大象传媒

An argument currently rages around The Bridge. Is director Eric Steel's study of the most deadly suicide spot in the world, San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge, documentary in its purest form, or cynical exploitation? Steel set cameras rolling on the Bridge throughout 2004: here, he unearths the human story behind a handful of the 23 suicides he recorded by speaking to relatives and friends of victims. It's haunting stuff, but ultimately, not as profound as Steel would like to think.

US critics have dubbed this film "voyeuristic", "ghastly", and "immoral", and there's no denying that grainy footage of real suicide victims making the four second, 25-storey dive into the Pacific Ocean leaves a queasy feeling in the stomach. But this is a movie full of compassion for the those victims, as Steel does his best to make their choice comprehensible. So we learn, via his friends, about 34-year-old Eugene Sprague, who became depressed after losing his mother in childhood. A mother, Rachel Marker, tells of her daughter Lisa's three decade battle with schizophrenia. All this is presented without sentimentality or cloying Oprah-style pop psychology, and is all the more affecting for that.

"STRANGELY UNSATISFYING"

Ultimately, though, there's something strangely unsatisfying about The Bridge. The interviews with bewildered friends and relatives at centre of this film are moving, but in the end they fail to reveal what lay in the hearts of those who died, and tend to fall back on vague generalities - depression, childhood bereavement - that only get us so far. We end on a positive note; jumper Kevin Hines talks about leaping from the Bridge and miraculously surviving. But despite the shocking, up-close look, we're no closer to a real understanding of the terrible urge to end it all.

The Bridge is released on Friday 16th February 2007.