Journalism with a Heart

Journalism 101: Be objective.
Journalism 102: Find a face for every story.
Journalism 103: Know the rules, break the rules.

The lessons I learned in my introductory journalism classes came flooding back to me two nights ago as I watched Trouble the Water, Carl Deal and Tia Lessin’s documentary about Hurricane Katrina. As independent filmmakers, they filled in the gaping holes of reporting by the mainstream media.

Motivated by objectivity, the media turned robotic, mechanically divulging facts about the disaster. They reported from a distance, showing aerial shots of water and houses, but showed little of what was happening to people on the ground.

Deal and Lessin gave us stories. They humanized the devastation by tagging along with three charismatic New Orleans natives. “We wanted to tell the story the media wasn’t telling,” Lessin explained in a Q&A after the screening. “They weren’t showing Kimberly and Scott and Brian.”

Much of Deal and Lessin’s success came from breaking traditional media rules and creating their own. Their documentary has a fluid feel to it, characterized by raw home video and bouncing cameras following moving people.

“We didn’t do any of the typical documentary stuff you usually see in documentaries,” Lessin said. “We didn’t have a story treatment. We didn’t do any of those ‘talking head’ interviews where you sit people down and place lower thirds on them.”

Most significantly, Deal and Lessin admitted to forming close friendships with their subjects, and saw this as a strength rather than weakness of their piece. When asked about keeping their own biases out of the documentary, Deal replied: “No such thing. None.” Lessin added: “If you’re not bringing your passions into your work, you need to find another line of work.”

Spoken like proud non-robots.