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The Ethics of Bearing Witness: subject empowerment versus true crime intrigue in Kim Longinotto’s Shooting the Mafia (2019)

Larke-Walsh, George S. (2022) The Ethics of Bearing Witness: subject empowerment versus true crime intrigue in Kim Longinotto’s Shooting the Mafia (2019). Ethical Space: The International Journal of Communication Ethics, 19 (3/4). pp. 21-27. ISSN 1742-0105

Item Type: Article

Abstract

The ethics of bearing witness to testimony on true crime events is affected by the way a documentary chooses to frame it and the way it is contextualized within the larger narrative of events. To create empathy for a subject’s experiences, films must detail the danger and horrors witnessed, but risks framing testimony within victimhood. Topics of violent crime, especially on the scale of the Sicilian mafia, encourage audience expectations of sensation and intrigue. These expectations are influenced by the conventions and popularity of the true crime genre which threaten to drown out individual testimony and reduce films to intriguing exposé of mafia secrets. This article explores Kim Longinotto’s Shooting the Mafia (2019) as an ethical practice that attempts to avoid such pitfalls and empower its subject to challenge true crime conventions.

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Depositing User: George Larke-Walsh

Identifiers

Item ID: 14949
ISSN: 1742-0105
URI: http://sure.sunderland.ac.uk/id/eprint/14949
Official URL: http://www.ethical-space.co.uk

Users with ORCIDS

ORCID for George S. Larke-Walsh: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0002-2255-144X

Catalogue record

Date Deposited: 06 Apr 2023 12:02
Last Modified: 31 Jul 2023 06:34

Contributors

Author: George S. Larke-Walsh ORCID iD

University Divisions

Faculty of Arts and Creative Industries > School of Media and Communications

Subjects

Media > Cinema and Film
Media > Film

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