Screening tonight at the 2025 Telluride Film Festival, Learning to Fly is a documentary that follows an amazing journey. We have the exclusive trailer.
Produced by Evan Hayes, who won an Academy Award for the awesome documentary Free Solo, working alongside HOKA, who helped fund the film, Learning to Fly is directed by Max Lowe, whose credits include Torn from National Geographic, which bowed at Telluride in 2021, and the documentary short Camp Courage, now streaming on Netflix, which was shortlisted for Oscar consideration.
Here's the official synopsis:
"Learning to Fly follows former competitive runner turned photographer Aisha McAdams as she embarks on a journey to document the triumphs and struggles of some of the biggest names in ultra running, such as Jim Walmsley and Eszter Csillag, as they compete at the Western States Endurance Run in the Mountains of Eastern California and the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc (UTMB) in the French Alps.
"While photographing and interviewing these elite runners, Aisha confronts her own painful and complex past, and the reasons why she had to step away from racing, a pursuit that had once brought her a much-needed sense of freedom, joy and belonging.
"On its face, it might be hard to understand why someone would push themselves to run grueling 100-mile trail races, through the night and up and down thousands of feet of mountain trails. Throughout the journey of documenting these elite athletes in competition though, watching their failures and triumphs up close and seeing the community they've built by the process of pushing the unknown, Aisha starts to reclaim not only her love of the sport but also her belief in her own ability to confront her own idea of impossible within her interpretation of the sport."
Have a look at the trailer below.