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A breach of integrity on television By: Kong Rithdee Published: 30/05/2009 at 12:00 AM Newspaper section: News It's alarming how a falsehood can spread like wildfire. And it's painful to realise that the media are responsible - not solely but largely - for selling a fib as fact, for misleading the public into believing in a piece of non-existent news.
And it's painful to know that once the truth is revealed "sorry" seems to be the hardest word for everyone involved.
In a week of relatively calm politics, you must have heard news about a Thai student who supposedly won an award at the Cannes Film Festival (which ended last Sunday, and which I attended). It was reported in both Thai- and English-language newspapers (though not the one you're holding) that Pornpatchaya Supannarat was a "winner at Cannes" in the student film section.
The 24-year-old Pornpatchaya went on TV Channel 3 - twice - to talk about her short film; that it was officially selected by, and even won an award at, the Cannes Film Festival, considered the world's most prestigious cine-event.
The TV host quickly hailed her "the Spielberg of Thailand".
Thai reporters who were in Cannes were perplexed. We'd never heard about a Thai student whose film was invited by the festival; we didn't see Pornpatchaya's name in the official catalogue. The only Thai film in the festival's Official Selection this year was Nang Mai, by director Pen-ek Ratanaruang. But in Bangkok even my mother, who hasn't seen a movie in years, knew that a Thai student had won some prize in Cannes. "It was on TV," she said.
Let's make the truth clear: Pornpatchaya did not win any award from Cannes and her film was not "officially selected". It was shown in the Short Film Corner at the Cannes Film Market, a trade exhibition in which participants have to pay a registration fee in order to have their movies included. There's no competition, no prizes distributed; her film is not part of the Cannes Film Festival and she's not a "winner at Cannes" as one of the papers splashed across its front page (two days later, it ran a retraction).
To use an analogy: To pay your way to have a film in the Film Market is like, say, during the World Cup 2010, you pay a fee so your football team can go to South Africa and play 5-man beach football with some local sides, but you come back to claim that you've competed in the World Cup itself.
Pornpatchaya told me on Thursday that it was all a misunderstanding. She had only received an email from a viewer complimenting her, but she mistook it for an award.
She used a few English terms in her interview, she told me, and maybe the reporters of the Thai paper who broke "the story" didn't entirely get her meaning. And by saying on TV that she was part of the "Official Selection", she didn't mean official as in official, but official as in the Short Film Corner, though she knew that it meant not-so-official; and on TV she was too slow to explain her point to the host.
She went on Channel 3 again yesterday. I thought she'd say sorry that her misunderstanding - if she insists it's only a misunderstanding - had misled the viewers (including my mother!). And I thought the same TV host would admit that he was, at least, partly to blame for spreading the false information because he'd failed to do a fact-check prior to the interview.
But no. No admission, no sorry. They wouldn't let the 15 minutes of fame become a lifetime of shame, so the session on Friday bordered on a twisting of the truth that would have stunned even the most pliable contortionist. Cannes, they said, is such a complex film festival that we're confused about the awards. The host spent much time defending his subject. Is it such an undignified gesture for the people in this country to publicly say sorry? Not the politicians, not the bureaucrats, not the filmmakers - and not the journalists. (Had this happened in Korea, someone might have hanged himself!)
The saddest thing is the real talent who genuinely was in the Official Selection this year wasn't interviewed by any TV channel.
Two years ago when Anocha Suwichakornpong became the first Thai student whose film was invited into the Official Selection (for real, in the student film section), she wasn't asked to be on TV either, and nobody called her "the Spielberg of Thailand".
Entertainment journalism is still journalism. Not advertising, not PR. I won't dare judge whether Pornpatchaya is naive or dishonest. But to the media and journalists who still refused to correct "the story", what happened was nothing if not a serious breach of the profession's integrity.
Kong Rithdee writes about movies and popular culture in the Bangkok Post real.time section.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/17590/a-breach-of-integrity-on-television
จากคุณ :
thunska
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31 พ.ค. 52 01:38:58
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