Salt of the Earth (2015)

Wim Wenders is not one to shy away from difficult subjects as a film maker, and this is no exception.  In this documentary he trains his camera on photographer Sebastiao Salgado and the result is an invigorating and interesting observation of the man, his work and the entire medium of photography.
Salgado originally studied economics and worked for the World Bank in France after being exiled from his home country in 1969, before deciding to give it all up in order to pursue a career in photography. After his first major project, a photographic chronicle of South America, he began a series of expansive projects in which he used his keen eye and ability to create striking images to create works that allowed viewers to bear witness to glimmers of hope and humanity in the face of almost unimaginable misery. There are quite a few dead bodies in his work, which is wide ranging but largely man's inhumanity to man are laid out, from the refugee camps in Ethiopia to the massacre in Rwanda, and the war in the former Yugoslavia.  He then turned his attention to beauty across the globe as a means of healing after bearing witness to atrocities for decades.  He has an incredible eye, and the film is a testament to the power of visual imagery to begin to tell a story.