BAFTA winner Andy Mundy-Castle follows the activist and photographer, Misan Harriman, during the year of his Oscar nomination in this portrait of a portraitist, Shoot the People.
Misan Harriman has spent the last 6 years bearing witness to the world’s pain and protest, capturing the strength and resilience of activist movements across the UK and US. In this new full-length documentary, Shoot the People, Andy Mundy-Castle follows Harriman across three continents, revealing the life and work of the photographer and Southbank Centre chair, otherwise unseen. Nigerian-born, English-raised, the documentary explores Harriman’s upbringing and his neurodivergence, but most of all, the art and drive behind his powerful photography. This film comes mere months after figures such as Tracy Emin, Greta Thunberg and Brian Cox defended Harriman over the controversy surrounding his speaking out against Reform, a matter that embodies his outspoken activist nature.
It starts with chaos and crisis, foregrounding Shoot the People with the context of Harriman’s work. Loud sirens and chants mix with a visual dissonance as shaky cameras show riots and police brutality, setting the scene for the world that Harriman’s art was born out of. Misan Harriman started photography merely as an amateur passion, with no intention of greatness. In 2020, his brutal, black-and-white reportage-style photography of BLM protests gained him global virality and led him to be the first Black photographer to shoot a Vogue cover, the same year. After this dramatic start, we’re met with the stillness of Misan’s home, and a calm, articulate man working on his camera. The documentary continues to artfully balance these levels as it follows Harriman on-site at demonstrations, at home reflecting, and in conversations with powerful activists and community leaders about the power of protest.
There’s a dignity and gravitas to the documentary’s formal style that blends well with Harriman’s own photography. Refined drone pans and interviews are spliced with archival footage and portraits Harriman can be seen taking in the film. There’s a reflective use of archival voiceovers, as the voices of MLK, Peter Magubane, and other civil rights speakers can be heard over scenes of unrest, both in gathered and shot footage. Mundy-Castle resists a singular focus, framing Harriman alongside the people fighting for equality, civil rights, and social justice. Across the UK, the US and South Africa, the film follows various grassroots movements, shining a light on their causes and their dedication.
At one emotional crux of the documentary, Harriman travels to Johannesburg and visits Peter Magubane’s estate shortly after Magubane died in early 2024. Speaking to his conservator, the two discuss at length the impact of Magubane’s work, life and legacy on both of them, reflecting on the photographer’s wisdom and his images that continue to narrate the horrors of South Africa’s apartheid. A poignant quote comes out of this interaction, which becomes the message, almost mantra-like, of Harriman’s work and this documentary: “A struggle without documentation is no struggle”. It paints Harriman, in part, as Magubane’s artistic successor, granting him a stature he has not yet fully earned but may grow into. Still, this moment shows both the inspirations and aspirations that drive the artist forward, and places him in the greater context of those who came before.
Shifting focus to the US, the film then depicts the photographer at the centre of two worlds colliding: the Academy Awards and the pro-Palestine protests against them. Harriman, nominated for an Oscar for his short film The After, is seen conflicted by the convergence of his work’s grounding and its success. This gives the documentary a compelling tension, with Harriman caught between validation and resistance, desperately wanting to be part of both worlds at once. He sits on both sides of the picket lines, and this moment serves as a broader reflection on the complex entanglement of art and activism today.
Shoot the People reflects on the good fight beyond Misan Harriman’s work and current affairs, mapping historical civil rights movements and highlighting their pioneers. It does well to shine a light on a range of protest groups, including Khulumani Galela and the University of Johannesburg’s students for Palestine demonstration, who are poignantly paralleled to show that the fight for social change resonates across generations. It becomes more than a documentary about a man in the year he’s nominated for an Oscar, reflecting, with visual weight, on the greater importance of resistance.
The documentary ends where Harriman’s work started: the wake of George Floyd’s death. Visiting East 38th Street and Chicago Avenue, where Floyd was killed, and his memorial remains, Harriman joins an anniversary celebration to honour his name and impact on the world. Talking to Floyd’s childhood friends, activists and community leaders, the documentary does well to continuously shift the focus from Harriman to the causes he bears witness to. Emotional and resonant, the documentary comes full circle, moving through Harriman’s career, his inspiration and the people who pioneer the movements he records, and ending on something bigger. It shows Harriman as part of the picture of change, rather than branding him as the change itself, and this is where Shoot the People finds its greatest strength.
Shoot the People arrives in UK cinemas on July 6.
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