Which Way Is the Front Line from Here? The Life and Time of Tim Hetherington

I had the chance to review the film Which Way is the Frontline from Here through a link sent to me by the producers.

The director and the producers decided to place the film under the documentary category, but I would call it rather a tribute than a documentary. The director, Sebastian Junger, was one of Tim Hetherington's best friend and took little risks in this movie. The film, uses almost 130 minutes to call uncritical and monotone lines about Tim's personality, life and work. It leaves out any nuance or questions that could open unknown doors towards the complexities the person Tim Hetherington may have had.

The film has little objectivity on the event of Misurata April 20th 2011. It ignores important elements that could illuminate the questions about how and most important why the photographers decided to return to the frontlines ignoring the eminent risks they knew existed. In one scene, my voice was taken from a video where I'm calling for an ambulance to rescue the wounded rebel fighter Hamid Swahili. My voice was taken out of it's original context and used to illustrate the explosion that killed Tim Hetherington, Chris Hondros and wounded two other photographers. I was not present at the place where the explosion happened, and, therefore, my voice could logically never be there. The situation my voice was taken from happened 5 days after the incident that killed and wounded the photographers.

The directors paid no attention to credit the ones contributing with videos for the film. Because of that, the viewer is induced to feel/believe all the videos used in the tribute were filmed by Tim Hetherington.

The deaths of Tim Hetherington and Chris Hondros came to confirm the start of a distressful trend where many other good journalists would loose their lives covering the Arab Revolutions. Adopting a highly conservative and at some points superficial view, the director and the producers, lost a unique chance to contribute with reflections and to raise important questions about that.

If you watch an HBPO documentary on a subject you don't know you probably assume it is done honestly and accurately. But have ever watched an HBO documentary on a subject you do know you realize HBO cherry picks, falsify footage, used set up footage for takes that are implied to be candid and spontaneous, and spin and spin agenda driven work with documentary style that is outright fiction. So it is no surprise to see acclaimed photojournalist Andre Liohn on this IMDB review section point out several bogus elements to this HBO product. although it is a ironic to see Liohn surprised, when both the documentary business and the photojournalists business have long left neutral journalism behind and become advocated for their personal points of view.

The film was an expert insight into the 'life and time' of Tim Hetherington, created by good friend and collaborator Sebastian Junger. As well as giving invaluable information about arguably the most talented photo-journalist of his generation, the film shows Hetherington as who he was, not what he was. There was a beautiful quote from James Barabazon saying 'He was just Tim… its very hard to find that'; and this is the key message of the film, Hetherington wasn't political or war orientated, he was a humanitarian trying to make the world a better place. Other photo-journalists capture what they see, Hetherington captures what the audience needs to see to bring humanity to the situation and try and make a change. Instead of being a traditional documentary, it felt like an adapted screenplay because of the emotional story, which if you knew nothing about Hetherington before, you would feel the world still needs his photographs to comment on the latest human tragedies. It feels as if he brings clarity to photography, his new ideas about sleeping soldiers and bravely breaking barriers seem so right, but they were very much is unique traits in the medium, and its such a sadness to loose such a brilliant personality as Hetherington. The film showed an unedited visual of the photo-journalist; Hetherington speaking how he felt about what he stood for, it didn't just show what he stood for, but who he was as well and how everyone felt the same way.