Obviously I support media and am against dictatorships with such socialist leaders. But then again you will likely just agree with 90% of the docs made by Frontline as they are center left-wing and largely uncontroversial. They don't actually try to make shows about controversial topics that will irritate some people. It's just this "dictatorship bad" stuff. What Frontline doc is controversial without being wrong? They don't dig deep into any topic the left may disagree with so we are left with these shallow topics. They are not bad, it just shows that PBS is not really top-tier anymore.
It's a doc about a news paper in Philippines that attacks Rodrigo Duterte. Largely he hates them for being critical of his war on drugs and they hate him for hating them. The issue is that the older lesbian woman who runs the newspaper is extremely unlikeable. She's an American who settled in Philippines to start a liberal newspaper which is partly why she is accused of being a foreign agent. But either way he is extremely unlikeable here and the doc is 1:40 hours long with her in most scenes. She is obnoxious. Refuses to make herself camera ready by looks and always looks ashy with an ugly haircut. And is constantly talking about how great and honorable she is. She even meets George Clooney which is kinda fitting as the South Park episode about him is a perfect illustration of Maria Ressa. Every single statement she makes is either her bragging about her achievements, her bragging about how brave she is, or her praising journalists like herself. And she is so extremely fake on camera that it becomes a giant cringe show instead of proper critique of a psychopathic dictator. I support her right to speak and maybe the Nobel Prize was right. But that doesn't really change anything about her personality.
When you find a person this horrid on camera you are supposed to work around that not just make a movie length doc about her. It's a shame as all the stuff about Rodrigo Duterte created from news clips was actually really good and did show how silly he was.
It's a doc about a news paper in Philippines that attacks Rodrigo Duterte. Largely he hates them for being critical of his war on drugs and they hate him for hating them. The issue is that the older lesbian woman who runs the newspaper is extremely unlikeable. She's an American who settled in Philippines to start a liberal newspaper which is partly why she is accused of being a foreign agent. But either way he is extremely unlikeable here and the doc is 1:40 hours long with her in most scenes. She is obnoxious. Refuses to make herself camera ready by looks and always looks ashy with an ugly haircut. And is constantly talking about how great and honorable she is. She even meets George Clooney which is kinda fitting as the South Park episode about him is a perfect illustration of Maria Ressa. Every single statement she makes is either her bragging about her achievements, her bragging about how brave she is, or her praising journalists like herself. And she is so extremely fake on camera that it becomes a giant cringe show instead of proper critique of a psychopathic dictator. I support her right to speak and maybe the Nobel Prize was right. But that doesn't really change anything about her personality.
When you find a person this horrid on camera you are supposed to work around that not just make a movie length doc about her. It's a shame as all the stuff about Rodrigo Duterte created from news clips was actually really good and did show how silly he was.
