In 2004, 24 people committed suicide by jumping into the sea on the Golden Gate Bridge. Director Eric Steele and his crew captured real footage on both ends of the bridge. They also interviewed the family and friends of the unsuccessful and the deceased to make the documentary The Bridge.
This film is mind blowing. This shock comes not only from the shock of seeing death up close, but also from the indifference of the world when misfortune occurs. For those around the deceased, the event of suicide seems inevitable and doomed. This is of course an illusion caused by the helplessness of the people. In any case, the event was accepted, albeit with sentimentality, anger, or a little relief.
The film tells of two kinds of pain. The first type of suffering is the one suffered by suicide because of mental illness. The second is more common and is determined by the isolation of life. Isolation, deep estrangement between the deceased and relatives and friends, incomprehension of suicide. Or the former pain also comes from the latter.
There is an air of absurdity in the seriousness of the film. The father of Kevin, a teenager who attempted suicide, said in an interview: "They told me on the phone that he (Kevin) jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge, but he was still alive. I thought, maybe they were just comforting me so that I wouldn't be there. There was a car accident on the way to see his son's twisted body." And Kevin was crying on the bridge before jumping into the sea, but a German woman asked him to help him take pictures... Camus once said: "Absurdity is an encounter." The absurdity in the film , it is the encounter between the numb daily life and the emotional and broken spirit. Perhaps this is one of the things suicides prepare for before they die: to separate their lives from the everyday world and people—and thus avoid the absurd.
As for why the Golden Gate Bridge has become a suicide mecca in the United States, I think nature has a lot to do with its environment: jumping into the blue ocean symbolizes a kind of return, and the grandeur of the Golden Gate Bridge also magnifies the end of life.
At the end of the film, a man with long hair and a black leather jacket is standing on the railing of the bridge, his arms raised to the sides and falling backwards. It feels like the whole world is tilted. That picture is full of romance, of course, except for the protagonist there, no one knows what kind of loss, madness and sadness are hidden behind this picture.
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