Let the Viewer Decide

Documentarian Frederick Wiseman on free speech, complexity, and the trouble with Michael Moore

Jesse Walker from the December 2007 issue

(Page 2 of 4)

They wrote a recommendation to the Massachusetts Supreme Court that the film could be allowed to be seen, but only by audiences of professionals consisting of doctors, lawyers, judges, people interested in custodial care, and students in these and related fields. That amicus brief formed the basis of the Massachusetts Supreme Court’s decision.

Four or five years later, the executive director of the Massachusetts ACLU asked me whether I would show the film to the board of directors. At that time, the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruling was in effect: I could show the film on the condition that I give the court and the attorney general’s office a week’s notice of any screening and then file an affidavit afterwards saying that everybody who saw the film was in the class of people allowed to see it.

So I showed up at the board meeting with a print of the film and a 16mm projector, and I said I was glad to show them the film but they had to prove to me that they were in the class of people allowed to see it. I took two and a half hours to call each of them up individually and ask to see some identification. Each of them had to prove to me they were who they said they were and that their training and background allowed them to see the film. Then I showed them the film, and they all voted to support it.

The obvious point that I was making was that the restriction of the court was a greater infringement of civil liberties than the film was an infringement of the liberties of the inmates.

Reason: Where do you think the boundary should be between privacy rights and free speech?

Wiseman: The right of privacy only exists by statute or by common law tradition. At the time Titicut Follies was released, there was neither a statutory right of privacy nor a common law right of privacy in Massachusetts. For good or bad, the right of privacy didn’t exist. It was found to exist for the first time in the Titicut Follies case.

In any number of cases before and after the Titicut Follies case, the U.S. Supreme Court found that when the right of privacy and the public’s right to know are in conflict, the public’s right to know is the dominant value. Even where the common law or statutory right of privacy exists, it falls before the overriding importance of the First Amendment.

Reason: And that’s your opinion as well?

Wiseman: That’s my opinion. Maybe 80 percent of the films I’ve made have been about public, tax-supported institutions. I’ve always taken the position that what goes on in a public institution should be transparent. And once it grants access to that institution, the state cannot assert a right of privacy.

Reason: I’ve read different accounts of how Titicut Follies was initially received by the prison authorities, but most of the sources suggest that they liked the portrait of the institution.

Wiseman: They did.

Reason: When did that change?

Wiseman: That changed when the film was accepted to be shown at the New York Film Festival in 1967 and some reviews favorable to the film appeared prior to the opening of the festival. A social worker in Minnesota who had not seen the film wrote a letter to the governor of Massachusetts, John Volpe, saying that he should be ashamed for allowing a film to be made that showed naked men. Volpe then inquired to Elliot Richardson, who was the state attorney general at the time. Richardson in the previous year had been the lieutenant governor and had made the key phone call that allowed me to make the movie. Richardson wanted to be governor or senator, and he thought that his political career was going to be jeopardized when his role in my obtaining permission became public. So he then moved against the film.

Reason: I understand something similar happened with High School—that initially the school was pleased with how the film portrayed them.

Wiseman: That’s correct. When I showed it to the superintendent and the teachers, they all liked it. Then the reviews appeared, and the reviews were very critical of the school. The superintendent continued to support the film, but the teachers turned against it.

Comments

|11.16.07 @ 4:27PM|#

Is Titicut Follies available on DVD?

|11.16.07 @ 4:28PM|#

his company, Zipporah Films, is preparing to release his movies on DVD

Serves me right for not RTFA carefully.

SxCx|11.16.07 @ 5:12PM|#

A sincere thanks to Jesse and Reason for bringing this man to my attention. I checked out my local library shortly after reading the piece and discovered they have around seven of his films on VHS, including Titicut.

On the other hand, I'll be patronizing a wasteful public institution...

JBinMO|11.16.07 @ 5:17PM|#

What a different world we live in today. That was just 50 years ago.

|11.16.07 @ 5:23PM|#

What a different world we live in today. That was just 50 years ago.

You must have missed the part where Jesse drew the comparison of Titicut with Abu Ghraib.

Or did you mean how we treat the mentally ill? God, I hope we're still not doing that stuff.

LarryA|11.16.07 @ 6:24PM|#

Or did you mean how we treat the mentally ill? God, I hope we're still not doing that stuff.

Na. Most of them have been "released," quit taking their meds, and are now homeless. My hometown has a wonderful new program for them, as we've been blessed with state funding for a couple of new bridges and a recent flood keeps the city diligent on keeping brush and trash cleared out of the riverbottom.

In addition, when it rains they send a cop around to warn everyone about flash flooding.

|11.16.07 @ 7:45PM|#

For more recent MH goofiness, see "The Satanic Panic" and "repressed memory syndrome".

I work at a Mental Health Center. I do manage to keep my mouth shut for the most part.

|11.16.07 @ 9:11PM|#

No human being should be treated in such a manner.

Massachusetts instead of modernizing facilites for the chronic ill, mentally ill, and schools fo the retarded literally destroyed them.

The state became a buyer of services instead of a provider of services establishing an out of control Human Service Industrial Establishment riddled with waste, fraud, and abuse containing little or no accountability or oversight.

Vendors, providers, and consultants continue to ply their poor services or no services to those in need and continuing to rip of taxpayers.

The time has come for a factual updated documentary of what has and is happening in Massachusetts.

Investigative journalists, documentary filmakers, and research collaboratives, consider yourselves invited.

BakedPenguin|11.16.07 @ 9:57PM|#

One of the great innovators in documentary film making. Film History by David Bordwell & Kristen Thompson has a great discussion of his works. Unfortunately, it's a textbook, and really pricey.

|11.17.07 @ 6:58PM|#

Michael Moore has never made a documentary. He makes socialist propaganda, and he's the best director in that field since Leni Riefenstahl.

-jcr

The Libertarian Guy|11.18.07 @ 10:33PM|#

"Michael Moore has never made a documentary. He makes socialist propaganda, and he's the best director in that field since Leni Riefenstahl."


But... but... what about the children???

stephen the goldberger|11.19.07 @ 5:26PM|#

I'm not a huge fan of Wiseman. He makes movies for intellectuals, films that are more interesting to talk and write about afterwards than actually watch. Hence why this article was infinitely more interesting than any of his works (especially "Zoo" wow that was boring).

|11.21.07 @ 9:14PM|#

Oh, the "but what about the children?" thing has so become a favorite sarcastic interlude of mine as well.

People fear monger on the left and fear monger on the right. Just because you believe in one side more does not negate the fact that it is a detriment and not the way education should be spread.

And all movies are for intellectuals. I learned more from old school disney than any documentary I ever saw. And plus, if it pleases you, many movies can show you what idiots people are. But that wouldn't be too intellectual I guess.