume his true calling.
Youssou Ndour: I Bring What I Love

In the Spring of 2011, Senegal was pitched into crisis when President Abdoulaye Wade decided to change the constitution to allow for a third term. An artist-led youth movement erupted to protect one of Africa' oldest and most stable democracies.