Reading: The Truth About No Lies

The chapter called The Truth About No Lies in F Is For Phony allows the reader to see what Mitchell Block did in order to create a film that has been widely seen by film students since its creation. The genius of the film is the way in which Block was able to make us think that we are watching the long take of a woman telling the story about how she was raped. Block was practically being forced to make a film so that he could graduate. He was using few actors, a small crew, and only had one location. The story seems so real because he used actual stories about women who were raped that were on a tape, which he calls "The Rape Tape". He was careful not to make the actual women who were taped seem as if they were telling the story. He used an actress who could manipulate an audience into believing that this is her story, and not simply a story that a filmmaker is trying to tell. Block also says in the reading that the catalyst for No Lies was An American Family. There are many similarities between the two, except that No Lies was fiction while An American Family was real. Both works, however, are able to create a sense of reality for the viewer because everything seems to progress in real time. No Lies rings true for so many who see it for the first time because Block researched the subject very carefully, from the way in which the women were raped to how the police officers questioned them. Block succeeded in creating a fake documentary that shows us the endless possibilities of film.