Sundance. Man on Wire.

"On August 7, 1974, a French tightrope walker named Philippe Petit and a team of sympathetic raconteurs constructed a cable between the rooftops of the two towers of the World Trade Center," writes Tom Hall. "For 45 illegal minutes, Petit performed without the safety of a net, walking the wire, laying down on it and dazzling the crowds below.... In James Marsh's beautiful new documentary Man on Wire, Petit's walk, known among his collaborators as Le Coup, is examined in detail. Through detailed interviews with Petit and his collaborators, the entire planning and execution of the daring walk is shown. As such, the movie is a celebration of the beauty art (and the film leaves no doubt that Petit is an artist) and also a heist movie on par with, say, Rififi."

For Robert Koehler, writing in Variety, this is "one of the most wildly entertaining docs of recent years.... [and] an adventure tale that astonishes in every respect.... Petit's final walk - seen here mainly in still photos - is stunning enough, but the aftermath is unexpectedly emotional and overwhelming as human drama. The immediate effect on Petit of sudden, post-WTC notoriety mixes erotic comedy and personal loss that seems possible to be conveyed by only the best screenwriters."

"It's a story worth telling, yes - but maybe not for an hour-and-a-half," writes the AV Club's Noel Murray.

The Reeler talks with Marsh.

Posted by dwhudson at January 30, 2008 1:46 PM