Trama

A mountain climber becomes trapped under a boulder while canyoneering alone near Moab, Utah and resorts to desperate measures in order to survive.

127 Hours is the true story of mountain climber Aron Ralston's remarkable adventure to save himself after a fallen boulder crashes on his arm and traps him in an isolated canyon in Utah. Over the next five days Ralston examines his life and survives the elements to finally discover he has the courage and the wherewithal to extricate himself by any means necessary, scale a 65 foot wall and hike over eight miles before he can be rescued. Throughout his journey, Ralston recalls friends, lovers, family, and the two hikers he met before his accident. Will they be the last two people he ever had the chance to meet?—Fox Searchlight Pictures

On Friday, April 25, 2003, Aron Ralston (James Franco) prepares for a day of Canyoneering in Utah's Canyonlands National Park as he drives to the trail-head at night. Aron is a hiker and a mountaineer and has done this many times before. On many previous occasions Aron has encountered cave art in the canyons and has documented them on his video camera. At the trail-head, Aron sleeps in the back of his pickup truck.

The next morning, he rides through the park on his mountain bike, aiming to cut 45 minutes off the guidebook's estimate for the time needed to reach his destination. Aron is proud to be an engineer and is always finding new ways to get things done. However, Aron doesn't get much far before the bike trips over, sending Aron crashing into the ground. He is on foot, running along a bare rock formation when he sees two hikers, Kristi (Kate Mara) and Megan (Amber Tamblyn), apparently lost. The hikers were looking for an underground pool and Ralston convinces the pair that he is a trail guide and offers to show them a much more interesting route than the one they had been trying to find. He leads them through Robbers Roost area narrow canyons (Aron argues that the rocks of the canyon have been around for ages and are not likely to move anytime soon), including a blind jump into an underground pool, where the three film themselves repeating the plunge using Ralston's video camera. As they part company, Kristi and Megan invite Ralston to a party they're holding the next night, and he promises to attend. However, they doubt he will show up.

Ralston continues into Blue John Canyon, through a narrow passage where boulders are suspended, wedged between the walls of rock. As he descends, one 360 Kg boulder is jarred loose, falling after Ralston to the bottom of the canyon and smashing his right arm against the canyon wall, trapping him. He initially yells for help, but the extreme isolation of his location means that nobody is within earshot. Aron attempts to move the boulder, but it does not budge; he also soon realizes he is alone. Aron notes the time (3:05 PM on Saturday April 26, 2003) and takes inventory of all the stuff he has on him. He only has the use of his left arm and his legs. In his hurry leave his home, Aron never brought his Swiss Army knife with him.

As he resigns himself to the fact that he is on his own, he begins recording a video diary on his camera and using the larger blade on his pocket multi-tool to attempt to chip away at the boulder. He also begins rationing his water and food and struggles to keep warm at night. At one point, the knife falls off his hand, and he is forced to use his bare feet and a little branch to recover it. Aron secures his knife with a string. He also sets up a pulley using his climbing rope in a futile attempt to lift the boulder. He then uses the ropes to set up a harness for himself to rest, as he had been standing non-stop since the ordeal began.

As he realizes his efforts to chip away at the boulder are futile, he begins to attempt to cut into his arm but finds his knife too blunt to break his skin. He then stabs his arm but realizes he will not be able to cut through the bone. He finds himself out of water and is forced to drink his own urine. His video logs become more and more desperate as he feels himself dying. He begins dreaming about relationships and past experiences, including a former lover Rana (Clemence Poesy), family (sister Sonja (Lizzy Caplan), father Larry (Treat Williams), and Mother Donna (Kate Burton)), and the two hikers he met before his accident. He also imagines going to the party he was invited to and having fun. After reflecting upon his life, he comes to the realization that everything he has done has led him to this ordeal, and that he was destined to die alone in the canyon. During one hallucination, Aron realizes his mistake was that he did not tell anyone where he was going or for how long.

After five days, Ralston sees a vision of a little boy, which he assumes is his unborn son, a blond boy of about 3 (Peter Joshua Hull), through a premonition, spurring his will to survive. He discovers that by using his knowledge of torque and applying enough force to his forearm, he can break the radius and then the ulna bones.

He gathers the will to do so and eventually severs his arm with the smaller, less dull knife on the multi-tool. He fashions a crude tourniquet out of the insulation for his CamelBak tube and uses a Carabiner to tighten it. Aron frees himself on Thursday, May 1, 2003, at 11:34 A.M. Mountain Standard Time. He wraps the stump of his arm and takes a picture of the boulder that trapped him as he leaves it behind. He then makes his way out of the canyon, where he is forced to rappel down a 65-foot rock-face. He then finds some rainwater collected while descending down, drinks the stagnant water due to dehydration, and continues.

Aron hikes several miles before, exhausted and covered in blood, he finally runs into a family on a day hike. The family sends for help and Ralston is evacuated by a Utah Highway Patrol helicopter.

The film ends with shots of Ralston from his life after his ordeal - including several of Ralston's further adventures in climbing and mountaineering, which he continued following the accident - and of the real Aron Ralston with his wife, Jessica, whom he met three years later, and their son, Leo, born in 2010. A title card that appears before the closing credits says that Ralston now always leaves a note whenever he goes anywhere alone.