"When I see three oranges, I juggle; when I see two towers, I walk." - Philippe Petit
Have you ever been shown evidence (visual, audio, otherwise) of something that suggested conclusiveness but was just so incredible, literally incredible, that you couldn't allow yourself to believe it? Your senses internalize and process what appears to be real & true but you feel something slightly askew, a knot at the base of your brain stem. Better to be a cynical skeptic than a sucker, and nobody appreciates laughs had at his or her expense, so you store away that something's-off feeling while you passively nod your credulity - that way when you are invariably informed that you fell for it, you can proudly (and with the force and conviction of one who has since learned he's right) declare No, you knew it all along. After all, in these modern times the once clearly-marked line between Genuine and Synthetic, Authentic and Artificial, has been so eroded that it becomes difficult (if not impossible) to discern whether even sensually-enjoyed personal property (breasts, lips, hair) is the Real McCoy. With PhotoShop surgery and doctored audio clips and digital effects that can convincingly recreate anything from weather patterns to ancient cities (not to mention products like I-Can't-Believe-It's-Not-Butter, whose brand name boasts its authentic inauthenticity), there is more reason than ever to doubt what appears before you, ostensibly claiming Realness.
Fortunately, Man On Wire is neither a hoax nor an elaborate conspiracy. Instead, the documentary is based on fact, and it constitutes a towering monument to the boundless possibility of humankind. Featuring a playful and almost Kubrickian soundtrack, the film is multifunctional: equal parts Heist, Elegy, and Visual Poem. The Heist involves the execution of the so-called Artistic Crime of the Century: securing a cable between the roofs of the Twin Towers for the purpose of walking it. The film artfully cultivates The Heist motif, employing a series of America's Most Wanted-esque dramatic recreations detailing the events that immediately preceded The Walk, and interviews with the perpetrators describing the anterior period of espionage and observation.
There are images of a young Petit - gymnastically sinewy, boyish & foxfaced - cross-edited with archive video of construction of the Towers. The grainy 1970's footage of brawny, beer-bellied workers operating machinery in cloudy haze, whitehot sparks shooting in small arcs, enormous steel pieces and pipes and rivets rising by crane and cable, provides testament to the awesome task of assembling and constructing (and, especially in the earlier, gloomier, more piecemeal stages, implicitly evokes images of the wrecked doom of) the Towers. "Usually when you have a dream, the object of your dream is there, confronting you, but the object of my dream [didn't] exist yet," Petit said in anticipation of the Towers' completion. The effect of the original footage is to establish something tangible; the arduous and monumental construction project physically embodies the construction and potential realization of Petit's dream. One parallels the other in ponderousness and painstaking method.
Man On Wire does not include any images, discussion, or suggestion of 9/11, yet in viewing the footage of their construction, one finds it difficult to avoid thinking of the Towers' ultimate undoing. That the Towers took over 4 years to complete, and just over 1 hour to tumble and crumble down to fire and rubble, is a painful realization for the viewer. The photos of Petit suspended, balanced a quarter-mile above the street at the apex are ghostly beautiful, not only for the awe and fear they inspire but also due to the foreknowledge that what Petit achieved really was once-in-a-lifetime, sui generis, inimitable.
Petit described his insatiable proclivity for high-stakes wire-walking as the "dream of not so much conquering the universe, but as a poet conquering beautiful stages." His motives less Napoleonic, more Proustian, Petit saw himself as an artist, and those who watched him perform considered themselves a veritable and constituent audience. Like other courageous acts that assume an artistry through their sheer audacity, the images of Petit on the wire are at once heroic, beautiful, and incomprehensible. They are enhanced by the artist's phenomenal ability on the wire. When he genuflects, his salute not only honors the challenge he perceived presented by the Towers, but represents a tribute to the monument of possibility.
In light of my last piece, it seems I might have been too hasty to rush to judgment and condemnation on the state of modern American heroes; perhaps we merely need to reach out for and embrace whomever offers us a chance to participate in his or her dream and a glimmer of heroic wisdom, even if it is a Frenchman. "Life should be lived on the edge," Petit says, without a trace of cliché or pun. "To refuse to taper yourself to rules, to refuse your success, to refuse to repeat yourself, to see every day, every year, every idea as a true challenge...then you are going to live your life on the tight rope."
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