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389 24 conclusion: problems and challenges I hope that this book has given you some insight into filmmaking. I have tried to cover most of the main issues and show you how professionals deal with certain problems. However, some issues don’t fall neatly within the previous chapters, and I will therefore deal with those here. They concern the outlook of the filmmaker, the question of perspective, and the challenge of the future. The Director’s Burden We looked at some of the director’s day-to-day problems in chapters 11 and 12, but there are also wider problems that you must confront sooner or later, the most serious of which are ethical. I am presenting this here as a director’s problem, but it goes without saying that it is also a matter of serious consideration for the writer. Ethics The relationship of ethical considerations to film practice is one of the most important topics in the documentary field. The problem can be simply framed: filmmakers use and expose people’s lives. This Conclusion 390 exploitation is often done for the best of motives; sometimes it’s done under the excuse of the public’s right to know. Whatever the excuse, though, film occasionally brings unforeseen and dire consequences to the lives of the filmed subjects. So, the basic question is how you, the filmmaker, treat people to avoid such consequences. It’s a hard question and one that has existed in documentary filming from Nanook through the Grierson years to the present. Now it has a new dimension added to it because of cinema verité, a technique that allows a closer, more probing view of people’s lives, as well as less time for reflection and consideration of one’s reactions, than anything that has gone before. Using a lightweight portable camera, a filmmaker can also intrude and interfere in the most aggressive way, as seen in Michael Moore’s Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11. Many questions lead from the main issue of how far the filmmaker should exploit a subject in the name of the general truth or the general good. Was Claude Lanzmann, for example, justified in filming Nazi war criminals without their knowledge? Does your subject know what is really going on, and what the possible implications and consequences are of being portrayed on the screen? When the subject gave you consent to film, what did you intend and what did he or she intend? When should you shut off the camera and destroy the footage? And should your subject be allowed to view or censor your footage? There is also the question of economic exploitation. We filmmakers earn a living from our work, building reputations that are convertible into economic advantage. But our subjects generally acquire no financial gain from the enterprise. Finally there is the matter of fakery. On British television in the late 1990s, this subject suddenly assumed major importance after a number of documentary scandals hit the headlines. In 1996 a film called The Connection, made for Carlton TV, about the running of drugs from Colombia to the United Kingdom, was shown to contain a number of invented scenes passed off as real. In 1998 Rogue Males, made for Channel 4, was shown to contain similar inventions. Another British film made in the same year, Daddy’s Girl, which dealt with the relationship of fathers and daughters, had one girl’s boyfriend play her father. One may ask, Where is the damage to the audience since there is so much manipulation in documentary anyway? In physical or financial terms there probably isn’t any. However, I think there is an unstated assumption on the part of the audience that says, “We understand Conclusion 391 editing and camera choice and so on, but given all that we still believe, documentary gives us a higher truth than fiction, and that’s why we watch.” Fakery attacks that basic assumption, and my advice is stay well clear of it. Obviously, I think that in the end, most of us can justify what we do. If I couldn’t, I wouldn’t continue as a filmmaker. But the subject of ethics is tricky, and it is one that you must, as a serious filmmaker, come to grips with sooner or later. Legal Matters Whether you work as a producer, director, or writer, you must be aware of certain legal considerations. I am not talking about obvious things such as theft or personal...

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