DANGEROUS TRUTHS: CONFRONTING BIAS IN DOCUMENTARY STORYTELLING
Business
Documentary is often mistakenly presented and received as objective truth – so how can filmmakers better acknowledge bias and still maintain trust and authorial legitimacy? Join this diverse group of storytellers as they explore how we can recognise and work with bias ethically, transparently and creatively.
Documentary is never objective. Every decision – who creates the work, which participants are featured, what is framed, how it is edited, who funds the work, and what is omitted – reflects conscious and unconscious bias. But instead of pretending bias does not exist, today’s filmmakers (in a world closer to ‘post truth’ than we’d like to be) are increasingly called to interrogate it, own it and build more accountable practices.
In a time of global unrest where attempts to silence ‘the truth’ are rampant and polarised narratives mean heightened scrutiny; how can filmmakers retain trust without pretending to be neutral?
Led by award-winning journalist, presenter, and filmmaker Patrick Abboud (Only Human Productions/Dreamchaser Studios), this session brings together diverse documentary storytellers, to examine how bias functions in the documentary pipeline. Rather than asking “How do we remove bias?” this panel asks: “How do we recognise and work with bias ethically, transparently and creatively?”
Image credit: ‘Welcome to Gayrabia,’ Compass (Only Human Productions and ABC, 2024)
Session
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Moderator
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Session Producer
Mary Tran