Activist Films:

Do They Inspire Action?

by Claude Forthomme - Senior Editor
 

When you watch a terrifying or heartbreaking documentary, are you moved to do

something more than just “share” the news on Twitter and Instagram?
Participant Media is trying to discover what films work on the people’s social
conscience and what films don’t. To do this, it has developed, with assistance from the
Annenberg school’s Media Impact Project, an interesting index intended to measure audience
reaction. As reported in a recent article in the New York Times, the new index “compiles raw
audience numbers for issue-driven narrative films, documentaries, television programs and
online short videos, along with measures of conventional and social media activity, including
Twitter and Facebook presence. The two measures are then matched with the results of an
online survey, about 25 minutes long, that asks as many as 350 viewers of each project an
escalating set of questions about their emotional response and level of engagement.”

Early results are surprising, and tend to show a gap between emotional response and
taking action.

One film in particular, “The Cove” about the killing of dolphins in Japan sold poorly
(only $1.2 million in ticket sales worldwide).  It seems activists are not keen to see the movie

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because of its gory content, but are willing to “sign up”, said Chad Boettcher, Participant’s
executive vice president for social action.

What would be interesting is to know exactly how the Participant index defines “taking
action”, especially in the Internet age.

In the real world, away from Internet, there are all sorts of ways to express political
activism, from street marches to sit-ins to boycotts as well as more institutionalized forms,
both illegal, like the famous Black Block in Italy, and legal like industry lobbies in
Washington D.C. There are also different forms of activism, from “judicial activism”, a term
introduced by  Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.,  in a January 1947 Fortune Magazine article titled
“The Supreme Court: 1947”, to environmental and climate activism, the latter having
sprouted a new genre of literature, and climate fiction.

Does the Paticipant index consider “hashtag activism” as “taking action”?

Unfortunately, the NYT article does not clarify this point – but “conventional wisdom” has it
that the Internet multiplies the speed, reach and effectiveness of activism. So it may be
possible that the Participant index counts a reaction on Twitter or Facebook as the equivalent
of “taking action”.

But is activism really more effective thanks to tweets and Facebook “likes”?

This is an important point: “hashtag activism” is definitely on the rise, there have been
many such campaigns recently, notably the #BringBackOurGirls, a response to the May
kidnapping of hundreds of young girls by the  infamous  Boko Haram in Nigeria that has
garnered over 4.5 million tweets. Alas to no avail so far, as we all know.

There is a real danger that social media siphon activist energies off on the Net, giving
people the illusion that they are being “active”. It’s just too easy to press that “share” button
and be done with it. It’s also too easy to “sign” online petitions from Green Peace and Avaaz,
maybe donating a few dollars via Paypal.

Comment définir le cinéma engagé ? Comment le différencier du cinéma

militant ou du cinéma de propagande ? Selon la distinction étymologique proposée
par Nicole Brenez, l'origine guerrière de l'adjectif « militant » (du latin militare, « être

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soldat ») désigne un cinéma enrôlé, obéissant à des ordres ou au cahier des charges
idéologique d'une organisation politisée. Le terme « engagé », venant de « mettre en
gage » (ses biens, mais aussi sa foi ou sa parole), renvoie quant à lui à une
démarche cinématographique plus risquée et plus personnelle, notamment d'un point
de vue formel.

Fondé sur la libre initiative, le cinéma engagé offrirait donc la possibilité d'un
contrechamp social via la construction de nouvelles représentations : il s'agit de
changer le cinéma pour changer le monde, mais aussi et avant tout le regard du
spectateur. Non pas informer mais contre-informer, non pas divertir mais mobiliser
par le biais d'un argumentaire en images et en sons ; s'en remettre à la force de
ceux-ci pour défendre sa vision du monde et induire un passage à l'action. Ainsi le
cinéma engagé est-il indéniablement « puissant » sur les plans cognitif, créatif et
performatif, comme en témoignent les actes de censure voire de destruction des
films qui en relèvent et le fait que nombre de cinéastes engagés ont vu leur liberté
d'expression remise en cause.