The Walk (2015) Review

Directed by Robert Zemeckis, The Walk is the extraordinary story of Philippe Petit (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt), a French high-wire artist, who famously hung a wire between The Twin Towers and walked across in a spectacular display.

As someone who loved the 2008 documentary “Man on Wire” I was quite excited for this film, especially after hearing it would be in the hands of Back to the Future director, Robert Zemeckis, I felt the film would work better in the hands of another director but as long as it was in good hands I was happy. I wouldn’t say I was hyped for it, I was more intrigued to see how it would turn out, the trailer didn’t massively impress me and it used the feature of 3D like a main selling point, making it seem like Zemeckis only just discovered it and thinks it’s mind-blowing and state of the art. I did get a tad bit more excited when I heard the news of people vomiting from vertigo, it may seem weird but if a film was effective enough into making people physically throw up then I was going.

The first thing I notice is the narration from Philippe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) and at first I was a little hesitant as I believe that narration is most of the time just a cheap story telling method, and while it still was that I was still happy with it, Levitt was so charismatic, you could tell he was having a great time which rubbed off onto the audience. He performed excellently; you felt every emotion he went through, the joy, the longing, the fear, the determination, the restfulness and at the end, the triumph. Philippe stole every scene he was in as a great protagonist who you really got behind and rooted for. What also impressed me was his accent, he was convincing as his role, he even had a better French accent than an actor who was actually French (well French Canadian but still, her accent was all over the place!).

The score was also very well done by the great Alan Silvestri, nothing spectacular but for the most part complimented the scene well and was just a delight to listen to. It set the mood very well and just caught my attention.

Now I talk about what really made this movie great, the tension. I found what made the documentary so effective was it’s very tense scenes, I hoped to dear God that these scenes would be equally, if not more, nail biting. When I came to see this movie I came to be shaken and on the edge of my seat, and did it deliver? For the most part yes, I was hoping it would be a little bit more but I was certainly gripping my arm rests at some points. The tightrope walking scenes just make you tense up and even start to sweat a little. You don’t have to be afraid of heights for this to get to you (if you are then buckle up) all you really have to do is recognise the danger and the fear and that’s all you really need, I was very glad this film freaked me out as much as it did.

Most of the cast was excellent, they were very likeable and unique with interesting personalities, unfortunately the others felt undeveloped and boring, like they were just unnecessarily cluttering the screen, one character I just hated, not because he was a dick or anything but because he was an annoying stereotypical stoner dude, the humour felt so forced and it made me kind of angry at some points because the only people who would laugh at those jokes would be children, and not even them anyway because they probably wouldn’t know what drugs were!

Another problem with the film I had was some of the special effects, they weren’t terrible but you could easily tell the CGI which took you out of the scene, you can’t really blame them since the Twin Towers are unfortunately no longer standing but I think a bit more time spent improving the visual effects (especially in the last walk between the towers) would have went a long way.

Overall, The Walk was a fantastic telling of an amazing story, with a mostly great cast, a good score and brilliant suspense that really gets your heard pounding, weather you’re afraid of heights or not. Some weak performers and CGI but in the end I still enjoyed watching the plan unfold before me. It was a enjoyable movie which I think most would really like, I certainly did.

7/10