Jump (10/09)

                                                          

Of course just the idea of Patrick Swayze in his last film, “Jump” attracts attention.  And he is superb in it, understated and strong, showing a surprising range.  Add to this triumph that the dramatization of iconic LIFE and “JUMP” the book photographer, Philippe Halsman, of Austria, unfolds in such a way as to make it unforgettable.

 

Lilly Berger produced JUMP with private money. An international film, JUMP was filmed entirely in upper Austria historic district of Linz (home of the original Linzer torte), originally in English.

 

The movie opens in New York city with that fifties light look and music that draws in the viewer to believe that only fluffy,  fashionable things will take place.   The fashionably rail thin photographer is in the midst of a photo shoot with a celebrity jumping.  Halsman’s photographs indicate the hundred or so LIFE magazine covers, more than any other photographer. He is involved with one of his legendary ‘Jump photos,” his sister part of his crew.

 

Then Phillippe’s story, as a part of an interview with reporter Katherine Wilkins (Stephanie Powers looking like her old ravishing self) begins, first with his professional life.

 

He tells the interviewer, “When you ask a person to jump, they focus their attention on jumping. Their mask falls and what is left is their true personality.” And then he allows his own personally story to be told.

 

We are drawn back to September, 1928 with the life-changing accident in the Tyrolean Zillertal for the photographer, then 30 years younger. 

 

It begins with at a meal with the Riga/Latvian family, stylish, refined  Mother Ita (Anja Kruse) and sister Liuba (Martine McCutcheon).  They are trying to appease husband-father, a rugged, materialist dentist Morduch Halsman (an ominous bear of a man, Heinz Hoenig) from further berating his engineering student son Phillippe, 22,  (Ben Silverstone), continually reminding the three that he is boss of the family because he pays their way.

 

Father and son go on a long mountain hike, and from the first father mocks son. But there are only a few facts that remain clear from there. 

 

The father harasses his son in every way from forcing him to carry his knapsack while they walk uphill, to wrestling with him in the lake; the struggle in the water ends when the father loses his balance and Phillippe steadies him and takes photos of him coming ashore.  The father continues his crude behavior that evening with payment to a waitress to sleep with him, which results in an argument the next morning, witnessed by the hotel guests. Phillippe throws the knapsack back to his father as they return back down the mountain.  On the path down, Halsman, with his weak heart,  loses his balance and falls to his death.  The son runs for help.

 

His son’s version of these events are unclear, and we are not sure whether a third party did further damage to kill the father.  In the small, provincial town, Philippe is arrested for murder.  Anti-Jewish sentiment, always present, is now on the rise as Hitler comes to power.

 

Mother and daughter plead with a renowned attorney, Richard Pressburger (Patrick Swayze) to take Philippe’s  case. This leads to an auspicious circumstantial evidence lawsuit, which causes a stir far beyond the Austrian borders and from there and involves such figures as Sigmund Freud, Albert Einstein and Thomas Mann.  Philippe also feels that he must accept his fate since he feels guilty at his behavior toward his father.

 

Writer and director Joshua Sinclair read the court documents and press articles in

Innsbruck from this time and talked to family members of Halsman, before writing this

Story.  His finely crafted film is strong and understated,  reviewing the events over and over.  Though the continuity (Cornelia Meyer)(film editer Horst Reiter) falters at times, it is never enough to weaken this striking film as a whole.