Philippe Petit's tightrope walk and the Twin Towers in documentary film

¶ … Man on a Wire

Suspended delicately, precariously in the air, the tightrope walker stands. The documentary "Man on a Wire" chronicles an improbable, one might say, seemingly absurd quest -- namely the French acrobat and performance artist Philippe Petit's desire to walk from tower to tower, across the narrow but seismic gulf between the then-proudly standing Twin Towers in 1974.

The documentary film directed by James Marsh offers no answer as to why Petit developed such an obsession -- Petit seems to wish to have done so seemingly because the towers were 'there,' the same reason often cited that people climb mountains. The film makes no mention of the events of 9/11, which at first seems like an odd choice, but then seems strangely fitting. How could a film about a strange, singular man's triumph also take on the subject of such a monumental mass tragedy? How could the complex tragedies and political circumstances of 9/11 be encompassed in a film about a high-wire act? The people who died in 9/11 did not want to die, but did, without warning, while Petit planned months to knowingly risk his life and survived.

What is so fascinating for the viewer about Petit is his arrogance -- arrogance of the law and of his own, human limitations. The same argument could be made about the towers themselves, that they were testimonies to human folly. At the end of the documentary, the question of why build the massive twin structures at all seems as inexplicable and unanswerable a query as why climb them -- the answer to both questions may be as simple as 'because it could be done.'