This Is Not a Movie

For more than 40 years, journalist Robert Fisk has reported on some of the most violent and divisive conflicts in the world: Northern Ireland, the Balkans, and Syria.Yung Chang’s ‘This Is Not a Movie’ captures Fisk in action-feet on the ground, notebook in hand, as he travels into landscapes devastated by war, interviewing both combatants and ordinary folk, ferreting out the facts and firing reports back home to reach an audience of millions.As corporations devour independent media, and language becomes a weapon, another less obvious battle is taking place. In an ever-accelerating 24-hour news cycle, the process of translating raw experience into incisive and passionate dispatches requires the determination to see things first-hand and the tenacity to say what others won’t.In his relentless pursuit of the facts, Fisk has attracted his share of controversy. But in spite of the danger, he has continued to cover stories as they unfold, talking directly to the people involved, whether that’s Osama bin Laden or a young Palestinian woman whose father was recently murdered. Unlike the glamorous films that fueled Fisk’s early ambitions, justice rarely prevails, villains aren’t punished, and there are no tidy endings. As Fisk says, “the truth is that this is not a movie.”Balancing the brutal realities of the job-gun battles, bombings, genocides-with quieter moments-a cup of tea and the paper-Yung Chang has created more than a portrait of a working journalist. The fundamental compassion that drives Fisk and his fellow correspondents is necessary to unearth the heart of a story. Get the story, tell it straight, and no matter the situation, report on the side of those who suffer.In an era of fake news, when journalists are dubbed “the enemies of the people,” Fisk’s determination to challenge the centers of power, to witness reality on the ground in real time, has become an obsessive war to speak the truth.