Eliciting empathetic engagement through nail-biting tension, Netflix's documentary 'The Deepest Breath' is a story of courage, trust, and tragedy, the last of which materializes in ways that are at once shattering and uplifting.
is a heart-stopping documentary that immerses viewers in the perilous world of freediving, a sport in which daring men and women attempt to reach unfathomable depths of the sea on a single unassisted breath. Writer/director Laura McGann’s film is an illuminating primer on this most hazardous of pastimes, with a particular focus on two individuals who dedicated their lives to it: Italian athlete Alessia Zecchini and safety diver Stephen Keenan.
Alessia knew from an early age that she was committed to this endeavor, and home movie footage of her as a young girl in the pool and the ocean illustrate her instinctive, imposing talent. When she topped the best mark of Italian national team member Homar Leuci as a teenager, Alessia made it clear to the field that she was the real deal. Nonetheless, a subsequent ruling that competitors had to be at least 18 years old slowed her rapid-fire ascent to the big leagues.
recounts Alessia’s efforts to become a peerless champion and the obstacles she faced along the way. Those included not only rivals such as Japan’s Hanako Hirose and ever-present diving threats to her health and safety, but also her own youthful ambition to push herself to, and past, her limits.
Watching Alessia plunge into the cold black void along a guide rope, acquire a tag at its bottom plate, and then slowly ascend is both breathtaking and edge-of-your-seat suspenseful. And the fact that she and others sometimes need assistance finishing the final few meters before blacking out—thereby necessitating immediate, life-saving medical attention—further underlines the jeopardy in which these men and women are willingly placing themselves.
As his dad, Peter Keenan, recounts , Stephen was a born explorer always in search of elusive fulfillment, and that quest led him across the globe, beginning in Africa. Eventually, he found himself in Dahab, Egypt, where he fell in love with freediving and, after setting the Irish record for a dive, became a safety diver.
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