Forbidden Lie$ (2007, Anna Broinowski) (Patreon)

73/100

Remember the uncomfortably riveting scene in Shattered Glass that sees editor Charles Lane accompany Stephen to the site of a Jukt Micronics party the latter had reported on, seeking evidence that this gathering had in fact ever taken place? And the way that every exposed lie ("Building's closed on Sunday") merely triggered a hasty revision ("That's why the Russells only stayed a few minutes, okay. Because it was such a dumb place to squeeze into") that seemed like it was almost certainly another lie? Imagine that going on for the length of an entire movie, and then further imagine someone who lies far, far more smoothly than did Christensen's Glass—so smoothly and persuasively, in fact, that you're never remotely confident about what's true and what's bullshit, even after watching her change her story multiple times upon getting caught. 

I knew nothing of Norma Khouri and Forbidden Love (or Honor Lost, as her book was titled in the U.S.) prior to sitting down, and probably wouldn't have been stoked for yet another documentary about a literary or journalistic hoax (though Broinowski's film predates some of the others I've seen, and my friend Victor, who requested it, started beating the drum back in 2009). But, then, neither was I remotely looking forward to Author: The JT LeRoy Story, which you'll find on my 2016 top 10 list. In both cases, what fascinates isn't so much the scandal itself as the bizarre personality behind it. It's truly remarkable to witness Khouri—who, like the real Stephen Glass (by all reports), comes across as immensely personable and likeable, someone you instinctively want to believe—deflect every accusation in real time, confidently pivoting to the next level of her fundamental pitch (which amounts to "The story you have seen is true; only all of the details have been changed to protect the innocent"). Over time, the movie itself becomes recursive: director Anna Broinowski starts appearing onscreen halfway through, functioning as the dogged Chuck Lane skeptic, and we get more and more scenes in which other interview subjects look at and respond to footage of Khouri's statements from earlier in the film, followed by Khouri's often surprisingly convincing rebuttal. (Incredibly, Australian journalist Malcolm Knox, who won an award for exposing Khouri's real personal history and detailing Forbidden Love's many blatant falsehoods, sorta becomes this movie's villain, even though Broinowski by no means supports Khouri's version[s] of events. To quote The Dude, he's not wrong, he's just an asshole.) Matters are enormously complicated by the inconvenient fact that certain claims Khouri makes, firmly denied by others, eventually prove to be accurate—she's not the only liar on view. Even the amazing "secret" footage we see, in which Khouri more or less brags about the phony info she's feeding Broinowski (correctly predicting that Broinowski will at some point dig deep enough to see through it), can only be in the film because Khouri volunteered it (we'd surely have been told had it been obtained in any other way), and that paradoxically tends to support Khouri's overarching insistence that her lies are meant to shield the identity of her murdered friend's family. Whenever she talks about that, or about having written the book in an effort to generate international outrage about honor killings, she seems utterly sincere, and I find myself leaning toward the extremely unlikely hypothesis that she's a noble con artist. 

For many years, Victor and I have engaged in spirited philosophical debate regarding whether "acting" as oneself in a nonfictional context should qualify as an awards-eligible performance. His contention has always been that while most people in documentaries are merely being themselves, a select few are essentially playing a character who happens to share their own name and circumstances. In the 2009 Skandies, he gave Khouri 30 points—the maximum allowed—for Best Actress, and while she received only one other 5-point vote, and placed only 24th, I gotta say: in this case, I get it. (The film takes a similar stance, running a cast list at the end that credits Khoury as The Artist.) Indeed, knowing nothing about Forbidden Lie$ or its subject matter in advance, and having successfully resisted the strong temptation to pause early on and investigate, I spent some time wondering whether perhaps the entire movie were pure fiction, à la [TITLE ELIDED]. Were that the case, I felt, Khouri, or whoever played Khouri, must be the only professional actor of the bunch—everyone else looks slightly self-conscious on camera, whereas she appears genuine and relaxed and so must paradoxically (again!) be skillful enough to hide evidence of rehearsal. How that same logic applies equally to one's existence in the real world I'll leave as a very simple exercise for the reader. I could have lived without Broinowski underlining her theme in cutesy ways (the film's chapter headings involve Khoury literally blowing smoke, accompanied by the riff from Santana's version of "She's Not There"), and the structure's quite clunky, at least in hindsight, with an expository first act that treats Knox's exposé as a big twist to be withheld for as long as possible. (We practically get a record scratch when the shift occurs.) Conducting interviews in an all-white room with a TV monitor towering high overhead is a bit much, too, not even sure what the intention was there other than gratuitous artsiness. On the whole, though, this is a singularly slippery movie that shanks the very concept of trustworthiness and leaves it to bleed out.