The Bridge

Normally I like documentaries that let you see for yourself and make up your own mind, but if ever there was a film that cried out for narration, personalization of viewpoint, or contextualization of some kind, this is it. Otherwise, Eric Steel’s film about the 24 people who jumped to their death from the Golden Gate bridge in 2004 is perilously close to being a snuff film for morbid voyeurs. The viewer really needs to know how and why this film was made, the responsibility the filmmakers took for what they were observing. With gorgeous photography of the magnificent bridge, and the use of music and cinematic suspense, the film flirts with the romantic myth of the Golden Gate as the place to step off to suicide. In defense from criticism, the director has explained that they had two cameras, wide and telephoto, recording HD video all day every day for a year, and that the cameramen would call bridge security whenever they started to follow someone who looked about to jump. The interviews with survivors (the friends and relatives left behind, but also one jumper who lived to tell) provide some backstory, and raise interesting questions. But the film does not answer them, or the reason for its own existence as document. Sure, the timelapse photos of fog rolling in are pretty to look at, and the actuality of self-murder has a grisly fascination, but why should we be watching? After the fact, the makers can make the connection to Bruegel’s “Fall of Icarus” but what we actually see in longshot is a pretty postcard picture of the bridge, with a sudden and inexplicable splash in the water. What does it mean? (2006, IFC/T, n.) *5* (MC-58.)