Bearing in mind that Werner Herzog has a history of embellishing fact in his documentaries, did it seem to anyone else like this scene might have been fake? Possibly to protect the identities and lives of a similar family? I don't want to disparage the actual family if that scene was real, but it definitely raised some questions in my mind watching it.
shareNever crossed my mind. If they were fake, they were very good actors. E.g., the husband's hesitation in being able to find the right words. Incredible naturalism, if scripted.
shareI have never seen a Werner Herzog before this. Could you give examples of embellishing facts in which documentary?
shareHerzog says facts are not as important as truth, which is an amorphous concept, but something he believes can be revealed and experienced through cinema. He admits having coached people on what to say in some specific, limited instances in films like "White Diamond," which is a delight to watch anyway. I don't watch a Herzog film expecting it to be a CNN news documentary. That would be like seeing a Terrance Malick film for the intricate plot.
shareAccording to Wikipedia the family was awarded 2.37 million USD in damages from the California Highway Patrol who leaked the photo of the dead daughter. Info easily found through a quick web search.
shareThe only fake part was the claim he wanted to protect their identities which was a load of balderdash unless he's that stupid he doesn't know how to search the interweb using key words.
Besides there are websites well known for gorish pictures and articles.
I didn't hear him say he wanted to "protect their identities" -- he had the name of the family on the screen, and the name of the dead daughter in his commentary. What he did say was that he didn't want to aggravate the situation by showing any photos of Nikki alive since that would obviously get people to search for the offensive photos of her following her accident. Of course some people will do it anyway. I checked to see if I could easily find such photos and the answer was, yes I could, but I chose not to view them. I didn't see any reason why I needed to know the extent of her disfigurement.
The real point as I saw it was that the leaking of those photos by the Highway Patrol personnel was a grievous violation of both policy and law, and something that cannot be allowed with impunity in public servants to whom we grant so much power and in whom we vest a great deal of trust. The experience shocked the parents, as one can understand considering they ween't/aren't from the social media generation, and they were stunned how quickly the grotesque photos spread, and how venomous the comments they received were.
We are more inured to such happenings now, a decade later, but for those who were involved, especially relatively net-naive people, it was a horrible awakening.
Did you watch the movie with the sound off and make up your own dialog as you went along? He made it perfectly clear that he didn't want to show a picture of the family's deceased daughter (instead showing only a room in the house that she liked) to prevent depraved minds from *further* wanting to dig up the photos taken of their daughter in the accident.
I feel for the whole family. Having to reckon with what the sickest of the sick are willing to do to you on such a personal level... I could see how that might change the way you see humankind as a whole. In truth, I think only a very, very small percentage of people would decide to torment a family like-- but I guess that's what the point is. The Internet can leave you vulnerable to absolutely everyone, for better or worse.
If you've seen death before, or you've been close to it, I think the desire to look at pictures of real horror and trauma has less appeal, because there exists a natural level of respect regarding those things.
I agree with everything you said.
Wanted to add: I remember that case (the decapitated girl, and internet handling of it, etc.) from before watching the movie. The web can truly bring up the worst in people.
I felt like this was one of the weakest parts of the film (and the beginning of the downward slide the film took, IMO) for a couple of reasons:
1) While the family was victimized by the public officials (officers) who chose to share the pictures, they chose to perpetuate the story/victimization by participating. When Herzog says he didn't show any pictures of the girl because it would cause people to "further search for pictures" the deed is already done: you've already piqued every viewer's human curiosity in a very primal way. Hence the whole segment betrays a supposed goal of the segment.
2) The segment (titled: "The Dark Side") takes issue with what is at it's root very fact-based information. The photos in question were not intended to be salacious--they were in fact crime scene photos. The only "betrayal" was their sharing, which then became public sharing, which was then unstoppable, which was one of the themes throughout the film. I'm not trying to minimize the family's grief, or the evil way some tried to abuse the family with that information, but at a very basic level this is the equivalent of one person choosing to look at the truth (in this case a person who died, the circumstances around that person's death, etc) verses another person choosing to avert their eyes. Neither has a moral high-ground which this documentary seems to imply. The pictures are more the true story than the parent's desire to pretend something other that what really happened, really happened.
Again (that last bit comes off pretty harsh), I'm not judging the parent's decisions, but I am judging their judgment of others. About the only thing this segment added was the interesting legal finding that our right to "an expectation of privacy" expires when we exhale for the last time.
As far as whether or not this was the real family, it most certainly was, as dad was in many photos, mom wrote a book, and those girls look terrified (likely at both the tragic events surrounding their sister's death and their parent's response to it).