By now, you would have seen the footage or at least heard of the incident.
A young woman entered an ATM vestibule while a young man was withdrawing some money. Asked him to hand over an amount — fifty thousand rupees, it was later revealed — and when he refused, she threatened that she was going to say that he tried to rape her. She was already not wearing a shirt, or any undergarment, by the time she was at the ATM.
He refused, rushed out but she was in dogged pursuit, making a scene, screaming at him and throwing stones at him. “Please just leave me alone. I don’t even know you,” he was screaming. A crowd gathered, of course. The screaming would have been enough for a crowd to gather, but there was public nudity involved here. Meanwhile, a man from the crowd told the hapless victim to give him the keys of his Mercedes, which she was threatening to throw a brick at. Frazzled and confused, he gave him the key. The kindly Samaritan, it later became clear, was in cahoots with her and ran away with the vehicle. The girl also disappeared.
The young woman, who turned out to be a transgender, and both her accomplices were later arrested by the Islamabad police. The internet, being what it is, was abuzz with speculation. He’d propositioned her, done the deed, and tried to make a run for it without paying up. Ghastly stuff about the victim. Even when the investigation officer used the Safe Cities Project’s camera footage to testify that the fellow was alone in the car, the speculation did not end. Again, welcome to the internet!
(An aside: the victim would probably still be in a state of shock. The incident took place in broad daylight, on a very busy road. What possible safe measures could he have taken?)
But the reason why this merits a media column is the filming. And how we became aware of it. Only a couple of years ago, the incident would have spread like wildfire through word of mouth. Now, actual videos of the incident became viral on Whatsapp.
But, and here is how this event was interesting, as opposed to a mere video circulating online, it was a series of videos. Multiple sources, all having different vantage points, owing to the proliferation of camera phones and security cameras. In the deft hands of an experienced editor, it could make a compelling, linear narrative.
The footage off the ATM security camera is where it started. Cut next to a “wide” from the roof of the building (the focal length of all these cameras are, more or less, the same; by wide, I mean in terms of distance) and then an upclose shot of the man trying to get away from her. Then cut to the same from another angle. There were so many people filming this, that you even had the luxury of adhering to the filmmaking rule of not “breaking the 180.”
The “found footage” technique of filmmaking is one where the audience’s disbelief is suspended into thinking that the film is spliced together by editors who had discovered footage somewhere. The Italian director Ruggero Deodato really brought the medium into its own with his 1980 filmCannibal Holocaust.
Since then, there have been a lot of films in this format, most notably the most famous Blair Witch Project which held the record for the highest grossing movie of all time — in terms of return on investment. The record for the highest grossing movie in the same terms is currently held byParanormal Activity, another film made in the found footage style.
But it is not only fiction that would benefit from the style. Citizen journalists can utilise the Facebook Live feature, or the Periscope app, to broadcast an event whenever they want. The prevalence of cameras everywhere means that all “public” events can be told from many different angles. The investigation into the case of the murder of the MQM activist when the Rangers raided the party’s office relied on video footage. The presence of other individuals would be able to tell more.
Editing will still determine the overall effect of the footage. As the famous French director Jean-Luc Godard said, “Every cut is a lie.”
Interesting times.
You are more mixing security with media. Both are opposite to each other and are polls apart. This media has illiterate people in majority and insignicant number who understand Journalism the way it should be.We have a,highly irresponsible media with no rules except money and power. Both come from one source and that is Govt in power.Media has done immence damage to every aspect of our society. Media includes PEMRA which is the root cause of the damage being perpetrated.
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