Films

The first in the Forum Follies series, ‘Counterpoint One’ pitches the ethnographic filmmaker Richard Werbner into debate with audiences for his film ‘Holy Hustlers’ (2009), from a rough to a final cut. Along with the interest in ethnographic knowledge, there is the fun and cross-play of argument about the making and eventual reception of a film. First comes feedback in the University of Manchester’s Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology. Rough and final clips show how Werbner and editor Andy Lawrence respond. Next are very different audiences for ‘Holy Hustlers’ in Kyoto, Manchester and London, and finally the GCVA again, this time for a rough cut of ‘Counterpoint One’ itself. Should the ethnographic filmmaker rely on spectator sympathy or empathy, and not make a ‘disturbing’ film? When is less voice-over, or less narration, actually more, for the film? Does making a film about a film about a film – a hall of mirrors – create a contradictory trap in which any ‘kernel of truth’ is elusive?