I watched the trailer for a film made by some acquaintances of mine yesterday. During this there was a scene with a small child, witnessing a fight between two adults, and walking away from it clearly extremely distressed, sobbing, saying 'Ma-ma' in that broken way children do when they are horribly upset or frightened.
I couldn't watch it again to check whether it was possible the child was edited into the scene so not actually crying because of the fighting, that it wasn't really her Mum, and she was upset for some other reason.
The child looked about 4.
Whatever the reason for the crying, it was not acting. It was genuine fear or distress, that much was obvious and it was incredibly painful to watch.
I'm pretty shocked that they thought it was Ok to use footage of a child in real distress, and also wondering what happened to make her so distressed, and if they just allowed it because they needed the footage for the film?
I kind of need someone to reassure me here. I absolutely hate seeing children crying in TV or films, because I think the same thing - they let them cry, or they may have even made them cry.?
This is wrong, isn't it?