A film called The Bridge tells the stories of just six of the twenty four men and women who committed suicide on the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco during 2004. It interviews friends, families and witnesses and tries to find out why these people jumped and what they've left behind.

The story from SFGate.com reminded me that I had read about this before.

The Director had lied in order to get his cameras located on the bridge and to film the suicides. When the officials heard they were none too pleased, but all seems to have been smoothed over and the film released.

In applying for permits, Steel told Golden Gate Bridge District officials he was shooting a film about national landmarks. In reality, he had stationed cameras on each side of the bridge, reloading film hourly, to record suicides from the bridge every day during 2004, something the bridge district learned only after he was finished, in January 2005. Film crews called 911 to report every suspicious-looking person, attempted jump and actual jump they witnessed...

..."The single worst-case scenario was -- if word got out I was filming the bridge -- that some unwell person would take this as an opportunity to end their life and have it immortalized on film,'' he said. "I wanted to avoid that at all costs. There was no other motivation whatsoever.''

It sounds a truly harrowing film, and Steel has shown everything on film.

And then, out of nowhere, with startling swiftness, a heavyset man in a green T-shirt lifts one leg over the red railing, then the other, sits for the fleetest of moments and allows himself to tumble forward and down into the vast blue.

"Some stuff fell,'' windsurfer Chris Brown, a witness, tells the camera. "Before it hit, I realized it was a person who jumped.''...

...Most controversially, Steel shows half a dozen death leaps from the bridge -- some in chilling detail through the filmmaker's telephoto lenses, others just pinpoints from a distance using a wide-angle.

A documentary called The Falling Man about the people, and one man in particular, who lept or fell from the Twin Towers on September the 11th was very moving and repeatedly showed photos taken of these people. It wasn't done in a sensationalised manner, it wasn't done to grab more viewers, but watching the film you did get the feeling it was very respectful and almost there to remember them. The papers had since buried the photos and the stories were never heard again, so this public viewing reminded us all, and the narrator really focussed on the strengths and positives of the story, and in particular the families left behind.

Perhaps this is a similar story, and despite the apparent voyeuristic fear of the filming of the jumps, these will help to understand the incredible feelings of those that did, and maybe, just maybe, shock someone into not jumping.

It's difficult to take a side on this, if a side needs to be taken, until you actually see it. I know that I really do want to see this film in order to make a decision on it, and as Steel himself says...

"I made a film about the human spirit in crisis.''..."Visual evidence,'' he said, "is very compelling.''

What do you think? How do you feel about such a film, and would you watch?