This excellent documentary is about Philippe Petit’s 1974 high-wire walk between the Twin Towers of New York’s World Trade Centre. Apart from the totally terrifying walk that Phillipe did (8 times) they didn’t even have permission to do it they sneaked in using fake Id and strung up the wire overnight.
This account from a policeman who went up to try and get him down makes me cringe.
Sgt. Charles Daniels, who was dispatched to the roof to bring Petit down, later reported his experience:
“I observed the tightrope ‘dancer’—because you couldn’t call him a ‘walker’—approximately halfway between the two towers. And upon seeing us he started to smile and laugh and he started going into a dancing routine on the high wire….And when he got to the building we asked him to get off the high wire but instead he turned around and ran back out into the middle….He was bouncing up and down. His feet were actually leaving the wire and then he would resettle back on the wire again….Unbelievable really….[E]verybody was spellbound in the watching of it.”
Just unbelievable, 8/10
