Dizzying Doc Skywalkers: A Love Story Defies Gravity, Not Narrative Expectations
Adrenaline courses through the filmic fabric of Skywalkers: A Love Story, director Jeff Zimbalist’s documentary about two young Russians who risk their lives to document their ascent to the tippy-top of the tallest buildings and construction sites—first in their hometown of Moscow, then across Europe and Asia. The only thing more dangerous than the potential of plunging to one’s death, the film argues, is falling in love with someone who potentially faces the same tragic fate. While the footage obtained from the duo’s exploits is thrilling and impressively artful, Zimbalist’s own due diligence as a filmmaker isn’t totally exerted, particularly as it pertains to probing his subjects on their relationship to social media, the ongoing occupation of Ukraine and making the bulk of their current income from NFTs.
Angela Nikolau and Ivan Beerkus both approached “rooftopping”—the self-explanatory term for these (often illegal) urban conquests—from radically different backgrounds, though with a simple common denominator. Nikolau was raised in the circus by trapeze artist parents while Beerkus grew up with a more traditional family structure, yet both note that their adolescent years were far from idyllic; Nikolau’s father left the family to pursue a relationship with another woman, while the rocky relationship between Beerkus’ parents “made home feel suffocating.” In their pursuit to come up for air, they found their life’s passion: “skywalking,” the term they coined for their acrobatic-inspired craft, and each other.
Per the couple’s story, Nikolau first noticed Beerkus’ rooftopping endeavors on Instagram, and as a result decided to try her hand at the extreme activity, especially when she noticed the dearth of women in the local daredevil community. (“I didn’t find any girl rooftoppers…I hit up the local boys to show me the best spots, but they told me they don’t take girls rooftopping.”) It wasn’t until Beerkus directly messaged Nikolau in 2016 about collaborating on a climb of the world’s tallest construction site in China that they became a unit. Of course, part of the built-in virality that Beerkus—or, perhaps more aptly, his financial “sponsors”—sought on this journey was Nikolau’s strikingly lithe, photogenic presence (indeed, she packs a fashionable change of clothes during each trek to ensure the most dramatic photo-ops). After this method proves successful, the pair become virtually inseparable. But is this union the product of true love or a craving for continued clout?
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