Documentary film

1. Documentary film • Minds on the power of the camera • Think positive • Today, you will be able to • Recognize the construction of reality in documentary film • Extension question for further thought • Do we as viewers see the same phenomenon in reality television?

2. What is it? • Examples? • What distinguishes it from other genres? • What purpose does it serve, or aim to serve? Documentary film ‘Fahrenheit 9/11’ (US gross $119m), ‘March of the Penguins’ (US gross $77m) ‘Bowling for Columbine’ (US gross $21m)

3. General Ideas of Documentary Films • Documentary = a factual film or television programme about an event, person, etc., presenting the facts with little or no fiction. • Documentary = A film whose representation of its subjects that viewers are intended to accept primarily as factual. A documentary film may present a story or it may not.

4. Position in question • Are they strictly non-fiction films? • Is the world depicted real? • The filmmaker observes and makes an objective record of real events?

5. First documentary film • Nanook of the North(1922) - about the daily lives of an Eskimo called Nanook and his family in the Belcher Islands in arctic Canada • Listen with and without sound

6. First documentary film • Truth and fiction • Recording and construction • Scenes planned in advance • … Discussion between Flaherty and Inuits about the filming of the walrus hunt. They may have to give up the kill if it interferes with the film. • …The reply: “yes, yes, the Aggie will come first, not a man will stir, not a harpoon will be thrown until you give the sign.” • A harpoon was made specially for the film

7. Categories: Documentary • Scottish John Grierson (1898-1972) is regarded as the founder of the documentary movement in Britain in Canada. • Grierson defined documentary as “the creative treatment of actuality”. Q. Think of the phrase ‘creative treatment’. List ways in which documentary makers can treat real events in a creative manner.

8. Construction of reality • Typically, the audience views • Filmed in selected mise-en-scène • Filmed events are ordered and reshaped in particular montage • Not recorded but constructed reality • Addition of voiceover a good example

9. Alternate realities Supersize Me Me and Mickey D • Gained 24½ lbs • 13% body mass increase • Experienced mood swings, sexual dysfunction, and fat accumulation in his liver • 14 mos. to lose the weight • Used a vegan diet • Soso Whaley ate nothing but McDonald’s • 2,000 calories a day • Lost weight

10. Supersize me vs. Me and Mickey D’s • Why such different results? • Technical aspects – more calories, etc. • Why reveal such different results? • The filmmakers each have a motive or a message • “The medium is the message.” • Marshall McLuhan • The form of a medium embeds itself in the message, creating a symbiotic relationship by which the medium influences how the message is perceived

11. Documents for examination Join those who examined the same document as yourself Synthesize your findings into two overarching points for the purpose of sharing with the class an inconvenient truth

12. Narrative: Rhetorical Narrative Typical features of rhetorical narrative are that it: • Presents a reasoned argument • Appeals to the emotions • Addresses the audience directly e.g. to camera or by voiceover • Uses repeated motifs to emphasise its argument e.g. recurring images, sounds, phrases • Suppresses, mocks or criticises contrary opinions • Encourages the audience to act. Q. Identify how ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ uses each of these features to advance its argument.

13. Institution: Market Context • Documentary features very popular in recent years: • ‘Fahrenheit 9/11’ (budget $6m est., US gross $119m), • ‘March of the Penguins’ (budget $8m est., US gross $77m) • ‘Bowling for Columbine’ (budget $4m, US gross $21m) • Often feature alternative viewpoints which receive little coverage in mainstream news • Has encouraged companies to finance production and distribute documentaries • An Inconvenient Truth cost just over $1m and grossed $24m in the USA and to date around $50m worldwide)

14. Technology • There was a small budget of $1m • Some of the shooting was done without a crew, Davis Guggenheim simply used digital video cameras • The producers were determined that the climate change issue was so urgent that the film had to be made quickly • The disruption of shooting by Hurricane Katrina only increased their determination • The film was shot with many different formats of film, digital video and animation • These had to be converted to the same digital format HDCAM SR on order to edit sequences and produce the digital intermediate version of the film • Efilm who were responsible for conforming and colour correction were involved at the start and informed filmmakers, editors and the labs at Cut+Run of their requirements; this reduced technical delays and hence kept the production on-time and on-budget • Canadian film on similar subject matter: Manufactured Landscapes