Case Study—Global Lives Project
Case Study—Global Lives Project
The Making-of a Global Film
Video to Spark Global Empathy
We all have the desire or passion to contribute in some form to the relevant issues of our time, and for me, it’s about cross-cultural empathy. Through Global Lives, I can better envision a world where all people are valued equally, and treated with dignity.
I grew up in a bi-cultural household, with a Hungarian-American father and Japanese mother. My husband is Indian-Canadian and my brother’s wife is Vietnamese. Not one of us look related at family holiday gatherings.
The method of expression and communication in each of our cultures is very vastly different. Yet, for my brother and me, this dichotomy was a natural part of everyday life. From this lived experienced, I feel we are better equipped to see two sides of a coin.
Viewers watch day-in-life videos unfold in this Global Lives Project exhibit at Creative Commons.
What we see and experience informs our actions and our decisions. If you can view someone who is vastly different from you, in a friendly, familiar light, that’s one step towards empathy, and one set towards a world in which each of us have equal value.
But—what if we can’t personally experience diversity? What if we’re surrounded by like-minded people? What if we don’t have the means to travel? Then how can we truly relate to people vastly different from ourselves?
Video can be our transport.
Imagine being immersed by 10 videos of the daily lives of people around the world. These 24-hour-videos of human life experience allow us to slowly make connections to an individual living an entirely different life than our own.
It’s a powerful experience to soak in humanity all at once. That’s what drew me to work with the Global Lives Project as both a strategic leader for almost a decade, and on the ground as a filmmaker in Vietnam. Through Global Lives, I can better envision a world where all people are valued equally, and treated with dignity.
And that human connection starts on the ground as we film with our participants, and then continues with how our audience interacts with our content.
The 24-Hour Challenge
It was the ultimate filmmaking challenge, a crazy adventure, and a collaboration between worlds.
As director of a Global Lives shoot with Lê Huyền, I was excited to soak in life on the Mekong River, but also apprehensive.
Could my crew and I logistically direct a shoot in which we continuously film for 24 continuous hours? Off a boat? In the middle of rural Vietnam? In a region suspicious about filmmakers? In a language I didn’t know? And at the same time help our participant feel comfortable, feel truly represented?
Naomi and crew greet Huyền before her life story interview
Documentary filmmaking is unique in that we’re working with real people, living real lives. And because of that, it’s so important to make authentic connections with those we film—to honor their participation, and to ensure their story is true to them.
Luckily, my crew was phenomenal to collaborate with, and more than half of us were Vietnamese speakers. We truly represented multiple cultures. My co-producers were Vietnamese filmmakers who had worked in the Mekong region for years. My co-director was a former monk from Tibet, and my photographer was a bi-racial artist from NYC. And although our personalities were vastly different, it worked out.
Life in the Mekong Delta revolves around the river. Huyền sleeps under the stars and wakes up as the sun rises to begin work on the boat: cleaning, driving the barge, buying produce from river boats that pull up, and cooking fresh meals on the boat. Her boat is a sand barge that dredges sand from the bottom of the river and transports it to riverside villages.
Huyền drives the barge as we continue to film for 24-hours
Tsering films as Huyền and her boat workers eat lunch.
From the production perspective, there is an intimacy when filming someone for 24 hours. Although you aren’t speaking, you begin to get to know each other. Huyền and I don’t share a language, but we shared smiles, and even laughed at universal jokes.
We noticed how slowly the day unraveled, almost meditative, as we floated on the river. Huyền and her husband would sit for hours and hours patiently floating, sitting, and often in silence. They seemed so content.
And that night, she slept at her family’s home, only accessibly by a tributary, where an extended family gathered together to share a meal, laugh and play games.
And behind the camera, Huyền’s family offered us mosquito nets as we continued to film into the night. The last whispers died down, and it was silent for hours. Then, at 3:30am, the first rooster began to crow.
Traveling by water was the only way to get to Huyền’s village.
An Immersive Video Exhibit
Imagine a video exhibit, in which you are surrounded by 10 huge screens of the daily lives of others around the world. You become immersed in someone’s 24-hour day as it slowly unravels. Being able to step inside someone else’s world is so powerful and eye-opening. You are transported out of your own reality, and into someone else’s reality.
Global Lives premieres at the Yerba Center for the Arts to a crowd of over 1,000
What I think is interesting is in the way we present it, unraveling in real time. We can explore the texture of everyday human experience, unraveling in real time—waking up, making food, eating breakfast, laughing at a joke.
This unedited, raw form is the ultimate and purest form of documentary. There is no other narrative other than the unraveling of the day, and so it itself up for dialogue; it allows for multiple narratives. You can place yourself into this person’s day.
Photographer Elena Togashi with the kids in Huyền’s village
We see the value in other human beings, no matter what their nationality, culture, or belief systems. Together, we are building a culture of empathy. And empathy is the foundation of thriving cultures.
A Truly Global Project
With more than 1,000 collaborators worldwide, we’ve built a truly global project with widespread impact. Global Lives Project features more than 500 hours of footage of the daily life of 20 people from 17 countries. We are a three-time National Endowment for the Arts award recipient. In partnership with Stanford, we’ve built a curriculum from ground up. People from 182 countries have visited our website, and we’ve held exhibits and screenings at dozens of venues worldwide including the Smithsonian, United Nations University, Lincoln Center and the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Learn more or participate at www.globallives.org
