The Bridge is out on DVD

From CHUD, "This is something of a perfect storm review for me. I have to disclose first thing that I became deeply emotional during this film, with good reason. I suffer from a clinically-diagnosed depression, for which I take medication and undergo therapy. I'm far from unique in my condition, but I wanted to make clear that Steel's mature and guileless exploration of suicide hit me on the experiential level, which could very well color my opinion of the film. I have a tendency to fawn over any fiction or nonfiction that presents such mental illnesses as a disease rather than a scene.

I also made the mistake of viewing The Bridge on a day in between meds.

It would be easy, then, for me to ascribe a great weight to Steel's film. I won't, deliberately, because this is a documentary completely unconcerned with assuming such importance. It's a film almost without thesis, without communicated concern beyond filling its frames with raw humanity. There's no interference by the filmmakers. Those who loved the suicides, after their own fashion, speak their candid, baffled, broken stories. And, in a decision sure to raise a dissonant note of ethical concern, there is no interaction with the suicides themselves (barring the one failed attempt) apart from observing their bodies and distant, blurry faces tumbling from the rails.

As a film concerned with the distances that stretch between people, The Bridge does two things remarkably well: Displaying the humanity of its interview subjects, and ascribing humanity to the suicides. The skill necessary to create a texture of acceptance, denial, anger, and more out of brief interviews with people of no special import can't be overlooked. In the interview segments, Steel and his crew capture a startling amount of insight into the lives of the survivors and, one step removed, into those of the suicides. The editing deserves a lot of the credit, here.

The different subjects are balanced throughout the film, picking up with one of the suicides, intercutting with another, concluding the first and moving to a third; it's a complicated layering of individuals, and it works wonders. While some of those individuals reach no greater insight than that their suicide is in a better place, the creation of context within the film lends even those small clichés an air of wisdom, as one part of a larger understanding.

I was consistently spellbound by Steel's ability to penetrate the emotions of his subjects, but even moreso by what is built out of the suicides themselves. We get to see them wandering back and forth on the bridge. They lean over the railings; they wave aside concerned passers-by; they prepare; they lose their courage. They jump. These sequences look like the sort of things you'd find drifting through the seas of viral videos online, but when watching The Bridge you feel no cheap thrill. Your heart picks up, but it's out of sympathy for the human being, out of recognition of the strange, contorted logic that has rewired their brains.

You know that feeling where you want to scream at a fictional character to do something differently? This time, Lancelot, don't fail your king. This time, Hamlet, don't listen to your uncle. I predict you will never feel that moreso than when one of Steel's subjects vaults the railing, pauses for half a second, then shoves clear.

By imbuing such a spirit of humanity in these subjects, Steel has done something that I think is both quiet and important. Suicide, as an extension of depression or other mental illnesses, isn't well understood by society at large. It's an anomaly, usually attributed to selfishness, when a motivator can be attached at all. Here, Steel has done the best thing he can to communicate to a wide audience: he has put human faces on a complicated subject. We can relate to real humans, and Steel portrays them well, the living and the dead.

As an educational tool, it's also worth noting that the one surviving suicide attempt is given extensive coverage in the latter third of the film, and has a lot to share about the specifics of bipolar disorder. "Bipolar" is one of those buzzwords , one of the chic diagnoses going around these days, but here you'll find a succinct example of how it affects a life and how it can be contained.

I'm finding that the other notes I've taken on this film all relate to me, personally, and aren't really suited for this review. This film has been on my mind for a solid week, now, as I've dug for the words to give it proper consideration. I will be encouraging as many people as I can to watch this, as an example of how compelling nonfiction can be, and how such minimal strokes can be used to illuminate a cloudy subject."