Documentary Mini - Task

Documentary Mini Task;

What Is a Documentary?

Documentary in my eye is a non fiction film to express or share a section of life that people may not know about, it should be factual and accurate.

Expository Documentary;

This form of documentary speaks directly to the viewer often like a commentary. Giving you points of view or ideas to think about while watching the footage and purposes questions to the viewer. The voice is usually male to act like a voice of god. So generally this form of documentary acts as feeding you the information while related footage is over the top. An example of one of these documentary is 'The Shock Of The New (1980) This documentary is a good example of a expositiory documentary because it contains many examples of factors that make it so. It contains lots of direct speech to the audience and has a good use of footage and voice over.

Observational Documentary;

This form of documentary attempts to make an account of real life events from a fly on the wall perspective. Fly on the wall is the feeling of watching reality. Observational documentary With little to no input by the filmmakers. Within doing this you can get a accurate depiction of the events unfolding in-front of you being as natural as possible the presenter therefore acts as a narrator. A good example of a observational documentary is Zwerin's Gimme Shelter (1970) This documentary depicts the last weeks of the Rolling Stones. it contains many factors that an observational documentary should contain fly on the wall feel which connotes a realistic feel to the documentary.

Interactive Documentary;

This form of documentary is when the documentary maker steps down from being a fly on the wall or behind the camera and becomes a actor on screen who we can familiarize with and relate with, he/she is the voice of god in a visual form that can ask the questions that we are thinking making it sometimes awkward. A good example of this is Louis And The Nazi's (2003) This form of documentary is when the documentary maker steps down being a fly on the wall or behind he camera and becomes an actor on screen who we can formalize with and relate with, he/she is the narrator  visual form that can ask the question that we are thinking making it sometimes awkward.

Accessing privacy and permissions can affect the production of documentary heavily as in film you need permission for people to be on camera due to them acting. In a documentary they are not acting they are being themselves to that is tougher to convince people. Gaining access to locations is even harder because you are using the location to film the location not depicting it as a different location entirely. In the Ofcom section 8.22 states that "Legitimate expectations of privacy will vary according to the place and nature of the information, activity or condition in question, the extent to which it is in the public domain"

Reflexive Documentary;

These documentary's don't see themselves as windows on the word, Instead they look at how they draw attention to there own constructiveness. Questioning the documentary authenticity itself. A good example is MacDougall's Wedding Camels (1980) This documentary questions itself when depicting the story about the two family s tension when marrying it questions the differences between the United Kingdom and Africa and asks why we are all so different.

Performative Documentary;

This type of documentary uses actors to dramatize events that the documentary is about. I spurs to get an emotional response from the viewer this makes the story stick in the viewers head. They are usually made if no footage of the event has happened. They are usually very subjective and they have the power to change the views of the public's view on a controversial topics. A good example of a performative documentary is Alain Resnais Night And Fog (1955)  This documentary shows the story through reenactments and found footage the events that unfolded in Nazi's Germany's death camps. The problem with this form of documentary is that it can controversial in its contents. It is a very personal documentary and can hit home with a lot of people who many have experienced these times. The problem with dramatizations is that it can be overly exaggerated for the entertainment of the viewers.

Conclusion;

My stand on documentary filming is of a balanced view. I believe that showing parts of the world that people may never see is fine as long as the information and the visual we see is accurate and is not bias or staged in anyway. I believe that no documentary however can not be unbiased or accurate due to human nature and fears of the documentary being boring. By all means however it isn't appropriate or right to stage documentary and be bias. I think in some cases however over exaggerating footage can be both helpful and negative because if you make something worse than it is, it can make the real event seem worse than they actually were. But making it over the top than it actually makes the story have more than an impact.