Collateral Murder

Collateral Murder (2017), deliberately borrowing its title from the declassified WikiLeaks video unveiling a war crime committed by the US army in Iraq. Filmed from the gunsight of an Apache helicopter with a thermal camera, the footage vividly captures the indiscriminate killing of individuals, accompanied by the sounds of the pilots laughing callously.

In a unique approach, the project borrows a segment of the authentic sound recording and merges with another short video from the popular video game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. This gaming sequence depicts a mission where the player takes command of a plane’s weapons, supporting an ally commando on the ground. The player's viewpoint, captured through the gunsight with a thermal camera, mirrors the imagery exposed by WikiLeaks.

The newly edited video was then presented to an audience who had been given a similar context of the one provided by WikiLeaks – the video is a declassified evidence of a war crime committed by the US army in Iraq. Only a few observers discerned an interesting resemblance with a video game yet no one had questioned the narrative or the authenticity of the footage.

The presentation had sparked a thoughtful follow-up conversation, pointing out the technical advancement in the recreation of war footage across various mediums, including video games, but also the increasing difficulty to distinguish reality from simulation. Collateral Murder (2017), encourages reflection on the evolving landscape of visual storytelling in diverse media, while also raising concerns about the growing difficulty in deciphering what is real or not; what is partially manipulated, transformed, and true.