Award-winning American filmmaker and journalist, Brent Renaud was killed on Sunday, March 13, while filming Ukrainians trying to flee Russian forces in Irpin, a suburb of the capital Kyiv.
Renaud was fatally shot when Russian troops opened fire on the car he was traveling in with American photojournalist Juan Arredondo, who was injured in the attack, as it crossed a checkpoint.
Renaud was in the region working on a TIME Studios project that “focused on the global refugee crisis,” according to a statement from Time executives.
As a filmmaker, Renaud, with his younger brother, Craig, co-founded Renaud Brothers, a small film company winning national and international awards for their documentaries. The brothers also co-founded 501 Films, the Arkansas Motion Picture Institute, and the Little Rock Film Festival.
The Little Rock Film Festival started in 2005 and was the premiere film event in Arkansas through 2015.
Bruce Hutchinson, a film professor and film program coordinator at UCA, knew Renaud.
“The brothers started the festival right around the same time we started our film program, so pretty early on, I got to know Brent and his brother through them running the Little Rock Film Festival,” Hutchinson said. “Attending the festival and for the time it ran, it was a major event in Arkansas for film, probably the major event.”
The Little Rock Film Festival did a lot for the university and Central Arkansas. Renaud visited UCA during the 2008-2009 academic year and spoke to film students. During the 2012-2013 academic year, both Renaud and Craig visited and held workshops with film students and screened the latest film they were working on, Hutchinson said.
“Every year, we try to bring in visiting filmmakers for the entire campus community, especially for film students and because they were documentary filmmaker journalism students. Renaud and Craig were a big part in helping us bring visiting filmmakers in because they had a great network of filmmakers,” Hutchinson said.
“There was a time, probably up until 2015 or so, where every year for at least six or seven years, at least one of the filmmakers, if not more, was someone Renaud and Craig helped the film program set up,” Hutchinson said.
“Overall, they were extremely supportive of the film program, especially in its early years when it was getting established. Both the film program and film festival started around the same time, so between the two of them, it really grew the film community in Central Arkansas and the state in those first five to ten years from 2005 to 2015; it really helped it emerge and become what it is today, and they were central to that and an important part of us growing as a film program and helping us get connected to the outside world,” Hutchinson said.
UCA alumnus and California-based filmmaker Justin Nickels worked with Renaud on the Little Rock Film Festival for ten years.
“There was a core group of us that worked with Brent for a long time and got to know him through the festivals; he just mentored us in different ways, often through action and discussion about what we were doing as filmmakers,” Nickels said.
“I started with the festival in 2007, so we did nine main festivals, and then we started a spin-off festival under the guise of the Little Rock Film Festival called the Little Rock Picture Show for science fiction, horror movies, and stuff like that which ran one year past the last year of the film festival, he was very supportive. So, I came to him with the idea for the other festival before another one started so we could have it in Little Rock, and he was, like, yeah, let’s do it, and how about you run it,” Nickels said.
“Brent was a very supportive person; he and Craig both seemed to believe in all of us, basically, kids who came to work the film festival,” Nickels said.
“I think it is one of the coolest experiences I’ve ever had in my life was working with that festival. I met my wife through it, and I would not have met her had she not met Brent and gone up to him and asked about volunteering. So, there’s a lot of stuff that happened because of that festival for all of us,” Nickels said.
“Brent and Craig made us realize that there’s more to filmmaking than just working on commercials or doing stuff locally. We were able to grow into bigger projects because we happen to see this world that they opened our eyes to,” Nickels said.
American journalist and correspondent for Travel Channel Christof Putzel met Renaud and Craig through documentary filmmaker John Alpert.
“I had seen a piece that they did called ‘Off to War’ under the umbrella of John Albert. But Craig and Brent made it, and I was so blown away. I’d never seen filmmaking journalism like that, especially by guys around my age. So I asked John to put us in touch, and I contacted him, and I said we got to work together,” Putzel said.
“We had a couple of false starts. First, we were supposed to go to Egypt together, and that fell apart. We went back a couple of years later, but then we were supposed to go to Haiti together, and then that fell apart. Then we finally got a story, and we went to Juarez and did a piece about gun trafficking in Mexico, which won a Columbia DuPont right out of the gate, and we worked together ever since,” Putzel said.
“I’ve been in Iraq with Brent, Egypt with Brent. We did stories in Chicago, all over Arkansas, slept in Zuccotti Park. He was the voice of Omar Hammami in my podcast; that was the last project we worked on together. I did a podcast about my relationship with this Somali terrorist or this terrorist in Somalia who was actually from Alabama. Brent was his voice in the podcast because everything was on email or encryption, and that was, you know, only Brent could do that. So, Brent produced it with me. We’ve worked together forever. Brent was such a good guy,” Putzel said.
“Brent was immense — immensely compassionate, very focused and brave as hell,” Putzel said.
“I think the quote I was saying that has gone viral everywhere is that the only thing bigger than Brent’s balls was his heart. He was very brave, very courageous, and just so focused and incredibly disciplined. There was never a break for Brent; he was always working – always working,” Putzel said.
Putzel spoke to Renaud the day before he left for Ukraine.
“The realities of war reporting are most war journalists die in car accidents, and people don’t know that,” Putzel said.
