Controversial doc 'The Stringer' investigates famous Vietnam War photo
PARK CITY, Utah — Ten days before the premiere of the documentary “The Stringer” at the Sundance Film Festival on Saturday night, the Associated Press published an extraordinary 23-page report of a six-month investigation rebutting the movie’s premise, without having seen a second of footage.
"The Stringer” questions whether the world-renowned, Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph of a naked 9-year-old girl running from a napalm attack during the Vietnam War was attributed to the correct photographer. It’s also the only film to arrive at this year’s Sundance under a cloud of controversy, with a global news organization fighting its stunning claims and a lawyer for the image’s credited photographer seeking to block its screening and threatening a defamation suit.
Called by one news outlet “the most important photograph of the 20th century,” the image known as “The Terror of War” or “Napalm Girl” was seen on the front pages of newspapers by tens of millions of people within 24 hours of being taken. It’s been credited — some say apocryphally — with fueling antiwar protests and accelerating the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam months later. It was so impactful that President Richard M. Nixon questioned whether it had been “fixed,” as heard on the Watergate tapes.
Gift Link