Fly - Documentary Review

The Documentary: Fly

The Directors: Shaul Schwarz and Christina Clusiau

The Story: Over seven years, three couples involved in the extreme sport of BASE jumping test the limits of love and life itself. Risking everything for the thrill of the jump, their dedication is put to the ultimate test.

The Rating: 6 / 10

The Review: 

During a post screening Q&A, co-director Christina Clusiau mentioned that you can watch BASE jumping videos all day long on Youtube because, at this point, there's an endless amount of content available which is very true. I think that fact unfortunately takes away from the experience that viewers may be looking for with this film although Clusiau also mentioned how, since they were aware of this fact, even seven years ago, they decided to focus on humanizing the jumpers themselves rather than just showcasing their death defying leaps of faith.

As we got to know the three couples who are featured in the film, as well as many other people in the BASE jumping community, I began to wonder if this project could have been better served as a NatGeo docu-series rather than a feature fim. Other than a two day special IMAX presentation, it's going straight to TV and streaming platforms anyway so why not deep dive into these people lives in an episodic format. This would have been nice for me since I found it difficult at times to keep track of where we were in the world and who we were focusing on as things bounced back and forth.

The stories are compelling enough and I was adequately entertained throughout the film so there's nothing really wrong with the documentary, it's very well put together, it just didn't really stand out as a theatrical experience for me. What was most interesting for me, was learning about these people's lives and how BASE jumping becomes such a dominant part of who they are and it's very apparent how living for the next jump becomes so important above just about anything else. There's not many people in the world who will ever even attempt these types of jumps so I now have so much respect for the people that are courageous enough to take on the challenge.