Good documentaries to watch:
Grizzly Man
Supersize Me
When We Were Kings
The Act of Killing
Spellbound
Sicko
The Future is Unwritten
Amy
Features a lot of intertextuality (referencing other media), i.e. having celebrities on it to talk about her. Doesn't rely on prior knowledge of people, unlike The Future is Unwritten.
Focuses on personal life not music to create an ideology of tragedy - mediation
Amy Vs The Future is Unwritten
Amy felt constructed, attempts to add verisimilitude
Lift
Purely negotiated reading, not lead down any path.
What we take away from a documentary is not what we see, but what we feel and think about, how it effects our outlook, which is the opposite of narrative film.
It's arguable that we can only capture our own reality for documentary - as reality depends on the perceiver. This brings up the question 'can documentary show the truth of a situation?
John Grierson - documentary is the creative treatment of actuality (what's actually happened)
Not easy to get an accurate representation of someone in 30 minutes, people are a lot more nuanced than that
History
Pre 1900: films that showed events taking place
1920s onwards: the romanticized form of documentary. Staged scenes, director controlling action
1940s: propaganda documentary
So ideology is present, even when someone is trying to represent 'reality' - we all define our own reality
Night Mail
Made in 1936 - documents overnight delivery
Huge work of artistic merit, but how accurate? Some studio use and set ups means it's not accurate
As time has gone on, the need to inform and educate has been, to some extent, overtaken by the need to entertain
Cinema Verite
Relies upon technological advancements
- Small crews - in modern documentaries there's usually camera/director, sound/editor and presenter
- Portable equipment
- Quiet equipment
- Cheaper film stock
Edited into the finished product
How much of this is 'real'? How much is the creation of the editor
Modern Age
Rise in digital technology
Everyone has a camera - we have more footage of every event
Also can switch from different types of footage with digital editing where we couldn't before
Change in form from verbal to visual
Editing is now the most important aspect - where ideology is formed. Process of focusing, organizing (putting them in order to create narrative) and selecting material (where does the camera want us to look)
Media being used is documentary film - the way we work within its limits and how they affect the way we choose our material is called mediation, which = ideology
How does this use of technology - clips, assist Kapardia in getting his preferred reading across for Amy?
Broomfield shows everything but doesn't really shape into a narrative - shows his investigation to make it genuine, not to make points.
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