Sunday, April 29, 2007

WATCHING THE HURRICANE & WONDERING WHO'S TELLING THE TRUTH

I watched a movie last night about Rubin "The Hurricane" Carter, a very long but inspiring movie about the black welterweight boxer (portrayed by Denzel Washington,) who was allegedly wrongly convicted of murder and had to serve 22 years in prison before being set free by a federal court.

I say "alleged" because after watching the film I searched the internet for more details about Carter's case and lo and behold I come across at least two websites claiming that Rubin Carter was really guilty of the crime,and that the movie was full of inaccuracies.

This leads me to a concern I have about how media handles the truth. If the producers of the movie were aware of the inaccuracies but went ahead and showed it to the public (to make money) then, isn't this being irresponsible? Whom will the public believe?

I know that Hollywood exaggerates a lot of what it shows in movies to make a film sell more but at least it must base its premise on truth.

I shudder at the thought that my all time favorite stations, National Geographic & Discovery Channel, would go to the extent of bending the truth too much in order to get more advertising money!