Two-time Academy Award–winning documentarian Barbara Kopple and her co-filmmakers, Bob Eisenhardt and Marijana Wotten, spent a year talking to and following around five female foreign correspondents, all of whom will eventually converge on Baghdad for the war or the insurgency. Molly Bingham, Mary Rogers, Marie Colvin, May Ying Welsh, and Janine Di Giovanni have variously reported or photographed for Newsweek, the Washington Post, CNN, Vanity Fair, Al-Jazeera, and the Times of London, from Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka, Israel, Sarajevo, Rwanda, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and East Timor. While winning dozens of awards, they have lost many relationships, several husbands, and one eye. They also smoke too much. As much as these intelligent and resourceful women admit to being adrenaline junkies, they also want to change the “darkness” they report on—to “make a difference,” even if saying those words makes them wince. Such journalists make the profession proud, as well as shame the safe-niche stay-at-homes who specialize in media criticism.

A&E
May 26, 9 to 11 P.M.

Related:

• Archive: “Television”
• Articles by John Leonard
• Table of Contents: May 30, 2005 issue of New York | Subscribe!