Which 2004 documentary about children of prostitutes in Kolkata won the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature? The answer is Born into Brothels.
Born into Brothels: Calcutta's Red Light Kids is an Indian-American documentary written and directed by Zana Briski and Ross Kauffman. It centers on children living in Sonagachi, Kolkata, one of Asia's largest red-light districts, whose mothers worked as sex workers.
Briski originally went to Kolkata to photograph sex workers. After befriending their children, she taught them photography and gave them cameras. Their images became a central part of the film, offering the children a way to document their own surroundings rather than appearing only as subjects of outside observation.
The film won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature at the 77th Academy Awards in 2005, recognizing its 2004 release. It is sometimes confused with The Cove or Darwin's Nightmare, but those documentaries concern marine conservation and global trade, respectively. The film also generated criticism from sex-worker organizations, which argued that it presented the community unfairly and raised ethical questions about documentary filmmaking.