Speaking this week at a screening in New York of The Walk, which reenacts Philippe Petit’s 1974 high-wire walk between the twin towers of the World Trade Center, the film’s writer and director Robert Zemeckis said he “completely identified” with Petit and “his creative expression.”
“When I came across his story, I didn’t believe it was real. I was caught up in the story. I read about him, his book, and had a long dinner with him in California. It’s such an amazing story. . . I completely identify with his passion,” Zemeckis said.
Zemeckis—who won an Oscar for his direction of Forrest Gump and has also written and/or directed the Back to the Future series; The Polar
Noting that The Walk—which is being released by
“Because it took so long, the technology kept on improving,” he said, adding that his earlier movies “prepared me to make this movie technically. The only technology I didn’t use was the animated cartoon.”
The film features all 3D virtual environments, as well as what he described as a “painstaking” recreation of 1974 New York. Zemeckis said his collaborators “pored over thousands of photographs of the towers, which were photographed a lot.” They also studied the World Trade Center’s technical and working drawings, movie footage and helicopter shots.
Philippe Petit (right), the subject of the new film, "The Walk," by Robert Zemeckis (left), attended... [+]
Zemeckis said that Petit once told him that before he began his walk, “he had a sensation that everything in the world had vanished except for the wire. I didn’t want the screen to go white.” The solution, he said: “To get the clouds to come in, an effect that’s extremely emotional and that I think is great.”
“I approached this as a ballet, as if I were choreographing a dance number. It was important that the camera becomes a partner with Petit,” he said.
The fact that the World Trade Center was later destroyed “creates its own sort of emotional power. I enjoy having the ability to go back, look at history,” Zemeckis said, noting that there are “no anarchic, subversive artists doing benevolent work” today, like Petit did, except for the British painter Banksy.
The screening of The Walk was part of MoMA’s current Zemeckis retrospective, which runs through October 18. This includes screenings of his three Back to the Future films.
The New Jersey Symphony, conducted by David Newman, will also perform the original score, by Alan Silvestri, of the first Back to the Future--celebrating its 30th anniversary this year—at screenings at Radio City Music Hall in New York October 15 and 16. Silvestri has composed 20 minutes of new music for this live concert production, which premiered in Switzerland last May.
The program also will be offered, with other orchestras, in Toronto, Indianapolis, St. Louis, Denver, Cleveland and overseas later this year, and in various cities in the United States and abroad in 2016.
