Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Mountain Queen: The Summits of Lhakpa Sherpa’ on Netflix, A Moving Portrait of the Only Woman To Summit Mount Everest 10 Times

From Oscar-nominated director Lucy Walker comes a story about perseverance and determination. Lhakpa Sherpa’s personal life went completely awry, but still she found the courage to summit Mount Everest a record ten times. After premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival, the film lands on Netflix and can be streamed now.

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The Gist: Following Lhakpa Sherpa on her 10th summit of Mount Everest in 2022—the world record for summits by a woman— Mountain Queen explores Sherpa’s most formative relationship (with the mountain) through the lens of her her humble beginnings growing up illiterate in Nepal, her abusive relationship with fellow climber George Dijmarescu, and her connection with her three children.

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What Will It Remind You Of?: A documentary that truly toes the line between riveting sports feature and emotional character drama, Mountain Queen feels a lot like Simone Biles: Rising , which tells the inspirational story of the woman behind the legend.

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Performance Worth Watching: It’s hard not to choose Lhakpa, who tells her story plainly and without expectations of pity. She is strong in her fortitude for climbing Mount Everest a record 10 times, in speaking about her abusive ex-husband George who belittled her, and in discussing her life as an illiterate immigrant in America who was raising three children on her own—inspirational doesn’t even begin to describe the woman at the center of this film.

Memorable Dialogue: There are many inspirational quotes to choose from, from Lhakpa herself and her two daughters, but one of the more memorable lines is Lhakpa lamenting about the 9-to-5 washing dishes at Whole Foods that she has to maintain to support her family and her climbing dreams. “I wish I could be outdoors all the time, but I can’t, I need to work,” she says at the beginning of the film. “Eight hours, nine hours… Whole Foods looks like a jail.”

Sex and Skin: None, and anything racy would have felt out of place in this inspirational and heartfelt story.

Our Take: Lhakpa Sherpa has summited the world’s highest mountain Mount Everest a record ten times, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg of things that she’s accomplished and overcome. The riveting documentary feature from Lucy Walker tells the story of not only her tenth summit but also all that led her to this moment—namely a childhood in poverty and an abusive marriage to a fellow climber that relocated her to America, where she struggled to find a job due to her lack of education in Nepal.

Mountain Queen spends much of its runtime on Lhakpa’s personal life, which is inextricably linked to her relationship with the mountain. Her first foray onto the mountain was only possible because she disguised herself as a man to enter; her Sherpa Nepalese society forbade women from entering a school, let alone summiting a mountain. Before leaving Nepal, she mothered a child out of wedlock which shunned her from her society, later marrying a fellow climber and having two more children with him before divorcing him after repeated domestic violence. But Everest was always her safe place, a challenge and a thrill that was worth chasing for Lhakpa.

Unlike some other climbing documentaries, Walker’s team remains unseen and uncommented upon, allowing Lhakpa and her family to assume their rightful place at the center of the story. Occasionally, the filmmaking feels cobbled together and lacking depth—Lhakpa’s daughter Sunny is moody and reserved at the beginning of the film, opening up about her traumatic childhood later on but never fully divulging how this shaped her relationship with her mother. Similarly, her son from a previous relationship is shown at the beginning of the film but doesn’t reflect on his own disjointed childhood. The missing pieces are forgivable given the heft of what they are dealing with, but both of their journeys ultimately feel partially formed in a narrative that is otherwise quite open.

Even with some fractured storytelling, Lhakpa is a vibrant persona to focus on. Her charisma is clear through her broken English, and it’s hard not to walk away from the film feeling a little bit inspired to chase your own dreams. And the best part is that she’s not done yet.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Lhakpa’s story is worth telling and might even move you to tears.

Radhika Menon ( @menonrad ) is a TV-obsessed writer based in Los Angeles. Her work has appeared on Vulture, ELLE, Teen Vogue, and more. At any given moment, she can ruminate at length over Friday Night Lights, the University of Michigan, and the perfect slice of pizza. You may call her Rad.

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