As documentary films become more influential, filmmakers face increasing pressure to handle their subjects with empathy, responsibility, and moral clarity.
A New Form of Documentary
As long as documentaries have been a popular form, questions have been brought up about the ethical and moral responsibilities that documentary films and filmmakers have towards their subjects. This question is more prescient now than ever about a century after the inception of popular documentaries. Now, filmmakers and collectives have, thankfully, come together in synthesizing accountability towards filmmakers, and working to make sure documentarians are asking the right questions, and portraying their stories properly and wholly.
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One such group is DAWG, the Documentary Accountability Working Group. This association has existed since 2020 (founded by Natalie Bullock-Brown and Sonya Childress) but is doing, probably, the most work in the field, looking to source guidance for filmmakers and films, from all levels of the documentary system and from both sides of the camera. On the website for the group, which I highly recommend visiting, DAWG gives some of their values, which I’d like to discuss briefly.
DAWG strives, firstly, to integrate anti-oppressive practices into their work, which I believe has been a struggle for documentarians, all the way back to the early days of the form’s production. The question is relevant now more than ever. It’s been due to a century of misrepresentation, as well as the occasional film that gets it right, that has led this collective to re-evaluate the role of filmmakers and their responsibilities when telling stories. The question of journalism within the realm of documentary has always been a hot-button topic. Shortly and sweetly, documentary film is not journalism; the acts of editing, staging, cinematography, etc., which are all unique to film, differ between the two mediums. Documentary filmmakers should not forget their duty to subjects, though, and it’s often when filmmakers take liberties with their film’s narratives that all credibility is washed away. Then the power imbalance, between who is depicting and who is depicted, is made clear.
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The Children Around the World Continue to Ask the question
The History of Filmic Documentation
Robert Flaherty is one landmark filmmaker to look at when grappling with oppressive practices in documentary films. Flaherty was an early pioneer, deserving of accolades for his trailblazing in the field, in addition to being a controversial figure for the manipulation and depiction of his subjects. His first feature-length film, widely considered the first feature-length documentary ever, ‘Nanook of the North,’ is a film that perfectly displays the uneven relationship between the filmmaker and his subjects. Flaherty traveled to the northernmost region of Quebec to film this documentary and spent time filming an Inuit community’s daily lives for the film. The problem with the film, which Sight and Sound ranked as the seventh-best documentary of all time in 2014, is its complete fabrication. The man, credited in the film as Nanook, was named Allakariallak, which, of course, didn’t suit Flaherty’s dramatization of the group. The Canadians were made to hunt in the film with harpoons, spears, bows, and arrows as well, when in fact they were using rifles by 1920, when the film was made. All sorts of other liberties were taken in their depiction. Flaherty, for his film, painted the group as “noble savages.”
His overtaking of the narrative around the Inuit group is the perfect example of what filmmakers, hopefully, attempt to avoid. Without a doubt, though, contemporary documentaries have continued to raise controversy around their narrativizations and depictions of their subjects. ‘Sabaya’ was a film released in 2021, which shared a similar reaction in the perceived mishandling of its subjects. This was certainly not a critique without basis. The film revolves around a group, followed by a documentary crew, and interspersed with interviews, as they barrel into an ISIS camp, attempting to free many captive Yazidi women. Sabaya translates to girls but refers to the terrorist group’s sex slaves. As noble as the project might’ve been, it ran into criticism in its exposition of these women. The women were faced with having to leave their children on their return to their communities, as the communities would not accept children of ISIS, making the decision much more complicated for the group. The documentary’s choice not to blur or remove any identifiable features of the women further endangered the women, as well. The form can easily dip into exploitation. In the cases of both ‘Nanook of the North’ and ‘Sabaya,’ it did.
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Objectivity Will Always be Flawed
Both of these documentaries bring up major problems in their execution. It appears the filmmakers were prioritizing their stories first and foremost, before considering the impact their work has on wider communities. In the case of Flaherty, it was a complete artifice that he created by drawing his own portrait of the group. The positionality he took was one of complete control in an image, and thus he yielded an incredibly crafted and acute, albeit false, documentary about the Inuit peoples. The following documentary Flaherty made was titled ‘Moana.’ You can probably imagine the pattern he was starting to establish with his highly inaccurate form of ethnographic filmmaking. The position that the filmmaker of Sabaya, Kurdish-Swedish documentarian Hogir Hirori, takes is altogether different, but in my opinion equally as manipulative in service of its goals. The film plays more like a Mel Gibson movie in its proceduralism and near-militantism. What it fails to do is show compassion or even awareness towards the effects it might have on its subjects. When asked why the filmmaker didn’t devote time in the documentary to addressing the problem of these women going home, the filmmaker said he didn’t have space in the film for the issue. In my opinion, that is the film, and the reactionary documentary that exists is more a fantasy for the filmmaker, likely shared by many audiences privileged enough to be apart from the issue.
Documentary filmmaking is a backhanded form of fiction filmmaking. Its narratives are as crafted and artificial as many fiction films, but the form claims a vague truth. In that claim, documentarians are eternally responsible for depicting their stories and subjects respectfully, and with empathy, if not objectively. DAWG has done a fantastic job in creating a meeting place between subjects, artist-documentarians, and the transformation that occurs between the two when turning a story into a film. I highly implore anyone interested in the group to visit their page and further research what they provide for filmmakers. The work to provide ethical, engaging, and important documentaries is ongoing and ever-evolving as we increasingly ask, whose story is this to tell?
Visit DAWG: https://www.docaccountability.org/
Film Credits
‘Nanook of the North’ (1922)
Directed by: Robert J. Flaherty
Produced by: Robert J. Flaherty
Country: United States
Language: Silent
‘Sabaya’ (2021)
Directed by: Hogir Hirori
Produced by: Hogir Hirori, Antonio Russo Merenda
Country: Sweden
Languages: Kurdish, Arabic
By Peter Hornaday
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Peter is a writer, filmmaker, and all-around student of movies. He has an immense passion for documentary film, classic Hollywood and everything in between. Peter believes that it’s movies that offer a unique and powerful effect that unites experiences between human beings and forges connections that allow us to relate to one another on a deeper level. In his work writing reviews and features for The Hollywood Insider, he aspires to uphold the mission of delivering thoughtful, substantial articles relating to the world of film and TV.
Peter is a writer, filmmaker, and all-around student of movies. He has an immense passion for documentary film, classic Hollywood and everything in between. Peter believes that it’s movies that offer a unique and powerful effect that unites experiences between human beings and forges connections that allow us to relate to one another on a deeper level. In his work writing reviews and features for The Hollywood Insider, he aspires to uphold the mission of delivering thoughtful, substantial articles relating to the world of film and TV.
