Maysles + Christo = 'The Gates,' an HBO Documentary
Thats my job, Mayor Michael Bloomberg says to the artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude, as they bemoan the possibility that an uncontrollable force (the weather) might undermine their massive Central Park art installation, The Gates. Its one of many priceless found moments in The Gates, an HBO documentary ([debuting tonight, Feb. 26]) credited to four directorsamong them a Maysles brother who has been dead for two decades – and rightly so. An epic work like The Gates deserved nothing less than the artistry of the Maysles to capture its tortuous path to completion in the winter of 2005. And the end result is a classic narrative, with the typical and stunning simplicity that has marked the Maysles brothers work since the 1960s.
As always with great achievements, luck has played a pivotal role. The directors had access, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, to the original battle over the prospect of The Gates, and the resulting footage catches the absurdist debate among the citys liberal leaders over whether the Christo vision would violate the artistry of Central Park. Its like painting over a Michelangelo, one arts patron sniffs, only to be laughed at later by Christo and Jeanne-Claude, who saw Central Park as the ultimate canvas for their saffron flags.
Sadly for the filmmakersbut fortunately for New Yorkers themselvesa two-decade leap forward in time results in a more accepting city ready to embrace Christos vision. The story devolves into a straightforward deconstruction of the work itself; we watch the painstaking preparations, the installation itself, and the impact of its extravagant beauty on those who spent hours wandering the parks pathways for a taste. The questioning and the doubts that fueled the films opening fades away, and with it its energy.
In the end, a two-dimensional film fails to capture the epic grace of The Gates and the feelings it left behind. But it does have the sense not to focus endlessly on flapping winds and beauty shots; it delivers, instead, on the human dimensioncatching the arrogance that drives Christo and Jeanne-Claude to see their artistry in such epic proportions. They act as though it makes perfect sense that the greatest city in the world should give over its showcase setting for an expression of their own, singular vision. But its exactly that sort of audacity that led to Central Park itself, wasnt it? New York was built on the dreams of men and women who see things in grand scale, and with the confidence to succeed. That, too, is what made the Maysles Brothers a brand of filmmaking like no otherand this, their last collaboration, is a memorable monument to their gifts.