Refusing Dramatisation: Cinematic Strategy as an Ethical Stance in the Documentary Film "Kumpul" (A Glimpse of Palu Liquefaction)
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.22487/ejk.v13i1.2786Keywords:
Participatory Documentary, Palu Liquefaction, Collective Memory, Ethics of Trauma Representation, Practice-Based ResearchAbstract
This article presents a practice-based analysis of the documentary film “KUMPUL” (A Glimpse of Palu Liquefaction, 2021), a participatory documentary capturing the collective memory of two survivor families from the Palu liquefaction disaster of September 28, 2018. The study examines how the film’s cinematic choices, uniform framing, rejection of disaster footage, absence of supporting music, and formal interview style simultaneously function as representational strategies and ethical stances toward survivors’ trauma. The researcher is also the filmmaker of the work under analysis; methodological transparency regarding this position, including systematic bias management protocols, is therefore foregrounded. The study employs a practice-based research framework combined with reflective textual analysis. Specifically, the analysis finds that uniform framing functions as a mechanism for equalising testimonial authority among subjects, while the absence of music transfers the entire dramaturgical burden to subjects’ oral narratives.
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