Taiwan must rein in rampant paparazzi culture

At the same time, Besson slammed paparazzi for disrupting the shooting of his latest film by taking photographs of lead actress Scarlett Johansson, calling the constant press intrusion “a nightmare”. The incident came two days after vehicles driven by Besson’s crew were almost hit by media, both foreign and local, during another segment of the filming in Taipei. The near crash not only affected the filming progress and the work of the acclaimed director, but also put Taiwan’s growing paparazzi culture under the spotlight.

 

An embarrassment

Certainly, it is normal to see the media trying to take pictures of such important productions, but negotiating a pre-arranged reporting plan with the media should not be a precondition to working peacefully. The string of incidents was not only an embarrassment for the country, but it could also potentially affect future plans by other overseas film-makers, including Oscar-winning US director Martin Scorsese, who is scheduled to shoot here in June 2014.

“Lucy” was the biggest Hollywood film shot here since Ang Lee filmed a large part of his 3D epic adventure Life of Pi in Central and Southern Taiwan in 2012. If authorities want to promote Taiwan as a major hub of cinema activities in the future, however, providing a huge variety of prestigious or evocative locations and a profusion of talented and highly experienced cinema professionals is not enough. We (the media) must fight the country’s growing “paparazzi culture” by rewarding better journalism ethics.

As unsavoury as some paparazzi may be, we must admit that it’s fairly difficult to craft a law aimed at reining them in because it would clash with the rights of a free press. 

The best way to cope with this issue in the short term is to more aggressively enforce existing laws against driving too close, speeding, trespassing – and jaywalking. Increasing penalties for reckless driving, for instance, would be beneficial to everybody, not only the rich and famous.

Speaking to reporters on Friday, Besson argued it was his right to keep details such as Johansson’s hairstyle and dresses out of the public eye until his film was released. The problem is that the media also considered it their right to publish news about the filming. From an editor’s perspective, we must admit that most of the rumours about the director’s mood and the script were unfounded. 

Over the last two weeks, media outlets in Taiwan, Hong Kong and the United States have been quoting each other in saying that Besson was thinking about cutting short his shoot in Taipei.

Instead of feeling sorry for our continuous shortcomings and hoping that we might get it right next time, we should wish that Taipei doesn’t follow our lead and further discredit itself by allowing such reckless behaviour by Hong Kong media outlets.