Triumph
Of The Wall (2013/First
Run DVD)
Picture:
C Sound: C Extras: D Documentary: C+
Bill
Stone's Triumph
of the Wall
(2013) is story of one man building a 1,000 foot stone wall by hand
without any mortar. What would he thought would start as an eight
week project turns into an eight-year project. As he builds the
wall, stone by stone he meditates on the merit of taking on such a
task and compares himself to stone masons of past. Instead of using
modern materials and machine to take one such a laborious task, what
started out a job turns into a symbolic metaphor for humans existence
in time.
You
would ask why would anyone make a film about building a stone wall,
let alone take 8 years to film it. Chris Overing is seeming a
jack-of-all-trades and has the time, a sponsor and the funding to
build one of man's earliest structure by hand. As he builds a stone
wall completely without mortar, a dry wall, and finding the exact
stones to fit perfectly, his views change and are a bit different,
what he is building isn't a waste of time. In the long run will last
the ages to come. He compares himself with the dykers of Europe and
that if people think it is crazy and then it is considered more art
instead of a structure.
As
best as I can sum this up, this was a very zen movie on how to build
a stone wall. While simple, most people would not attempt, let alone
finish, same to with the cameraman whom filmed it. Yet by the end,
you have to respect the patience and tenacity, and think about what
are we as humans doing with our lives and what will still be there
after we are gone. Sometimes life isn't about the money or the
results, but how we get there and what we leave behind.
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image is a little soft with some
motion blur, while the lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 sound is on the quiet
side. There are no extras.
-
Ricky Chiang
