The theme for the series is "Based on a True Story." All three films -- Bernie, Stories We Tell, and Big Eyes -- purport in some way to be telling the truth, each using different cinematic techniques to do so. One question this series intends to ask is what obligation filmmakers have to stick to the facts when they claim to be making a film that is "true." And what expectations does the audience have when watching a film that is "based on a true story"?
Two quotes illustrate the contradictions inherent in these questions:
"Photography is truth. The cinema is truth twenty-four times per second." -- Jean Luc Godard
"Film is 24 lies per second at the service of truth, or at the service of the attempt to find the truth" -- Michael Haneke
I suspect that somewhere between these two statement lies the truth (pun intended).