ANDREW SHORTHALL | staff writer
A recent surge in social films suggests movies are attempting more than entertainment.
Do movies have the power to change the world, the way a society operates, or how individuals conduct themselves? Recent documentaries and narrative fi lms have shown they can have an impact on their society. “Of course they can change us, like any storytelling does,” fi lm professor Monica Ganas said. Ganas believes different stories will affect people in different ways. She attributes the impact of fi lms to the fact that they offer society alternate scenarios. It allows people to see things they would otherwise be unable to experience or imagine. Senior cinema and broadcast arts major Peter Cote agrees with Ganas. “I wouldn’t be in this major if I didn’t think fi lms had an impact,” Cote said.
Jill Lincoln is an assistant professor in the Department of Theater, Film and Television. As a professional actress, she attests to the power of fi lm. “I believe movies make an important impact in our culture,” Lincoln said. “For example, Juno affected thousands of pregnant teenagers. Many adoption agencies have seen an increase in teenage mothers deciding to carry their babies full term and place them with adoptive families.” Ganas uses the fi lm Super Size Me by Morgan Spurlock as an example of a documentary that had an impact on its culture. Spurlock set out attempting to, at the least, draw attention to the unhealthy menus of McDonald’s and other fast food corporations.
It appears Spurlock was successful in this attempt because soon after many fast food companies, such as Wendy’s, Burger King and McDonald’s, were offering a number of healthier menu options. Instead of being stuck with only soda and fries, kid’s menus were offering fruit and milk as choices.
Plans by McDonald’s to drop the super sized menu items were made early March 2004 and McDonald’s offi cials said this was in no way related to the release of Super Size Me, which was released May 21, 2004. The fi lm may not have sent fast food into bankruptcy, but it drew the attention of many Americans to health concerns.
Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth is another documentary that has drawn a lot of opposition. Amidst the opposition, it was still able to accomplish its goal of drawing attention to the subject it presents. “An Inconvenient Truth has done a lot to inform people about global warming,” Cote said. Leading environmentalist and lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. praised the documentary on Stopglobalwarming.org. “An Inconvenient Truth offers the best opportunity we’ve ever had to capture the immediate attention of all Americans and move this country forward quickly to stop global warming,” Kennedy said.
Ganas acknowledges the changes brought by fi lms can be subtle. Sometimes, however, they can be “the seat of moral argument for many people,” she said. Certain fi lms have emerged in hopes of revealing hidden or overlooked injustice. Examples of these are Blood Diamond, Invisible Children, and Hotel Rwanda. All three of these emerged in hopes of addressing dire situations of genocide and other injustices occurring in Africa.
Invisible Children is a documentary familiar to many APU students. It began as a fi lm and soon evolved into Invisible Children Inc., a nonprofi t organization attempting to use education as a healing tool for children in Africa affected by the war.
A year after its release, the fi lm became a charitable organization. By 2006, Invisible Children Inc. was equipped with 35 staff members, 100 volunteers and had a budget of over $3 million, allowing them to raise awareness to the subject it addresses.
“Films raise awareness, especially documentaries,” Cote said. However, documentaries are not the only type of filmmaking that impacts society. Narrative fi lms can also impact society, according to Cote.
“Narrative fi lms reach an audience who most likely don’t go into the movie expecting to be changed,” Cote said. “But hopefully they can stir something up in them, causing change.” Films do have an impact since they can capture the attention of potentially thousands, even millions of people. However, ultimately, experts have concluded that a fi lm’s impact is determined by its audience. Only a receptive audience can take a fi lm’s message and transform it into action.
