Hey all,
Sorry it's been so long! The internet has been off and on for the past week in Abelenkpe, and I don't get home from my NGO's office until around 4:30-- too late to be braving the Accra traffic in search of a working cyber cafe! I got in on a Thursday, spent Friday trying to track down my lost baggage, and couldn't get into the office until last Monday. Funny, nobody from the office came looking for me, even though apparently they'd sent a driver to the airport to pick me up (without telling me first). Nobody seemed alarmed that it had been four days since we were last in contact with eachother. It reminded me just how alone you really are when traveling, no matter how many friendly-faced people on the street offer you a bite of their fufuo!
I spent the first week being shuttled off to various meetings and interviews; the mental health community is in crisis-mode right now, trying to get a Mental Health Bill pushed through Parliament while the NDC government is still paying attention to their campaign promises. It's given me amazing access, since all the major figures in the movement have been convening regularly, and BasicNeeds has funded a GhanaTV documentary to incite public outrage at the state of the country's mental health care. Originally, they wanted me to make it, but I really wasn't comfortable with the aggressive stance they have to take in order to get any attention. They are hunting down prayer camps that use chaining, bursting in to film, painting very real protagonists and antagonists in a way that I just can't do. My hesitation would show, I'm sure, and the final product would inevitably disappoint.
As far as the health care system itself, I expected dirt, despair, overcrowding, undermedicating, abuse... I was prepared, I thought, to look past all of that and try to meet patients on their own terms. But after sitting in on some sessions between psychiatrists and their patients, I just can't bring myself to film them. It just isn't ethical, pure and simple. One of the psychiatrists I met in particular was almost emotionally abusive, verbally punishing patients, it seemed to me, instead of trying to win their trust and bring them slowly back to reality. I don't think I can rightfully explain what happened over the Internet, but suffice it to say, I was pretty disturbed. There's no way I can approach that man with a consent form on behalf of his patients and then feel like I've really gained access in an ethical way. I might try developing a relationship with a different psychiatrist and his patients, and spend time with them regularly next month, but the only other one I've met so far seems pretty suspicious of my project (and rightfully so).
I'm trying to take the position I've been handed as a gift-- even in a locus of action and power, where administrative and political decisions are constantly being made, there are some interesting characters. Much to their amusement, I filmed the documentary filmmakers filming a doctor last Friday, and although the footage wasn't great, I'm hoping to weave it together with footage from their final project, and use it as a way of showing the dissemination of the bill's propoganda through Accra. This is a very different film from the one I'd planned on shooting. Less intimate, I'm afraid, more discursive, more action-oriented. But since BasicNeeds wants me to repay them for their assistance with an additional, low-budget documentary on their work in the country (instead of the expose), I have too limited a supply of tapes and time to remain rigid about my earlier concept.
For now, I'm just trying to be brave, to haul the camera around as much as possible, and to get over this systematic process I once envisioned: the introduction, the interview, the foundling friendship, then the camera. My schedule's been planned out ahead for me by the NGO through July 1st. It's so jam-packed that there's no time for regular, sustained contact. At least not now. And meanwhile, I've missed out on some amazing moments, all out of shyness. I'm trying to tell myself that it's only one week, that there will inevitably be more and better footage over the next seven, but even if the film suffers as a result, I'm glad I learned the hard way the lessons of filming. This "can-do," "be brave" front will be valuable in the long-run, I'm sure.
Nante yie-o, m'adamfoo,
(Walk well, friends,)
Grace
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Hiya Grace,
ReplyDeleteDon't let the NGOs use and bully you too much! Good though that you're being flexible about plans. The film within a film part sounds like it could be good material.
Worrying too much about ethics could just leave you at a standstill. I think if something compels you emotionally you should make a point of embracing it and trying to work with it. That's not to say you should overstep your own moral boundaries for the sake of the project but rather see if you can grapple with it cleverly. Yes, easier said than done! Anyway keep at it~
ATN
Oh, Grace! I hate that you always seem to have everyone’s best interests in mind, but nobody seems to have yours in mind. I’m so impressed with your strength dealing with all these obstacles, and I’m proud of you for sticking to your moral guns. It makes me angry that this organization is demanding so much of you, when you seem to be doing so much for them already.
ReplyDeleteI agree very much with Anh-Thu on some points—I’m finding there’s a really fuzzy line between what makes me uncomfortable to shoot and what’s really unethical to shoot, and it’s super hard trying to decipher that line. Harking back once again to Titicut Follies, it’s important to keep in mind that the real reason this film was banned for so long (I think) was that it exposed the government-paid authority figures as the abusive, inhumane bastards they were (pardon my French). I remember that one interest you had with this project was to explore the many problems with the mental health care system—emotional and verbal abuse is definitely one of them. Are your moral concerns about exploiting the abusive psychiatrist with your camera or exploiting the patients by gaining consent through their corrupt psychiatrist? Is there a way you can reveal the corruption of authority without revealing the identity of the patients? I’m no ethics whiz or civil rights activist, but if an abusive psychiatrist is open to you filming him mistreating patients, it actually be beneficial to the patients and hospital in the long run to film him. Anyway, stay strong and keep sticking to your guns… At the end of the day, you don’t have to film anything you don’t want to—for this film project or for the NGO!