I first heard about this record attempt on the very day that it was supposed to happen but got aborted. The next time I heard about it was 15 minutes before they did it again because it came on the TV in the pub I was in. Watching it was a bit of an anticlimax because, once the iconic shot from the capsule was done, the rest was blurry images of a small figure falling (but with no other things to put the speed of movement into context). Plus it played out in silence and, as much as the pub wanted to maintain the excitement felt just before he leapt, most people had turned away from the screen again before he had landed. I knew technically that it was amazing, but I didn't get that from watching.
It was just as well this documentary caught my eye then, because it does a great job at making me realize how much I missed out on in this story. The jump is the conclusion of the film and the journey, but it is only a small part of both and this film builds that picture really well. It introduces the players and explains the project with good access to the team throughout the years of work. It has great footage of tests that went wrong, of moments where emotions threatened the whole project and one very near miss that was seconds from being fatal to one of the team. The film never lets you forget the stakes involved and I found it as engaging as I did dramatic and this time when I saw Baumgartner pulling himself to the edge of the capsule and then taking the jump, I really was gripped because I knew so much more, had so much more context and actually knew all the people involved and what they had been through to get to this.
A really good story – even if you only had a passing interest in the actual jump itself, this is still a great story with lots of characters and drama and as a result is well worth seeing.
