Providing evidence for a philosophical claim: The Act of Killing and the banality of evil

Abstract

There has been an ongoing debate among philosophers and film theorists about whether films are capable of doing philosophy. The vast majority of the contributions to this debate have concentrated on narrative fiction films and the extent to which they are capable of producing something recognisable as philosophy.[2] This essay begins to correct this imbalance by arguing that a documentary can do philosophy. Documentaries are an important, thriving genre of contemporary filmmaking, so the failure to consider the possibility of their making a philosophical contribution is a serious lacuna in the debate about cinematic philosophy.