VivirLatino

Victory for activists over WWII film

14:37 H | Topics: Activism - Controversia - History - Media - Movies - TV

Last week, legendary documentarian Ken Burns angered many in the Latino community when it was revealed that his upcoming (and much hyped) PBS documentary about World War II completely ignored the contribution of Latinos on the U.S. side of the conflict.

Several Latino leaders and military veterans, angry that Burns' high-profile documentary series "The War" includes no conversations with Latinos who fought, are demanding changes. PBS and Burns want to satisfy an important constituency, without the precedent of a filmmaker forced to change his vision due to a protest.

According to AP, the omissions in the yet-to-be-released doc were revealed by one

Maggie Rivas-Rodriguez, a former newspaper reporter who runs an oral history project about Latino World War II veterans at the University of Texas.

Rivas-Rodriguez and her staff police projects about World War II all over the country -- books, films, conferences and the like -- to make sure Latinos are represented. Last November, when Burns previewed his film at a museum, her project manager asked whether Latino veterans were interviewed in the documentary. She was told no, and immediately set about trying to raise awareness.

All of this came to light late last week. It now appears that Maggie's policing and the pressure generated by wide reporting on the controversy has led PBS and Ken Burns to concede today to a re-edit of the film -- something pretty much unheard of in the film world.

PBS promised Wednesday to amend Ken Burns' upcoming documentary series on World War II to include stories about Latino veterans after activists complained he ignored their contributions to the American effort.

Burns has also agreed to hire a Latino producer to help create the additional content, PBS said.

It's clear that when an exective producer like PBS needs to please an important constituency like the Latino community, a filmmaker -- even one as powerful as Ken Burns -- has no other choice but to go back to the editing room. In filmmaking, subjectivity is perceived whether it is intentional or not. It is always present, no matter the director's good intentions of remaining objective. The lack of something in a documentary is often more significant than the presence of another.

Kudos to Maggie, her team, and everyone who applied pressure on this issue. This is a great victory for Latino representation in media.

Via / Boston.com and Yahoo! Entertainment

Images via PBS.org and MedalofHonor.com

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