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Kevin Carter was part of a tightly knit band of South African photojournalists known
as "The Bang Bang Club" - four friends who found their calling in the war-ravaged black
townships as apartheid was coming to a violent close.
Yet his most evocative image
came not from South Africa, but from southern Sudan, where he traveled to photograph
the mass starvation caused by a devastating civil war in 1993.
In the dreadful desert
plains, Carter happened upon a horrifying sight: a starving girl being stalked by a vulture.
The photograph won a Pulitzer Prize, but Carter was tormented by both the praise and
the criticism it inspired, committing suicide a few weeks after receiving the award.
Featuring interviews with colleagues, friends and family, THE DEATH OF KEVIN
CARTER: CASUALTY OF THE BANG BANG CLUB reveals how he was troubled by the
response to his Pulitzer Prize-winning work.
The photo became instantly famous after it
appeared on the front page of the New York Times, while Carter himself became
notorious. He embodied a classic dilemma facing journalists: whether to be witness to,
or savior of, the subjects they depict.
Many critics asked why Carter didn't "take off his
photographer's hat" and rescue the child from a dangerous situation. Haunted by all that
he had seen - as well as the decisions he made both as a photojournalist and a human
being - Carter committed suicide a few weeks after receiving the Pulitzer Prize.
First-time filmmaker Dan Krauss heard about Kevin Carter when he began working
as a news photographer more than ten years ago. Carter's story was a cautionary tale
about the risks of witnessing human suffering. Looking deeper into the photo, Krauss
saw the toll that living and photographing in a war-ravaged world had taken on Carter.
And in speaking with the photographer's loved ones, Krauss learned that it was not only
the violence that haunted Carter, but also his own mortality.
"In his famous picture of the vulture stalking the Sudanese girl, I began to see the
embodiment of his troubled psyche," explains Krauss. "I believe Kevin did, too. In the
starving child, he saw Africa's suffering; in the preying vulture, he saw his own face."
Carter's daughter, Megan Carter, says, "I see my dad as the suffering child. And
the rest of the world is the vulture."
Dan Krauss is a San Francisco-based filmmaker who is involved in a number of
nonfiction projects both as a producer and a cinematographer. He previously worked as
a professional photojournalist shooting on assignments throughout the U.S. and in Africa
and the Middle East. In addition to an Oscar® nomination, THE DEATH OF KEVIN
CARTER: CASUALTY OF THE BANG BANG CLUB received a 2005 Student Academy
Award®.
The documentary has been optioned by a major studio for a feature film, with
Krauss serving as executive producer.
THE DEATH OF KEVIN CARTER: CASUALTY OF THE BANG BANG CLUB is
directed and produced by Dan Krauss.
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