In the online premiere of The Risk Business | Chasing Pete Whillance, filmmaker Dom Bush explores his personal relationship with risk through telling the story of his climbing idol, Pete Whillance.

An understated pioneer of hard, bold, face climbing, Pete Whillance established some of the hardest traditional routes in Britain through the late 70's and 80's. He is also one of the most prolific new routers in history, with roughly 1400 new routes to his name. Now 76, he continues to climb and establish new routes.

We asked Dom a few questions about the film, the reasons he made it, and his creative choices, earlier this week:

Tell us about the genesis of the film, why did you decide to make it?

I've made a few documentaries that featured Pete, so he's been someone I've known for fifteen years or so. While I was studying my media degree in Penrith he very graciously allowed a bunch of students into his house to interview him, and I made a film about his discovery of Hodge Close with Ray Parker in 1980.

It was particularly impactful for me, because even then I was aware to some extent of his contribution to British climbing. I'd also seen Pete's appearance in Lakeland Rock, which is burned into the memory of a lot of climbers of a certain generation. I hoped to use some of the Incantations footage in this film, but would have spent half my overall budget on the ITV licensing fee alone!

Years ago, in that first interview in his house, Pete told us about the numerous times he'd sat beneath (what would later become) the Indian Face (E9 6c), gathering the will to set off up that wall. 'I could have climbed it, I could have died' he said. Probably from that moment, a more ambitious project was logged somewhere in my brain.

Back in 2015 I made a film called Eden, about the climbing history at Armathwaite in the Eden Valley in Cumbria, and Pete kindly contributed to that. Living close to Armathwaite, I'd climbed a couple of Pete's harder routes there, and had an epic on an E5 of his called Lucifer (E5 6a) on Bowderstone Crag. So, as a passionate slab climber, his routes have been impactful for me too.

Whilst making the first film about Hodge Close, we filmed George Ullrich climbing Stage Fright (E6 6b) on the main wall, which I went on to climb a few years later. All of this kind of cemented Pete's courage and abilities in my mind, and I was keen to understand how he did what he did. When he told me recently he was on a new routing spree across the quarries, it seemed like a good time to make something together again.

There are autobiographical elements to the film, and you feature as a character. How did that come about?

Naturally, some film projects I undertake are much more personal, and from the beginning this was one of them. I never wanted it to be a 'look how great this climber is' kind of film, and neither did Pete. There isn't a shortage of those around. So I knew there might be more fundamental themes about Pete's impact on me and the climbing community.

Part way through the process I caught up with Hazel Findlay for a different project, and she talked very eloquently about the stories we tell, and how impactful and integral they can be to people's understanding of the climbing world. That really made me think about including this as a theme in the film, and myself as the storyteller. Pete worked in TV and film in his climbing career, so in his time he has helped shape those stories too.

It did, however, feel like a big step to include myself, and I definitely flip-flopped on that decision quite a bit.

Participatory documentary (where the filmmaker is included within the narrative) can be very powerful when done well, because it adds a layer of depth and intimacy to an existing story. Filmmakers shape stories and are deeply connected to the subject matter, so why not hear from them too? I've watched many films where this hasn't worked well though, and I felt pretty self conscious about including myself.

The story and my connection to Pete is genuine, I didn't want this to feel like a vanity project or ego trip. After some views and feedback from friends and fellow filmmakers, I felt more confident to include myself and my family in it, and now it's all said and done I feel proud that I made that decision. I think Pete has appreciated that approach too, and it's always important to me that contributors like the film.

Risk, and how we approach it is a big theme within the film. Has your approach to risk changed a lot over the years, or has it stayed relatively constant?

This is a big topic so I'll try to keep it brief. As a filmmaker I've worked in the outdoor industry on and off for nearly fifteen years, and in that time I've filmed a lot of climbers on hard trad routes. It seems natural to wonder about the motivations of people who climb those routes, and whether it's really worth risking serious injury or death for those precious few minutes on lead. Add into that the ever-present influence of industry and monetisation on adventure sport - which I've been part of! - and there are some fairly big questions to ask, I think.

I've worked directly with someone who later died climbing, and without sounding overdramatic, the climbing world is small and death is never far away. Abseiling and dangling off cliffs to film climbers can also be very risky for the filmmaker, so it's all played on my mind a lot over the years.

Outside of work, I had a weird relationship with climbing for a good few years, but I'm coming out of that and feel excited about it again. For some time I would go out, and as soon as I was on a cliff or sitting on a belay ledge, I just felt like I didn't want to be there at all. That's a very conflicting thing if you've climbed for thirty years and see it as a part of your identity.

Reflecting on it now, I had pretty heavy things going on at the time, and was coming to terms with some difficult experiences I'd had growing up. I was also very worried about the biodiversity and climate crisis and how it would impact my children in the future (I do a lot of documentary work in the environmental sector), so day-to-day I just felt generally rattled and anxious anyway. When I put myself in risky places climbing, I just didn't have the resilience or desire to manage the fear.

My capacity for risk-taking was directly linked to my general wellbeing, and that was coupled with a re-evaluation of risk that can come with age and having kids. Stage Fright in Hodge Close really was a final high point before I turned my back on climbing completely for five or six years. Paradoxically, when I was growing up and dealing with lots of challenges, I was reckless, and would deliberately put myself in risky situations in an unhealthy way - which I don't think is necessarily uncommon for young people. Those situations weren't just limited to climbing but certainly included it. Luckily, I got away with it all.

All this has led me in the past year or two to think a lot about risk, how we approach it, whether it's critical to our existence, and whether I want to re-engage with climbing again. I felt like this project could help me explore all that in some way. In my opinion, it's right that our tolerance and desire for risk changes as we move through different chapters of our lives, and - broadly speaking - a relationship with and understanding of risk is a really positive thing. Though I feel a little sad to say it, with the world as it is, my children will need the skills to navigate and tolerate risk in the future.

Climbing has been a great teacher for me, and continues to be a companion. Hopefully this documentary serves as a tribute to that in some way, and will resonate with other climbers too.