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December 04, 2024 – Source: Golden Globes –
In a time, when journalism is under attack, there are plenty of movies and TV-series that focus on journalists as the heroes of the narrative. In films such as Lee, Civil War and Scoop, we follow female reporters, who play a significant role in documenting the truth.
“It was essential to tell this story now,” says Ellen Kuras, the director of Lee. “Especially when journalists are being targeted physically for the work that they are doing not only on the battlefield but in general. And also because of what is happening to women. I feel that in this moment, journalists are being targeted because (some decision-makers) want to silent us. That is something that Lee Miller was really adamant about: Telling the story in the gap of that silence.”
Lee stars Kate Winslet as American war photographer and journalist Lee Miller, who captured some of the most heartbreaking and unforgettable moments from the frontlines of World War II for British Vogue. Civil War has Kirsten Dunst playing the fictional character of a veteran war photographer named Lee Smith, who is at the center of a civil war in near-future America as the film explores the role of the media, when fascism and conspiracy theories have taken over.
Scoop tells the story behind the infamous interview Prince Andrew did with the BBC’s Emily Maitlis, who was the mastermind behind the revealing interview, which had serious consequences for him and the royal family. A TV-series named A Very Royal Scandal deals with the same subject and there Emily Maitlis is played by Ruth Wilson. In Scoop she is portrayed by Gillian Anderson.
“With good journalism and certainly journalism that we have come to through the decades and expect from certain news organizations like the New York Times, Newsnight and BBC, there are standards by which they attempt to hold themselves,” says Anderson via a zoom call from London about the importance of professional journalism. “So I think it is important to see those standards being held and to be represented in an accurate and affected way in film or television.”
In a day and age, where more and more people rely on getting their news from social media and bloggers, filmmaker Kuras points out that lies often are disguised as truths. Thus, there is a need to be reminded of the importance of professional, fact-based and objective journalism.
“Never has it been more important to have empirical evidence to back up the truth and for us to trust in journalists, who have done their research and who have the data and the evidence to back up their story,” says Kuras during a phone call from Massachusetts. “It is a time of propaganda, very much like in the interim period between the two world wars. We are seeing that much more now on social media now. People are not looking at news but news on social media.”
Anderson could not agree more.
“I think that now more than ever, it is important not to lose sight of what that ideal is. If we don’t keep having that representation on our screens because of the degree to which social media and comments from anybody from around the world who wants to weigh in on a topic, bloggers who potentially may not uphold the same kind of standards and also the degree to which the media is struck down and accused of fake news, where there is talk about ‘lying’ and deliberately misleading and misreporting.”
Lee and Civil War focus on the great lengths that Lee Miller, who later struggle with alcoholism and passed away in 1977, and the fictional Lee Smith for whom Lee Miller is referenced as a role model had to go through to uncover and document the truth behind the wars they are covering.
“When you read these stories about journalists’ hotels being bombed and being stuck in perilous situations and the loss of life, unbearable loss of life, I think it was important to me to show the truth of this,” says Winslet, who not only stars in but also produces Lee. “It was incredibly important to be true to not only who she was but also her experience so we can have a greater understanding of what those men and women now confront and deal with every single day.”
Kuras points out that the lead characters in Lee and Civil War are not young women, but highly experienced and also very brave women, who were willing to die while doing their jobs.
“Both characters in the films — Lee Miller and Lee — are both determined to throw themselves in the middle of this battle, as middle-aged women no less, to try and uncover what the truth is as they are they to witness what is happening,” says Kuras. “That is something that I think is key: Who will be the witness in the future? Who will be the witness of the truth?”
Anderson points to the importance of having women represented in the newsroom and in the field. Unlike Winslet, Anderson had direct access to Emily Maitlis during her research period. Anderson believes Maitlis, one of the most celebrated newsreaders and journalists in the U.K., uncovered aspects of Prince Andrew’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, who was a convicted child sex offender, and his behavior and actions towards women; the actress believes Maitlis was so successful because she was a woman.
“It is important that different types of questions are asked in relation to women as victims, and it is possible that different types of questions will be asked and that the imperative of those questions being asked will be upheld potentially by women for women,” says Anderson. “In the case of Andrew, Emily Maitlis is a tough interviewer, and by the same token, she started the interview incredibly softly. She was pointed, but she started softly. And it is possible that because she was a woman, Prince Andrew opened up to her maybe in a way that he would not if she had not been a woman and had not pitched it the way that she did.”
Winslet also found that Lee Miller had a different angle on her coverage of the war than her male colleagues. She had a special talent of connecting with the subjects, who were often in her case women and children, who were the victims of the war.
“She would walk straight in to the heart of it all,” says Winslet and points to the fact that Miller used a Rolleiflex camera with no zoom, which meant she had to be close to her subject. “It really did mean that she was looking in the eyes of somebody, forming relationships with those people and having those connections. That is why the scene in our film, when the young woman has her heads shaved felt so significant and important, it is because you can see it in the photographs. The real photographs of that girl. She is looking right at Lee. She is really looking at Lee.
“So she had a way of connecting that is very female, I felt. She was not photographing these soldiers and the gunfire and the bloodshed and the fighting, she was looking into the corners and the shadows and seeing those innocent victims and the impact that it had on them and that set her apart.”
Kuras points out that it is important to rewrite history and put the movie audience’s attention to women’s participation in significant moments of our history.
“She was an unsung hero,” Kuras points out. “She was able to tell women’s stories in a women’s magazine so that women could see themselves reflected in the war, so they were able to see what was really happening.”