A Message of Support from Joe Berlinger

Post-inaugural Cinema Eye Honors' comments and feedback have been, for the most part, extremely supportive and positive, with a real sense of excitement among the international nonfiction community.  Starting with a "thank you" message on my phone from Outstanding Nonfiction Feature presenter, Barbara Kopple, the next morning, to posts from attendees like Yance Ford and Jason Guerasio, the timbre of comments has been upbeat, imbued with a sense that we've started something that, it is hoped, will have a long and prosperous life.  (Pictured from left: Jared Goldman, Jason Kohn and Joey Frank, accepting for Outstanding Nonfiction Feature for their film Manda Bala (Send a Bullet).)

Thom Powers, co-chair of Cinema Eye, shared with me the following email, sent to him and AJ the next morning from filmmaker Joe Berlinger, the  presenter, with his filmmaking partner, Bruce Sinofsky, for the Outstanding Achievement in Direction (the recipient was Alex Gibney for his Taxi to the Dark Side).

I asked Joe if I could post his email in its entirety here, and he was kind enough to say, yes, go ahead.  So here it is:

Dear Thom and AJ,

As a long-standing member of the documentary community, I just wanted
to congratulate you guys on an amazing achievement with the Cinema
Eye Awards.

For years, I, too, have lamented the documentary-consuming public's
confusion of subject matter versus craft when evaluating the quality
of a nonfiction film.  In the narrative (fiction) feature world, a
poorly made film on an "important" subject would be rejected as
inferior; yet in the world of documentary evaluation, too often a
film is validated in terms of its subject matter instead of its craft.

We know this dilemma well.  In our own way, we tried to break the
mold with "Brother's Keeper" in 1992 by fusing traditional verite
filmmaking with a conscious attempt to emulate fictional narrative
techniques without compromising the "truthfulness" of the material
being presented.   At the time, we were highly criticized for
attempting this cinematic approach to nonfiction filmmaking,
including our use of a heightened visual mode; an emotionally driven
score and an editing style that followed classic narrative (fiction)
structure.  We were also taken to task for our choice of subject
matter and for purposely creating an ambiguous portrait that raised
more questions than it answered and allowing the viewer to come to
his or her own conclusion about the guilt or innocence of Delbert Ward.

Despite winning the Audience Award at the 1992 Sundance Film
Festival, distributors did not know what to make of our film (it was
also a very different theatrical landscape back then, with very few
documentaries getting theatrical exposure.)  So, we rolled up our
sleeves for a year and successfully distributed the film ourselves,
defying the naysayers by believing there was an audience for quality
nonfiction that unfolded on the big screen like narrative fiction.

The point I am trying to make is this:  as one of the early pioneers
of the current new wave of nonfiction theatrical filmmakers with two
decades of hindsight, last night's celebration of outstandingly-
crafted films and the recognition that there should be no rules for
conveying cinematic truth represented a real milestone in the
evolution of the perception of nonfiction films.

I was honored to have been a small part of the evening, and I wish
you the greatest success with this endeavor.

Joe Berlinger