REMINDER: The documentary premieres on November 7 on National Geographic, Disney+, and Hulu. National Geographic produces documentary about Nikon Ambassador Lynsey Addario
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I love seeing all that Nikon gear hanging from her in the trailer for the documentary Love and War.
The movie is produced by Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin
It is mostly centered around her efforts to document the Ukraine war.
From the movie website; link below: “Oscar winners Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin (Free Solo, TIFF ’18) turn the camera on Pulitzer Prize–winning photographer Lynsey Addario as she documents the war in Ukraine and looks back on her career.
“People have a tendency to move on,” says Lynsey Addario. “It’s my job to get people to continue paying attention.” Love+War profiles the Pulitzer Prize–winning photojournalist as she risks her life for that mission. We follow her on several trips to Ukraine in recent years and trace her past two decades in the war zones of Afghanistan, Iraq, Sierra Leone, and Libya — where she was kidnapped by Muammar Gaddafi’s troops — among others.
Photojournalism has long been dominated by adrenaline-chasing men who frequently succumb to addiction, divorce, or death. War correspondent Dexter Filkins observes, “Very few people have been able to do that for any sustained period of time without destroying their lives.”
Can Addario forge a different path? That’s a question at the heart of the film. We watch her commute from multi-week trips in combat zones back to her domestic life in London with her two young sons and her journalist husband Paul de Bendern. After an exhausting journey from Ukraine to put her boys to bed, she admits, “Kids are so much harder than war.”
Filmmakers Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin (Free Solo, TIFF ’18) thrive at trying to understand what motivates people driven to extremes. In Love+War, they never shy away from the complexities, contradictions, and feelings of futility that are inherent to war reportage. Addario’s work relies on faith that she’ll capture a powerful image, that news sites will give it prominent placement, and that readers will respond. We bear witness to occasions when all those things come true.”
THOM POWERS
To learn more, go to https://tiff.net/films/love-war
Guided by her philosophy of “living the story,” Vitale has worked in more than 100 countries, often embedded for years at a time, allowing her to cultivate meaningful trust with the communities and subjects she documents. A National Geographic magazine contributor since 2008 and an Explorer since 2017, her work consistently reveals the resilience of both nature and the human spirit, reminding us that our fates are deeply intertwined. This major thematic focus has brought empathy and humanity to wildlife and conservation issues, and demonstrates a long-standing commitment to storytelling for impact and community building.