Ralston: '127 Hours viewers should breathe'

Aron Ralston has advised queasy movie-goers to "breathe through" the scenes in 127 Hours which depict him amputating his own arm.

The adventurer, who is portrayed by James Franco in the upcoming Danny Boyle film, told The Sun that he had used controlled breathing techniques in order to remain calm while cutting through his arm to free himself from a remote Utah crevice.

Ralston said: "I breathed through it, much like the way in natural childbirth training you practise to breathe through it. Instead of being afraid of it, you go into it. When I severed that nerve I closed my eyes."

He added that he had "smiled" through the experience because the pain was "irrelevant", as he knew it was the only way to rejoin his family.

Commenting on reports of audience members that have fainted during the film's amputation scenes, Ralston advised: "People are fainting because they are not breathing. They stop and that's why they pass out."