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| Images courtesy of Dekanalog |
In the Fall of 1999, an experimental New York based
performing arts theater collective known as Collective:Unconscious three of its
key members Robert Berger, Patrick Daniels and Irving Gregory, embarked on a
most unusual stage play entitled Charlie Victor Romeo. Derived from the aviation term CVR or cockpit
voice recorder, the play consisted of near-verbatim transcripts of black boxes
from downed aircraft or flights in distress and had the actors sitting in a
cockpit reenacting the doomed final moments of six aviation accidents. The cast was comprised of Berger, Daniels,
Gregory and others and functions as a sort of chamber piece giving audiences a
glimpse into the nature of an aviation distress call and eventually the play
itself was taped and used by the Pentagon for the purposes of pilot training
while USAF Major General Walter E. Buchanan III presented the theater group
with a special award of gratitude.
After a successful run of the play throughout the United
States through 2004 and eventually getting a Japanese performance under the
direction of Yoji Sakate, the idea of preserving the play in cinematic form
came about and in 2013 Berger, Daniels and Gregory reunited and with the help
of filmmaker and editor Karlyn Michelson the directorial quartet mounted an
experimental 3D stereoscopic big-screen adaptation of Charlie Victor Romeo. Premiering at Sundance and making occasional
appearances in festival circuits, the 3D feature film adaptation of the hit,
terrifying stage play recreation of flights in distress finally makes its
long-awaited 3D blu-ray (as well as anaglyph) debut with a wide array of extras
including but not limited to original newsreels of the original stage play and
a NASA presentation about the value of the film.
Ever since Paul Greengrass’ 2006 dramatization of the ill-fated
flight United 93 and the heroism involved in the passengers’ prevention
of the hijacked aircraft from hitting its intended target, audiences have
wondered what the last things people might see and hear before a crash. With Charlie Victor Romeo, the entire
film is a rumination on that moment of fight-or-flight response in airplane
pilots when confronted with death. While
one can’t call the film or the play it originated from redundant or
repetitious, going through this experience of terror repeatedly becomes all but
completely exhausting and draining.
Rendered in 5.1 surround sound with stereoscopic video, despite
different scenarios reusing the same actors as with the play you feel yourself
trapped with the pilots in their moments of crisis and for a little while you
almost become a pilot and can feel yourself dropping with them.
A unique, deeply horrifying play-on-3D-film designed to
recreate the live theater experience as well as place you in the cockpit at the
moment of truth, boutique Vinegar Syndrome releasing label Dekanalog have done
a fine job finally releasing Charlie Victor Romeo on a limited special
edition that circles back to inform viewers of the steps that got the
production where it was and how strongly the endeavor affected real aviation
pilots. Some may gripe about the film’s
lack of agenda or purpose, instead giving viewers an undoctored gaze into the
stressors pilots go through without leaning one way or the other about it. But as a nonjudgmental documentary of the
facts replete with animated intertitles chronicling the outcome of each
aircraft incident, Charlie Victor Romeo is searing, powerful stuff that
will leaving you never looking at the art and profession of flying an airplane
ever again.
--Andrew Kotwicki
