Documentary Review: 'Super Frenchie' Inside the Life of an Extreme Sports Superstar

Super Frenchie is a terrific documentary about a fascinating man. Super Frenchie is the nickname given to Matthias Giraud, a base jumper and extreme skiing fanatic with a deep and abiding addiction to adrenaline. Matthias is one of the most famous base jumpers in the world and, as demonstrated in Super Frenchie, one of the most humble and charming. Giraud takes a sport that appears utterly terrifying and unnecessary and gives it a context and appeal that even someone as desperately afraid of heights as this critic can appreciate.

Super Frenchie was culled together over more than a decade in the life of Matthias Giraud. Director Chase Ogden embedded himself in the life of Matthias Giraud, became his friend and used footage of his own combined with footage shot by Matthias via his Go Pro camera to capture 100s of hours of footage from Matthias’s life at home to his remarkable jumps from bridges and through his time taking on mountains combining skiing and base jumping for the most terrifying and death defying sport imaginable.

How dangerous is this kind of stunt sport? They have their own terminology for dying: Going In. As in, Going In the ground. The people who have died doing this skiing-base jumping combo are more than just a number. As Matthias plans one of his most dangerous jumps, a friend, and another of the most well known daredevils in the world, Shane McConkey, was killed doing a jump in Italy.

Rather than seeing his friend’s death as a reason to stop jumping, Matthias goes ahead with his jump and dedicates it to his friend. The almost matter of fact approach to life and death is so much a part of freestyle skiing and base jumping that Matthias’ reaction to Shane’s death doesn’t come off as callous or inhuman but strangely wistful and inspiring. Matthias is inspired by his friend to keep going and keep jumping and while that might seem strange to those who aren’t in this daredevil field, Giraud makes this feel natural, just another part of what he does.

Part of the journey of Super Frenchie is following Matthias from a place of solitary pursuit of the next jump to opening up to life and love. Matthias grows up before our eyes as he meets a woman and falls in love and gets married. Then he becomes a dad just as he suffers his biggest setback as a base jumper, an accident leaping off of a mountain in heavy wind. Thrown against the rocky side of a mountain, Matthias was knocked unconscious and landed in some trees. He was left in a coma for three days, broke his femur and barely made it home in time for the birth of his son.

Director Chase Ogden crafts a lovely narrative throughout Super Frenchie while making sure we get plenty of the incredible shots of Matthias performing his remarkable stunts. The cinematography, the aerial photography, of Super Frenchie is spectacular and while Go-Pro cameras have become commonplace, they are well used in Super Frenchie as they give us a Matthias-eye view of how spectacular, dangerous, and exciting his stunts truly are.

If you can find Super Frenchie playing on the big screen that is certainly the place to see it. I wish the film had been made for IMAX as capturing those stunts on that massive screen would be awe inspiring. That said, as spectacular as the stunts are, the human moments of Super Frenchie are equally as resonant. Matthias’ mother is a standout as she reveals both her son and herself in her series of soundbites.

We also see Matthias’ son grow up before our eyes. We witness his birth, his growth and his own development of a love of niche sport. By the time Super Frenchie is over we’ve witnessed a remarkable chunk of this young boy’s life and the joy he inspires in his parents as he comes out of his shell. All of this in a small amount of screen time. Super Frenchie is only about 75 minutes long and yet we experience over a decade of Matthias’s life and most of his son’s early life.

Super Frenchie was released in a limited theatrical on Friday, June 4th. The film was also released on the same day to most on-demand streaming rental services. I highly recommend it for fans of extreme sports and for fans of great documentary storytelling.