The documentary Man on a Wire, follows a French trapeze artist named Philippe Petit. Philippe begins performing in tight-ropes across famous buildings illegally, until his performance between the two towers of the World Trade Center, which is his goal from a young age.
The film follows Philippe at mixed intervals, placing shots from different portions of time along the same timeline that is mostly based on Philippe's life. In this way, the film is able to capture the excitement of Philippe and his crew while it also is able to mimic a part of his personality that is ecstatic and unpredictable. It matches the scattered stereotype related to creative minds. With old footage and new interview footage along with photographs, the film is complete and allows the story, that one would assume must be rather short, to unfold in an interesting way.
In On the Absolute, Sublime and Ecstatic Truth, Werner Herzog writes, "But in the fine arts, in music, literature, and cinema, it is possible to reach a deeper stratum of truth—a poetic, ecstatic truth, which is mysterious and can only be grasped with effort; one attains it through vision, style, and craft." This idea is incredibly important when dealing with documentaries and especially this particular one. When an autor sets out to tell any story, even a true one, the true goal is to appeal to the human conscious. There’s no point in telling a story that no one will ever hear or want to hear. This also means there must be some bastardization of the truth. This story is unapologetically told through the romantic lens of nostalgic footage and people. Philippe and his crew are first person story tellers which makes their account both the best and worst. They tell an interesting and romantic story that may be greatly embellished, as it’s appeal certainly is through their telling and through the art of good film making.
Some nice observation! It's a bit ironic, that though this is a documentary, Philippe himself says that his life is much more akin to a fairytale. I certainly agree that it is often more important to appeal to the human conscience than the truth itself. I am a firm believer that there can more of a profound truth revealed through a completely fabricated story than a real one.
ReplyDeleteIts interesting that you bring up the idea of telling a story that is deviated from a true story but has its fabricated parts to help appeal, even if they are slight in that realm of telling it in nostalgia. It puts me in the mind of urban legends or wise tales that people pass down, there is some truth to them but its what we take away from that story and these edited parts just help us take it down easier or they stand in to help create the story to be more of what its trying to say. Every good story has some exaggeration to help make it better and much more memorable.
ReplyDeletePicasso said,"Art is a lie that makes us realize truth, at least the truth that is given us to understand." Even something as seemingly documentary as a photograph lies because it describes it's subjects as having two dimensions and one vantage point. In a film like this, we as the viewers cannot possibly have ALL facets of Petit's life without actually living out his life, thus we have to settle for a summary of his life and times. However, if the filmmakers and storytellers maintain a sense of integrity, we can know the man truly, if not fully.
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ReplyDeleteOne of the things that is missing about your analysis, I think, is the fact that the movie is about a man in 1974, but it was released in 2007. Obvious question, What happened to the World Trade Center in between those times? Besides the lobby being refurnished, of course. The whole thing, even the description of his life is a very backhanded critique of the world post-9/11. How there was a different sort of innocence and laxness about the whole thing. The movie was supposed to make you go, "There is now way anybody could do something like that today" Throughout the whole thing
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