The photographer behind some of the iconic pictures of the Vietnam War is suing Netflix and the makers of a documentary that claims he didn’t take the photograph.
Photojournalist Nick Ut has lengthy been credited with taking a Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph of a unadorned younger lady fleeing a napalm assault, titled “The Terror of War.”
Ut mentioned in court docket paperwork filed in France final week that the Netflix movie, The Stringer, had broken his fame after it claimed that freelance photographer Nguyen Thanh Nghe was truly behind the well-known picture.
“These accusations strike at the very core of who I am,” Ut said in a statement. “ My entire career has been built on telling the truth, often at great personal risk.”
Ut was 21 and employed by the Associated Press when he took the award-winning {photograph}. He is searching for $116,000 in damages and $23,000 in authorized prices, based on the New York Times.
The iconic picture of nine-year-old Kim Phuc, which was taken on 8 June 1972, exhibits her working down a avenue in Trang Bang, South Vietnam, as she flees an American napalm assault.
Debate over the {photograph}’s origin started in January 2025, when The Stringer premiered on the Sundance Film Festival. While Ut had lengthy been credited because the photographer, The Stringer prompt that the photograph’s precise creator was Nghe, a Vietnamese freelance photographer.
Nghe claims he was working as a driver for an NBC information crew when he visited the city of Trang Bang and took the picture. In the movie, he mentioned he offered the picture to AP for $20 and was given a print of the photograph in alternate. Nghe mentioned the souvenir was later destroyed by his spouse.
The movie, led by Gary Knight, a journalist and founding father of the VII Foundation, which helps photojournalism, investigates these claims and later concludes that Ut didn’t take the photograph — a declare each AP and Ut deny.
Lawyers for Ut requested Netflix final fall to not distribute the movie, based on the Times. The lawsuit claimed the movie’s accusations “go far beyond the acceptable scope of journalistic investigation” and counsel “fraudulent and disloyal behavior” by Ut.
James Hornstein, a lawyer for Ut, mentioned in an announcement that his shopper introduced the motion “to defend his reputation, and not for financial gain,” including that Ut plans to donate any award for damages to charity.
The World Press Photo Foundation performed its personal investigation and mentioned in May that two different photojournalists “may have been better positioned to take the photograph than Nick Ut. Ut’s credit for the image was suspended, but another photographer was not credited for the shot.
The AP also ran its own investigation, but said it would continue to credit Ut for the photograph.
“We left nothing uncovered that we’re aware of and we’ve done it with a great deal of respect to everybody involved,” mentioned Derl McCrudden, an AP vp who heads world information manufacturing.
“It makes no difference to us if we changed the credit, but it has to be based on facts and evidence. And there is no definitive evidence proving that Nick Ut did not take this picture.”
According to the documentary, the {photograph}’s predominant topic, Kim Phuc Phan Thi, has no reminiscence of the second that was captured.
“She states that eyewitnesses, including her uncle, told her that it was Nick Ut who took the photo, and took her to the hospital,” title playing cards on the finish of the documentary learn. “She still believes that.”