Off Limits

"What if they took this all away from us?" In 1998 a Québécois street photographer was successfully sued by one of his subjects, who claimed that he violated her privacy by taking her picture out in public. He uses this ruling to explore the social, artistic and ethical concerns around street photography. This is a passionate and convincing documentary that seeks to defend the rights of the photographer and tries to see where we should be drawing the line in terms of what is acceptable and what isn’t. Do you have the rights to your image, or is a photograph more like a painting? I like the film but I don’t entirely agree with the takes Duclos has in Off Limits. I think he yearns for the mid 20th century where most people taking photographs were either artists or holiday makers, but in 2005 when the film was made it was clear that the writing was on the wall for this style of candid photography. One person he interviews rues being called a creep for photographing a little girl in…