UNITED KINGDOM: The death defying feat bewteen the World Trade Centre Towers is brought to life in new documentary 'Man on Wire'

Record ID: 730672

  • Title: UNITED KINGDOM: The death defying feat bewteen the World Trade Centre Towers is brought to life in new documentary 'Man on Wire'
  • Date: 30th July 2008
  • Summary: LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (RECENT) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE) (English) TIGHTROPE ARTIST PHILLIPE PETIT (ON RIGHT, SITTING NEXT TO DIRECTOR JAMES MARSH) SAYING: "It is also an immense story that I myself as a writer, in my book 'To Reach the Clouds' had to tailor down to a few hundred page. So I had to edit myself, to bring down that story to what I choose to say. And then when this book was open to a movie maker, when James (Marsh - director) started thinking about his film he had himself to tailor that story to the format of the film that he had in his mind. So, it is not everything is there, everything cannot be there, but what is interesting is to see an artist who decided how to tell the story on the screen and that's very good." CUTAWAY - LEFT TO RIGHT PAN FROM PHILLIPE PETIT TO JAMES MARSH (SOUNDBITE) (English) DIRECTOR JAMES MARSH (ON LEFT, SITTING NEXT TO TIGHTROPE ARTIST PHILLIPE PETIT) SAYING: "It's Philppe's story. You know he created it and it's his performance, so you have to kind of respect that and understand that going into it, so there's a protagonist in the story and it was very important for him to tell it the way he wanted to, on his terms. And the energy of the film, I think, comes from that storytelling and the fact that it isn't a very conventional way of telling a story. It's not like we're doing an interview here we're doing like this and we're all restraining ourselves and we're behaving ourselves. With the interviews with Philippe that sort of broke down very quickly into something much more interesting which is sort of an acting out of the story and sort of reliving of the story for us and it's very powerful I think on film."
  • Embargoed: 14th August 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: United Kingdom
  • Country: United Kingdom
  • Reuters ID: LVAD61BILVPI879ETXDQ0XU3BW7V
  • Story Text: On August 7, 1974, French tightrope walker Philippe Petit achieved something amazing - performing on a steel cable some 1,350 feet above the ground between the Towers of the World Trade Center. The illegal stunt was the realisation of a 6 year dream for Petit. It had all the planning and drama and suspense of a Hollywood bank heist, requiring him and a team of partners in crime to secretly smuggle a 450 pound cable - and themselves - into the World Trade Center Towers after hours - then to rig the 450 pound steel cable between the roofs of the the two buildings.
    His motives were simple: to perform an act that would be seen as a work of art and inspire all those who saw it.
    Before he was arrested, Petit spent 45 minutes walking, dancing, kneeling and lying on the wire to enthralled onlookers below.
    Director James Marsh is now set to show the death defying spectacle to a new audience in his documentary film 'Man on Wire'.
    Based partly on Petit's book about the event, 'To Reach the Clouds', Marsh's film uses the scores of original film footage, photographs, note books, diagrams, models, compiled by Petit at the time, as well as interviews with those involved, and re-enactments to tell the story of the crime. Leading up to what Petit referred to as 'the coup', Marsh follows the tightrope walker's other exploits, including walking between the tower of the Notre Dame Cathedral, and pylons on the Sydney Harbour Bridge - for which the physical artist was also arrested.
    Marsh, who most recently directed King with Gael García Bernal and William Hurt, said he deliberately avoided references to the 9/11 tragedy.
    "Our story takes place in 1974 and the towers have just been finished, just literally been completed and that's why it's possible to do-- to break in and do what Philipe did. So there is no connection and of course I'm very aware that everyone in the audience is going to know what happened to those buildings but if feels that-- why not just enjoy this story for what it is and these buildings for what they were rather than rather just just the-- you know, defined by this tragedy, this horror show," he explained.
    As for Petit, he says he welcomed the opportunity to inspire another generation with a new telling of the tale of his exploits.
    "I can say from the point of view of the audience - and I have been sitting in the audience for the past couple of months - and have been all over the world so to speak, in the many film festival, and it is a common denominator the audience is taken by this film," Petit. "By surprise in some ways and they are totally immersed into being in awe, being inspired.
    They laugh, they clap, they cry, so it's right there for me to witness, the life - the strong life - the quality of this film."
    Marsh too hopes that the film will remind people of what is possible.
    "I think that the story itself offers up very interesting morals or inspirations and we're just telling that story again and reminding people.
    And I'd rather live in a world where that was possible than it wasn't possible," he said. "That people would still dream and achieve such things and that perhaps is-- there's a loss of innocence since various things have happened in the world and it will be even harder still to do what Philippe did now - and that's a shame, I think, and maybe the film reminds us of that. What we've lost a little bit."
    Man on Wire is released in the UK on Friday (August 1).
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