Good God, this is a painfully slow and boring documentary. It's talking heads for the majority of it, and the director often has more than one character in succession saying the same thing, but in their own different words. What are we, in kindergarten?? Your audience is not stupid, things don't have to be constantly repeated.
Parts of this story are told non-linearly, which is dumb. And I don't mean the current day with flashbacks/reenactments. I mean IN FLASHBACK (with current day voice-over), we get some of the non-linear storytelling. The editor should be shot for doing this, or allowing the director to dictate this. (If you've see the movie, you know what I mean.)
How this won an Oscar is beyond me. If this was the 1980's, okay, maybe I can understand the subject matter impressing the Academy's voters. But this was the late '00s, this is NOT good documentary filmmaking. IF this film was a 30 minute short, cutting out all the characters repeating themselves, and cutting out the incessant planning for the WTC walk, then it probably would have been decent. But apparently the director just got lost in being in love with characters talking, and talking about their plans, and reenactments of very unexciting moments. (Why?? Why would someone reenact unexciting moments??)
Now, if you happen to have the DVD and watch the short film in the Special Features section (the first one in the Special Features section), that short film is very entertaining. It moves, it's not boring, and you actually get MORE INSIGHT into Petit in this short film, than you do in the entire full-length documentary. That also is a failure of "Man on Wire"... that we learn so little about this man's take on life, when in fact the film should be about HIM. Not just on what he's done, but also about HIM.
Bottom line, this film is horribly directed, and while it could have been an interesting film, it's not. Skip it and watch the accompanying 15 minute short on the DVD.
My last issue, is that this film recycles the music/score from "The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover." The composer really shouldn't have allowed that. It's good music, but every time it starts playing, I'm taken back to Peter Greenaway's film. Not good. This is why music scores are not repeated from one movie to another -- to avoid being identified with a previous film. Bad, bad, bad. Shame on this director.
Parts of this story are told non-linearly, which is dumb. And I don't mean the current day with flashbacks/reenactments. I mean IN FLASHBACK (with current day voice-over), we get some of the non-linear storytelling. The editor should be shot for doing this, or allowing the director to dictate this. (If you've see the movie, you know what I mean.)
How this won an Oscar is beyond me. If this was the 1980's, okay, maybe I can understand the subject matter impressing the Academy's voters. But this was the late '00s, this is NOT good documentary filmmaking. IF this film was a 30 minute short, cutting out all the characters repeating themselves, and cutting out the incessant planning for the WTC walk, then it probably would have been decent. But apparently the director just got lost in being in love with characters talking, and talking about their plans, and reenactments of very unexciting moments. (Why?? Why would someone reenact unexciting moments??)
Now, if you happen to have the DVD and watch the short film in the Special Features section (the first one in the Special Features section), that short film is very entertaining. It moves, it's not boring, and you actually get MORE INSIGHT into Petit in this short film, than you do in the entire full-length documentary. That also is a failure of "Man on Wire"... that we learn so little about this man's take on life, when in fact the film should be about HIM. Not just on what he's done, but also about HIM.
Bottom line, this film is horribly directed, and while it could have been an interesting film, it's not. Skip it and watch the accompanying 15 minute short on the DVD.
My last issue, is that this film recycles the music/score from "The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover." The composer really shouldn't have allowed that. It's good music, but every time it starts playing, I'm taken back to Peter Greenaway's film. Not good. This is why music scores are not repeated from one movie to another -- to avoid being identified with a previous film. Bad, bad, bad. Shame on this director.