Directed by John Dower
Certificate PG
86 minutes
Released 22 May

The twentieth century saw major frontiers of aviation conquered: the first flying machine, the first man on the moon. Yet as the year 2000 loomed, no-one had managed to fly around the earth in a balloon. Bertrand Piccard was the grandson of the first man to ride a balloon into the stratosphere and the son of the first man to dive to the deepest part of the oceans, the Mariana Trench. As a boy, he was inspired by seeing the launches of the Apollo 7-12 rockets in Florida, where his family lived, and later by the sight of a balloon above him.

‘He fires his co-pilot who then leads a rival attempt’

The film doesn’t go into the finance – presumably the Piccards were well-heeled – of how he built three balloons named the Breitling Orbiter, the third of which attempted the nonstop navigation of the globe in 1999. That trip is the subject of this documentary.

Or perhaps it isn’t, because as the driven Piccard puts together his flights, he takes on then discards co-pilots, one of whom, British engineer Andy Elson, leads a rival flight attempt after being fired.

close proximity to each other for three weeks. It’s noticeable that for Piccard, it’s all about the male achievements of his family before him, whereas for Jones, saying goodbye to his wife on a trip from which he might not return is the biggest deal. The two men get along well, but as the voyage suffers its inevitable perils and setbacks, it is Jones who says to anyone up there looking after them – if anyone is – ‘Just keep doing what you’re doing.’

In the end, it’s a fascinating look at two very different men who get along, the forces that motivate them, and their poles-apart views of their place in human history or the cosmos.

For the 1999 Breitling Orbiter 3 expedition, Piccard fell out with and fired his co-pilot a week before launch, filling the position with Brian Jones, his trusted technician. Neither had previously considered Jones as a pilot, and Jones insisted on getting his wife’s approval before agreeing.

As part of the prep, Piccard had them discuss their views on religion, politics and other subjects because they were going to be stuck in

Jeremy Clarke is a film critic. His website is jeremycprocessing.com

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