Documentaries

Documentaries

 

What is a documentary?

A documentary is a film that focuses on real life and historical events where as films are mainly about fictional events. Documentaries are not staged and try to reenact life stories. They tend to do the fly on the wall and the interview techniques. Documentaries give you the opportunity to talk about subjects that films wouldn't do. For example they do this by taking a real life event like "Louis Theroux and the Nazi" and talking about real life Nazi's in America.                                                                                    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/

Codes and conventions of documentaries.

There are codes and conventions that says, what makes a documentary. Documentaries are known as non-fiction, this is because the cameras that are used are small hand held cameras so they blend in with the surroundings. this gives the feeling that people are not forced to act different in front of the camera, where as if there was a large camera crew with them they would act differently. This is also shown by the camera being shaky as the camera is being moved around following the people. This also leads to the camera looking around as if it is looking for something to film, where as a film has all the shots prepared and set up. This makes it easier when filming with a shot reverse shot across when somebody else is speaking in a conversation. All of this is done to make a documentary feel as real as possible and not planned.   

 

                                                                                             What is a expository documentary?

A expository documentary is one of the four biggest documentary techniques. They make the film based on one person or a single topic. Expository documentaries are mostly known for having a commentator talking over the images and videos explaining the story. For example "Backstairs Billy: The queen mum's butler" (1951) It is the story of him being a butler for the queen. But then loosing everything and living in a little flat. We also looked at "We Are The Lambeth Boys" (1958) where it follows a group of boys at a youth club. It also has a commentator speaking over the clips telling us about the boys.          http://www.channel4.com

What is a Observation documentary?
Observational documentaries are where a camera and sound man follow people around to observe the events that they get up to. This style of documentary don't tend to have any interviews, but the shots are long so it looks like we are with the people doing what they do. The example we watched in class was "High School" (Frederick Wiseman, 1968). I also found a good example was "War Photographer" (2001), following a shy war photographer who takes some of the worlds best and well known war photos

What is a Interactive documertary?
A Interactive documentary is about one person going around talking to people and asking for their opinions. This is most commonly used for debatable subjects. The example we used was "Louis Theroux and the Nazi" (2003) where he went around to America talking to Nazi's about their life style. This style of documentary is good when you have a debatable subject because the entire film is made up of him asking them questions which is the best way to get  answers. Another example of interactive documentaries is "welcome to the pine point2 (Michael Simons 2011) where he visited the company goggles, which is a website that looks back at a mining community in Pine Point. (Here is a link to where i found the image)     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Photographer

                                                                                            What is a Reflexive documentary?
A reflexive documentary is a more personal documentary because there are usually just the person on screen and one or two camera men. This makes it more realistic and real for the viewers to watch. You even see the camera men in these type of documentary, the best example of this is Nick Broomfield. In his documentary "Driving Me Crazy" you see the camera men looking at them selves in the mirror. This makes the documentary more about the making of the film instead of the subject. This makes the film more connected to the film maker and the viewer instead of the film makers and the subject.
http://documentarystartshere.blogspot.co.uk/2009_10_01_archive.html

What is a Performative documentary?
A performative documentary is more emotional than others because they talk about subjects where, for example a person has been scammed from someone they try and track them down and resolve the situation. A good example of this is the TV show "Cowboy Builders" where they track down builders that have done a bad job on people's houses and they purposely set up a meeting with them so they can see them and get an explanation to why they did a bad job. They do these type of documentaries to show people what bad things happen happen every day life and that they can be solved and with re-enactments their help to attract the audience to the diegesis.                  http://www.ricochet.co.uk

Conclusion

I think that documentaries are the best way to tell a large audience about a subject, person or even a group of people. They manage to tell you the story through interviews and images which is very different but is the most effective way to get answers and people's opinions. with documentaries they do tell the Truth with what they know but they do manage to manipulate what the people say by cutting the interviews so the audience hears what the film maker wants then to hear. A good example of this is Michael Moore because in "Bowling For Columbine" he goes into a bank and the same day he leaves with a gun, but we know it was filmed over two days and he asks questions that manipulate the people but when they start to answer it cuts away so we dont hear the answer. This is good because he is making you confused which is good because it is in a way mocking the bank because they also sell guns which is confusing