[yasr_overall_rating]
An expose of rape crimes on U.S. college campuses, their institutional cover-ups, and the devastating toll they take on students and their families.
Having not seen any of Kirby Dick’s other documentaries (“The Invisible War,” “Outrage”), I did not know what to expect as far as style or his ability to captivate an audience but I was intrigued by the focus of his newest documentary. “The Hunting Ground” seeks to expose the epidemic of sexual assaults on U.S. college campuses and the lack of institutional aid and systematic victim shaming. Having lived on a college campus for four years, this issue comes as no surprise. The documentary starts out with home-style videos of hopeful students discovering whether or not they’ll be attending the college of their choice. The ecstatic screams, jumps for joy and overflowing tears of unrelenting happiness is a foreboding juxtaposition of what is to come: injustice and betrayal by the very institutions of higher education that are meant to nurture and foster its students in hopes that these individuals, with the education and experiences they have received from these institutions, will aid the world with their particular talents and be the future every generation dreams of being.
We are then met with interviews of young women (and a few men) who have experienced sexual assault on campus. Their stories are raw, you can feel the intensity sucking the life out of you and filling you with confusion, disappointment and rage as you find that with each case there is the similar result of victim shaming and the administration doing nothing. They insult these women with questions like, “What were you wearing? Were you drinking? Did you lead him on? What would you do differently?” and so on. Essentially the administration urged the girls to move on and even supplied excuses for their perpetrators that were as silly as, “Maybe he has a lot going on.”
In between these interviews we are also hit with a slew of facts and figures concerning the number of sexual assault reports and the lack of action taken against those accused. Although these configurations are helpful for some, and are good for building a case, the mass quantity of them seems unnecessary. For me, they do not add to the seriousness of the issue but rather make the film a bit cluttery and fragmented in some instances. We also see archival and vérité footage that suggests the issue of sexual assault has a deep-rooted history on college campuses, as well as a history of inflammatory reactions both by students and administrators. Ultimately, reasons for “shooing” these young women (and men) away are connected to money, as well as prestige. These well known schools (Harvard, Berkley & Notre Dame to name a few) fear they will not receive their usual ample donations from alumni, applicants, and other institutions if their reputations are tainted with sexual assault cases.
The shining focus of the film is the stories of Annie Clark and Andrea Pino, both who were sexually assaulted at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and had similar experiences of being shamed and ignored by the administration. They connected with other students at other universities and started a grassroots movement that reaches out to the women and men affected by sexual assault, helping them file Title IX complaints against universities, which have led to investigations by the U.S. Department of Education. Their actions have been met with both encouraging and disparaging comments from social media. Students affected by sexual assault tell them their stories and support their movement while others send death threats, as if their movement were merely women complaining and causing a stir over nothing.
Overall, despite there being an overwhelming amount of statistics spattered throughout the film (and an unnecessary song by Lady Gaga and Diane Warren that is more distracting, bordering maudlin, than inspiring), “The Hunting Ground” is an absolute necessity to watch. The epidemic of sexual assault cases on college campuses is but a microcosm of a wider world where we have perpetuated a culture where rape and victim shaming is the social norm.
Opens at the Magnolia in Dallas April 3rd
