Article in 'Moviemaker' about Reed's 'making of LN'...including all the 'research' he did!
(The article discusses 3 films, so I have extracted just the LN parts).
Journalism Plus: How Hail Satan?, The Brink, and Leaving Neverland Blend Truth-Seeking With Cinematic Storytelling
For Leaving Neverland, Reed contacted Robson and Safechuck through their lawyers. “I made my request and I think Wade and James discussed it for a while with their wives and their families and with the lawyers, as well,” says Reed. “By the time I got to meet them, I think they had decided in principle to take part. It wasn’t the usual process of convincing a documentary subject.”
The only ground rule Reed set was that neither Robson or Safechuck or their lawyers would have any editorial control.
Reed says it quickly became obvious that Leaving Neverland would require extensive sit-down interviews with the films’ subjects.
Though the interviews span an 18-month period, the bulk of Leaving Neverland was shot during five days in February, 2017: three days interviewing Robson in a log cabin in Hawaii and two days interviewing James in a house in Los Angeles.
“I reserved the right to film observational material. But very quickly, this became a film about the testimony and the human voice and the face, the drama of speech. It’s a film about people speaking a truth that is very difficult to articulate,” says Reed.
Like Klayman, Reed served as DP on Leaving Neverland, partially to put his subjects at ease and partially for practical reasons. “There’s a huge advantage in terms of flexibility and responsiveness. If you have your own equipment, you just pick up and go. You don’t need to worry about a huge crew and when they’re going to have lunch,” he says.
Documentary films rely on many of the same techniques as journalism, but moviemaking is more reliant on the craft of storytelling than breaking news. Still, when making a film about life-and-death issues and topics that are controversial enough to provoke anger (including death threats), there’s a great responsibility for moviemakers to get their facts right.
When a commissioning editor at Channel 4 in England suggested that Reed investigate controversy surrounding Michael Jackson, Reed hired a researcher, who dug into past allegations and scoured the internet, including fan forums, for leads in the story. The researcher came upon references to Robson and Safechuck, which piqued Reed’s interest.
Before taking their stories as fact, Reed interviewed former detectives and prosecutors from the two principal investigations into Jackson. He shot interviews with the LAPD and the Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Department, which had investigated Jackson, as well as the deputy DA, who was the main prosecutor in the 2005 trial. He considered making a straightforward investigative documentary using the footage, but decided to craft the film primarily out of the interviews with Robson and Safechuck and their families.
When making a film about a controversial subject, Reed suggests that moviemakers record a master interview with their subjects to check for discrepancies in their stories. Reed devoured court records from the trials as well as any statements he could find from people who had worked in the Jackson household at the time of the alleged abuse.
“Try to corroborate everything you can. Spend as much time as you can trying to pick holes in it, trying to undermine it, trying to find cracks in it. If, by the end of that process, your subject’s story still stands up, then you have a winner,” he says. After double-checking Robson and Safechuck’s accounts, Reed says he didn’t find anything that contradicted their descriptions of the sexual abuse.
Though he insisted on fact-checking, Reed felt no compunction to include a response from Jackson’s family or lawyers. Reed says his film isn’t about Jackson, but about the two families whose lives were affected by his behavior.
All three films made sure to have lawyers vetting everything early on. “Most of my films, for better or worse, are legally contentious in some way,” says Reed, whose films include Three Days of Terror: The Charlie Hebdo Attacks and Terror at the Mall. “We always have a lot of conversations with lawyers because often times the films we make piss someone off, since we’re coming out with a truth that someone doesn’t want to hear or a story that someone wants to keep hidden.”
Since a deceased person can’t be libeled (per U.S. and U.K. law), that wasn’t a concern in the case of Michael Jackson. But Reed says they were sure to “cross every ‘t’ and dot every ‘i’ ” to prevent legal issues. Though the film doesn’t feature interviews with anyone from Jackson’s camp, Reed was certain to include rebuttals and statements of his innocence by Jackson and his legal team. Jackson’s heirs have sued HBO, the film’s distributor, demanding $100 million in damages.
Reed was able to use footage of Jackson concerts, videos, and commercials due to fair use law.
Reed says he was sure to let his subjects know they could take a pause for a snack of a bathroom break. But in general, his rule is to keep the camera running and decide what to cut in the editing room.
He recalls one moment where Robson’s brother Shane broke down during an interview.
“He had tears in his eyes and he became very emotional. There was a lot of debate between the editor and me about how long we should stay on that,” says Reed.
Reed acknowledges that “it’s disturbing when people are upset in front of you, but sometimes those are the very times when you need to keep filming and remind yourself that you’re there to witness and your main job is not to co-experience.”
This article appears in MovieMaker’s Spring 2019 issue.
https://www.moviemaker.com/archives/news/journalism-plus-hail-satan-leaving-neverland-the-brink/
