4/5 The Walk Though his movies have went on to classic status and won a nice handful of Oscars, I can never shake the feeling that Robert Zemeckis is the poor man’s Spielberg. At his best (Back to the Future, Cast Away, Flight), he can tap into that vein of humanism that runs through the most fantastical of stories. At his worst (Forrest Gump, A Christmas Carol), his stories push you past the breaking point of soppy emoting and humor. In The Walk’s final half hour, which finds French high-wire artist Philippe Petit scaling a line between the World Trade Centers, Zemeckis has made a sequence that is every bit as powerful as anything in Spielberg’s catalog. I must say, well done. The film is broken up into two distinct sections: let’s call them pre-walk and post-walk. As you can imagine, pre-walk, which gives Petit an origin story and highlights some of his previous accomplishments (walking between the Notre Dame towers), is far less exciting than the central ploy. As Petit narrates his tale - breaking the fourth wall at the tippy top of the Statue of Liberty, no less -, you may find yourself thinking “get on with it." Zemeckis, a veteran director, is aware of this, and injects this section with a sense of whimsy that matches the second half’s wonder. As anyone who saw James Marsh’s Oscar-winning documentary Man on Wire knows, Petit is eccentric and vocally flamboyant. The knowledge of Petit’s actual personality makes that stylistic whimsy go down authentically easy. | Director: Robert Zemeckis Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ben Kingsley Writers: Robert Zemeckis, Christopher Browne |
This section also serves to introduce us to the story’s cast of supporting characters. Ben Kingsley, the only other big name outside of Joseph Gordon-Levitt, plays a circus performer named Papa Rudy who becomes Petit’s mentor, teacher, and father figure - Petit’s own father angrily dismisses his talent and kicks him out of the house in a tacked-on flashback. Next closest to Petit is Annie, played by Charlotte Le Bon (The Hundred-Foot Journey), his girlfriend and support system throughout that part of his life. Lastly, there’s Jean-Louis (Clément Sibony, also in The Hundred-Foot Journey), his close friend and photographer. All of these performances are solid, but none of them match Gordon-Levitt’s dreamer’s sense of enthusiasm.
The thirty-four year old actor never fails to make every project he’s in a good five notices more entertaining. He throws every part of himself into every character he chooses, whether it’s a deadly Bruce Willis impersonation, a buffed up porn addict, or a funny sad sack diagnosed with cancer. That winning streak continues here. Some have criticized the film for casting the American actor and chastised JGL himself for his French accent; but, again, anyone who has seen Man on Wire knows that the actor perfectly nails Petit’s exaggerated French accent. It is never distracting in the way the worst accent work is. And when it comes time to deliver on the emotional highs and lows of the climax, you know the actor is going to bring it.
Which brings me to the much-lauded Twin Tower portion of the film. Starting from the early stages of planning and going all the way until the actual stunt, Zemeckis wracks up an incredible amount of tension that culminates in one of the most wondrous on-screen reenactments I have seen. Zemeckis replaces the sense of will-he-fall anxiety that most directors would have chose with a calm aura of beauty and grace, only emphasized by his suburb digital reenactment of the towers. Obviously we are not gong to feel the exact euphoria of Petit’s actual experience, but The Walk gets you as close to the feeling as you are likely ever to be. In this sense, this dramatized version is even better than Marsh’s documentary. Wait for Beethoven’s “Für Elise” to play near the end and welcome the oncoming chills.
Much has already been said of the underlying tribute to the towers now vanished from the New York skyline. It’s all true. A lesser film would have exploited the tragedy for extra tears, but not Zemeckis. The film’s final shot, awash in sunlight and silence, says everything by saying nothing. The Walk honors the towers, the fallen, and the city better than most of the films whose subject matter is the actual attack. For this reason and many more, this is a film you should not miss. Do not wait to rent and watch it on your home TV; see this on the big screen. You won’t regret it.
The thirty-four year old actor never fails to make every project he’s in a good five notices more entertaining. He throws every part of himself into every character he chooses, whether it’s a deadly Bruce Willis impersonation, a buffed up porn addict, or a funny sad sack diagnosed with cancer. That winning streak continues here. Some have criticized the film for casting the American actor and chastised JGL himself for his French accent; but, again, anyone who has seen Man on Wire knows that the actor perfectly nails Petit’s exaggerated French accent. It is never distracting in the way the worst accent work is. And when it comes time to deliver on the emotional highs and lows of the climax, you know the actor is going to bring it.
Which brings me to the much-lauded Twin Tower portion of the film. Starting from the early stages of planning and going all the way until the actual stunt, Zemeckis wracks up an incredible amount of tension that culminates in one of the most wondrous on-screen reenactments I have seen. Zemeckis replaces the sense of will-he-fall anxiety that most directors would have chose with a calm aura of beauty and grace, only emphasized by his suburb digital reenactment of the towers. Obviously we are not gong to feel the exact euphoria of Petit’s actual experience, but The Walk gets you as close to the feeling as you are likely ever to be. In this sense, this dramatized version is even better than Marsh’s documentary. Wait for Beethoven’s “Für Elise” to play near the end and welcome the oncoming chills.
Much has already been said of the underlying tribute to the towers now vanished from the New York skyline. It’s all true. A lesser film would have exploited the tragedy for extra tears, but not Zemeckis. The film’s final shot, awash in sunlight and silence, says everything by saying nothing. The Walk honors the towers, the fallen, and the city better than most of the films whose subject matter is the actual attack. For this reason and many more, this is a film you should not miss. Do not wait to rent and watch it on your home TV; see this on the big screen. You won’t regret it.