“You’re more likely to be killed in a car accident in a war, and that’s not saying wars aren’t dangerous. They’re incredibly dangerous. It’s just that car accidents in war zones are very dangerous too, because you’re often not wearing your seatbelt or on a crazy road, and the roads are bad. So, your racing, going fast, and that’s the reality,” Putzel said.
“And then there’s the reality of getting shot, blown up, kidnapped and imprisoned. These are all things that are a reality of the profession when you’re going it at it for real, and they’re the hazards that journalists take to get the story,” Puztel said.
“Here’s the thing about covering war, is that war is one of the worst things humans do — right? It is the worst because war is humans killing humans in mass capacity, which we’ve been doing, almost as long as there have been humans; it’s where we lose our humanity,” Putzel said.
“The problem is that if you can’t see it, you don’t connect with it. You don’t actually see people and the suffering and the death. You don’t have that humanity awakened inside of you to know that it’s wrong — we can’t do that,” Putzel said.
“When you hear stories about refugees, like Brent was going to do, you often hear that there are refugees everywhere, it’s a problem and hurts our jobs, whatever. It’s like, no, these are human beings. Human beings just like you who have to flee their homes — just like you one day might have to flee your home, you don’t know, and they don’t have anywhere to go. Because there’s some fucking crazy madman going insane and like, and that needs to be covered. The problem is it’s very, very hard to get up close to actually capture what that looks like, so people like Brent go out there and film it. So, all of us back home can have an understanding of what is happening over there. Because if we don’t, that is how we lose our own humanity. And so yeah, it’s fucking hell. But if we don’t go out there and do it, and journalists don’t go out there and do it, people like Brent, you won’t know what’s happening, and you know what, that’s when it does come for you. That’s how World War Two happened. People didn’t get pictures soon enough of the Holocaust, and it didn’t get out. People didn’t know that was happening, so that madman went nuts,” Putzel said.
“Right now — there’s a madman destroying a place, and he will go for the rest of Europe unless people see that this is real. This is not just a political conversation. This isn’t something to hide from or just post memes about on Facebook. This is a real war. The world is changing right now. And it’s very important to pay attention, and somebody, a local hero Brent, lost his life trying to bring that to people,” Putzel added.
“Look, we live in the attention economy now. You know, and where does the attention have to go? Look, at the end of the day, I’m human too. I understand that people can’t. Our psyches are not totally equipped to handle destruction and what is coming at this level, so sometimes yeah, your brain needs a little break to watch a dancing panda. I totally get it. I have no shame in like people like needing to check out sometimes like that is just like our capacity for dealing with what is actually happening on the planet right now,” Putzel said.
“The earth is dying with global warming. That’s very real; the political argument is over. It’s a fact, and it’s happening incredibly fast. And, and now we’ve got a World War Three that could very well break out with nuclear weapons like this is this is as intense as it gets in a moment. And, so I totally understand some people need to check out and watch TikTok. I get it. I have no shame in that. But here’s the thing to make sure you’ve swiped and watch this too because otherwise, it’s going to get worse unless the entire world rallies and stops this and figures out and goes deeper and figures out whom do you want to be? Do you want to be somebody sitting on your couch and scrolling constantly? Or do you want to figure out what your contribution is, whatever it be,” Putzel said.
“I spoke to a pastry chef today, who made the most incredible bread kano pastry that I’ve ever seen because he said he felt helpless, but he knows how to make cakes. So, he went and like meditated on this for days and days. It’s one of the more moving tributes I’ve seen because what I saw wasn’t just a cake made in Brent’s honor. What I saw was a human being going deep inside of his soul. Deeply trying to figure out who am I going to be, what is my contribution to this? You know, and like that is what everyone needs to be doing right now. Everyone needs to figure out who the fuck they are and who am I going to be in this war?” Putzel said.
Putzel found out about Renaud’s death right before the news broke via text.
“I found out within a couple of minutes of the news breaking — not long before. I think I knew 10 to 15 minutes before the news broke,” Putzel said.
“The thing about Brent is that he saw people, the light in people amongst all their suffering and struggles. That’s why he was determined to show it, you know; I think he saw it himself and in people. And I think that’s why he worked so hard and was so good at it was he just really felt he really saw people, and I think people felt seen by him. And that’s why they would open up to him almost anybody. And I think he just felt like this is stuff that needs to be seen. You know, like he just he really believed everyone’s story. Especially those that would probably otherwise not get the attention that really deserved to be told,” Putzel said.
“Brent’s projects were like his children. He was immensely proud of every project, and he worked immensely hard. Trying to do it Brent Renaud highlight reel is almost impossible because there were just so many incredible stories. His first, “Last Chance High” for HBO, “Off to War” for Discovery Times, “Meth Storm” for HBO, “Army in The Cartels, which he did with me for Current TV. Then there’s “American Jihadi,” which he did with me. “Shelter,” which he did for VICE documentary films about LGBTQ homeless kids in New Orleans, and then, of course, he won a Peabody for “Last Chance High,” and that’s just to name a few. Any one of those pieces for any other journalist, if you had even had your name associated, one of those would be a highlight of your life, you know, and that’s somebody Brent had; he was just that good,” Putzel said.
Funeral services for Renaud were held on Saturday, March 26, in The Sanctuary at Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church.
A letter from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was read during the service.
“A talented and brave journalist, Brent lost his life while documenting human tragedy, devastation and suffering of the millions of Ukrainians,” wrote Zelenskyy.