Plots and covering are ten cents in fictional films (excitement, political drama, called whatever you want). But when the documentary is broken, a conspiracy, this type of miracle suspense that was the films that she enjoyed and rarely did it. (The peak of cinema conspiracy, the era of the seventies of “All the President of the President”, “Chinese District”, “Conversation” and “The Paralax View”, was about 10,000 plot films before.
“Strenger“It is a documentary mystery on a deadly dangerous topic: the true composition of the famous Vietnam War image, which was taken on June 8, 1972, in the town of Tảng Bàng, which showed the effects of the 9-year-old Nabalm-old attack, a girl named PAN Thi Kim Phúc, naked, towards The camera, stretched out of its arms like the broken wings, and its mouth is open in a screaming of torment.Nabalm girl“It’s one of the most famous and destructive pictures of the horror of the war you have ever seen.
It is recognized that “Naplam Girl” is an imbalance of flawless historical importance, which had a profound impact on people’s feelings about the Vietnam War. (It is usually said that the image helped end the war; I would like to say this is an exaggerated thing.) But who took the picture? The next morning to photograph it, when he was sent from the Sigon office at the Associated Press, he was returning to Nick Att, 21 -year -old Vietnamese photographer and was photographer of local employees in AP. Almost overnight, the image changed his life. From that moment on, it has become celebrated to take one of the most famous pictures of the twentieth century.
But “The Strinner”, directed by Bao Nguyen (“The Great Night in POP”) and the CEO produced by Gary Knight, who led the investigation trip for two years around which the movie (Knight, tall and British, with a wedge of white hair, works As evidence of the camera and his interview), he claims that Nick út was no The person who took the picture. There were on that day, on this lock tape of the road in TRảng Bàng, along with photographers and photographers of other films. But the documentary confirms that the photo was taken by Naguin, Thana Nagie, the independent photographer who contributed to the photos in AP. There was on that day as well.
The film is required for what happened relatively simple. He says that Horst F., AP photo editor in Saigon, knew that NGHe had taken the picture, but after he paid him the standard of $ 20 for that, he commanded that to be the credit for Nick úT, because he wanted to be an AP employee. According to the film, this type of things happened all the time and was not considered a big problem; It was part of the “benign” exploitation system. But with a picture of this strength and size, it proved to re -recite (if this is what happened) that it is very important.
It is my job to say whether I think a good movie or not, and let me say now that “The Stringer” is a very good movie: RAPT, urgent, absorbed. But in this case it is not so simple. The entire movie revolves around a binary question: Did Nick út take that picture? Or is Naguin a nickname? It is impossible to evaluate the film in any useful way without judging its central thesis, which is essentially a conspiracy theory: this credit was stolen for the image, and that all of this has been covered for 50 years. If this is what happened, it will be a scandal, a tragedy, perhaps a crime.
Gary Knight, the photographer himself, leads the investigation, but the pivotal personality of the film is Karl Robinson, who was at that time AP photo editor. Robinson now says in his eighties, he was the person who exchanged a photographer after another after his boss ordered him, Horst Fe, to do so. He claims that he sat on this secret, with silent guilt, for 50 years.
Why didn’t he say anything before? It would mean to shake the boat to the tenth power. Throwing a hand grenade in the middle of a sensitive cultural heritage; Disrupting the life of all those who lied about it; Moreover, he had to ascend against AP, a news organization that strongly protects its legacy. AP conducted its achievement for a period of six months in this case, which included conducting interviews with seven witnesses, and the conclusion he reached was that there was no conspiracy, there is no credit for photos-that Nick út was, in fact, the photographer. I have AP Causing To “The Stringer”, Nick út threatened to take legal action against filmmakers.
For a while, I saw “The Stringer” with my goalkeeper, skeptical of his demand. This is partly because the film, instead of taking a position “Oh, let’s check this question”, works directly outside the box from the point of view that the image balance was stolen. The film collects evidence while it is, but it seems that he has already decided. This put me on alert. Meanwhile, I listened to Karl Robinson telling his story (about requesting to forge the image balance), and the story is not only up to persuasion, but a still existing question: What will his motives lie about this? The story he tells it looks bad. “The thesis of the movie is incorrect) as a completely extension. You make this story nowAfter 47 years, all for revenge on the organization that has worked for decades?
