Been watching a bunch of "Front Line" PBS documentaries made in around
2015 over the last few days off. The list includes one on Torture (Under the Bush
Presidency), on El Chapo (Drug Trafficking in Mexico), on the Secrets of
the Catholic Church-Vatican (Priest Abuses-Fraud) and one on Rape on
the Night Shift (janitor staff working nights, mostly Latinas).
All "Front Line" are of exceptional quality but what rings truest with me is not the grand doc telling the large tale but instead the smaller simple documentary telling a more human story, with people opening their hearts up. The doc that had the most lasting impact on me was the night shift rape film. That movie had many individual talking head moments filled with emotion, the women explaining what they went through etc. One part that surprisingly connected was when a husband of one of the victims opens up and explains his thoughts and emotions (the multiple rape on his wife, by his best friend). It all seemed so real, so powerful. That is true documentary strength, not distant large scale governmental abuse, not some giant story with global implications, just the story of a simple man whose life and family had been destroyed (they also showed the couples damaged children). Seeing and hearing the victim and her husbands-families story, affected me most, on a personal gut level. I could relate to this mans emotions so much better. Moments like in the rape movie where the wife tells of blood on her legs and asks the rapist "What have you done to me?" then wipes up the blood with tissue before completing her nights work (how could she clean after that?). Filmed moments like where her husband is so filled with anger-sadness and pain that he discards his macho exterior to openly cry when he speaks of what happened to his wife.
A real documentary film affecting everyday lives in such a profound way. That is the type of films I want to make. I will try my best to do that, not sure it will happen but you got to try baby, "You Got to Try!".
Frontline: Rape On The Night Shift
All "Front Line" are of exceptional quality but what rings truest with me is not the grand doc telling the large tale but instead the smaller simple documentary telling a more human story, with people opening their hearts up. The doc that had the most lasting impact on me was the night shift rape film. That movie had many individual talking head moments filled with emotion, the women explaining what they went through etc. One part that surprisingly connected was when a husband of one of the victims opens up and explains his thoughts and emotions (the multiple rape on his wife, by his best friend). It all seemed so real, so powerful. That is true documentary strength, not distant large scale governmental abuse, not some giant story with global implications, just the story of a simple man whose life and family had been destroyed (they also showed the couples damaged children). Seeing and hearing the victim and her husbands-families story, affected me most, on a personal gut level. I could relate to this mans emotions so much better. Moments like in the rape movie where the wife tells of blood on her legs and asks the rapist "What have you done to me?" then wipes up the blood with tissue before completing her nights work (how could she clean after that?). Filmed moments like where her husband is so filled with anger-sadness and pain that he discards his macho exterior to openly cry when he speaks of what happened to his wife.
A real documentary film affecting everyday lives in such a profound way. That is the type of films I want to make. I will try my best to do that, not sure it will happen but you got to try baby, "You Got to Try!".
Frontline: Rape On The Night Shift
