The Fondazione Cinema per Roma was delighted to learn that Man on Wire by James Marsh has won the Oscar for best documentary. The feature-length film about the extraordinary exploits of the tightrope walker Philippe Petit was acclaimed at the International Rome Film Festival last year, when it was presented in the L’Altro Cinema/Extra section.

The kudos for best costume design went to another film presented in the 2008 Official Selection of the Rome festival, Saul Dibb’s The Duchess.

‘The two Oscars are the proof that the International Rome Film Festival is a quality showcase for important films that also take top honours at other international events,’ the festival’s President, Gian Luigi Rondi, declared.

Director James Marsh used material from the filming of the amazing stunt of the summer of 1974 – the brainchild of Philippe Petit and a group of visionaries – when Petit walked a steel tightrope strung between the brand-new World Trade Center’s twin towers in New York. Marsh manages to recount an epic, utopian parable tinged with madness, part game, part miracle, part political statement, and part artistic provocation.

Before the end of the year the documentary will be available on DVD thanks to a co-production between the Fondazione Cinema per Roma and Feltrinelli.