Nick út refused to conduct an interview with the directors (which may be a sign of something), and is devoted to a lot of “The Stringer” for trying to discover the identity of the “other” photographer. At the beginning of the movie, they do not know who he is, or even if he is dead or alive. “Striner” becomes the story of the detective. Carl Robinson’s wife, Vietnamese, claims that 50 years ago, was a secret open among Vietnamese photographers that the image is thanks to the “Girl’s Word” stolen. And when the name of the Naguin, a second nag was applied to the surface, we start feeling some venting caused by a suspicious drama. Film makers are tracked in California, where he lived for decades, and fills his CV. Finally, Gary Knight sits with him, and we hear his novel for events.
NGHE memories do not provide any conclusive evidence. However, as viewers, we take him – a man with a nice power in the early nineties of the last century, with an atmosphere of radioactive sincerity, and his college is large . Once again, we ask ourselves: If this is not the truth, then why does this old man lie? He does not want to controversy or glory. Why does his novel lined up completely with Karl Robinson? There are one details in the painful NGHE story: He says that Horst F, on that fateful day, he gave him a copy of the image he took, which he took nitty and then to the house, and his wife was so updated to the point that she destroyed her. Later, it may have been a proof of his authorship.
“The Stringer”, like any plot of conspiracy, makes us want it Believe. This is part of the nature of a movie like this. However, I am more skeptical to take this kind of dramatic motivation like anything final. Watching a documentary such as this movie, what we want, in the end, is not an emotion, or even a very reasonable argument. What we want is evidence. We want it as citizens watching a movie about an arduous artifact. In a strange way, we want cinema pioneers, who were conditional on half a century of cinema, the plot to expect a scenario crowned with a smoking pistol.
guess what? I would like to say that “The Stringer” is close to the presence of one. In the middle of the movie, we see all the main pictures taken in those terrible minutes along the way in TRảng Bàng, after the village area was bombed behind (wrongly) by the southern Vietnamese air invaders. (This is true, the attack that was “Napalm Girl” is a record of a “friendly fire”, and the American forces did not participate.) 8 x 10 images are assembled on a table, and a moment you might think about the sequence in “Blow Out” by Bian de Palma where he is taking place The voice man played by John Travolta with a collection of a set of fixed images in a raw piece of 20 seconds of animated shots just like Zaprder. (Apropos of Noteing, I have always found that this scene is the moment I am checking from “Blow Out”-a movie that I do not like intensive enough The shots that you can actually make a short movie?)
As it turned out, though, the sequence of images on the table in “The Stringer” is just an appetizer. Film makers deliver all these materials to a group of forensic experts in Paris, who are an accurate analysis on the basis of the computer, and includes satellite images, which stood exactly numbers where and when during these few decisive minutes in TRảng Bàng. At the height of the movie, they present their analysis, really similar to combing the Zapruder movie, looking for these decisive visual details that will suddenly bring the hidden reality to focus.
We see footage of what happened – Kim Falkk runs on this road (which we also see in colorful shots). We see footage of the photographers who were there. We see the pictures they took. All of this should be tracked in a spatial temporal way.
What the analysis ultimately reveals is a personality, standing away, and perhaps 60 feet on the road from Kim Fak – in other words, very far from taking a “Nabalm Girl” image. The forensic team claims that this number is Nick. Then we showed many pictures that this number was in the exact position taken. Here Kicker: These pictures were AP photos, which are attributed to Nick út. Take them. This indicates that when it came to the “Nabala Girl”, it was not possible to be in the right place at the right time. “The Stringer” is a strong human story of arduous cultural resonance. But like all the scenarios of conspiracy, what you practice is the magic of cleansing of the reality you have set. It is worth seeing – for the important facts in it, and for the destructive audacity.
