The threat of imminent death gives a trite and morbid focus to “The Deepest Breath,” an otherwise moving documentary tribute to the record-setting Italian freediver Alessia Zecchini and her close friend, revered Irish safety diver Stephen Keenan. The best scenes, directed by Laura McGann, present freediving as a haunting and impressionistic collage of hand-held diving footage.
Zecchini and Keenan’s experiences tend to be defined by the high risks that they took whenever they plunged underwater to depths of 100+ meters. Zecchini isn’t even featured in on-camera interviews until it’s clear that she survived while Keenan did not, a narrative contrivance that says more about the makers of “The Deepest Breath” than it does their subjects.