Research
A documentary can be defined as a factual film or television programme about an event, person presenting the facts with little or no fiction. The popular perceptions of a documentary are that it is a television piece on a current or historic topic where facts are presented to the viewer through footage and interviews in such a way which is informative as well as entertaining to the viewer. A typical documentary which most of us could relate to would be David Attenborough’s natural history documentaries which collectively form a comprehensive survey of all life on the planet. From a more conventional take, ‘The Only Way is Essex’ is also a modern and very current documentary about a group of young people and what Essex is like.
Scot Grierson was regarded as the founder of the documentary movement in Britain and Canada. Grierson defined a documentary as ‘the creative treatment of actuality’. This may suggest the way in which reality is portrayed to the viewer in an innovative and imaginative way. For example, ‘The Only Way is Essex’ is alleged supposed to show the viewer the stereotypical ‘Essex’ lifestyle, however it is mildly exaggerated in order to entertain and capture the viewers sense of humour. Actuality can be defined as actual existence, typically contrasted with what was intended, expected or believed. This may also be expressed as reality. Creative treatment may be interpreted as a more playful take on what is being documented, like the example given before, how real life events are manipulated with the intention of making the viewers viewing experience more captivating and entertaining.
Through Grierson’s definition it is possible to question whether there is real potential to capture the real world on film. Documentaries are about factual events or circumstances, therefore they should be truthful and accurate. However, behind the documentary the real aim of the film or programme may be to persuade or promote the topic they have constructed, therefore there may be an element of manipulation or strategic planning in order to portray the hidden agenda to the viewer. Another point to consider is how genuine people would act when cameras are put in front of them. For example, the current realist documentary ‘Educating Essex’ is a fly on the wall documentary about life in a school in Essex. Although from what we see may be genuine acts, when teenagers are faced with cameras following their every move they may wish to act differently in order to get their ‘fifteen minutes of fame’. Therefore the viewer may not be experiencing the real behaviour of these teenagers. Also the way in which the film or programme is later edited also questions the possibility of capturing the real world on film. Although a realist documentary should impose minimal treatment on the recorded material, the shots would be picked out by how effective or entertaining they would be for the viewer, therefore not giving the viewer the full scale of events.
Furthermore there may also be ethical dimensions to be considered. To take the example of the documentary ‘Educating Essex’, a pupil that is recorded misbehaving may have had an ‘off’ day on that particular day they were filming, but still gives the impression they are a bad student who is a trouble maker, resulting in Essex schools having a bad reputation. There is also the ethical issue of filming people this young, people who are still children being exposed to the nation as being badly behaved teenagers- an image which is very current in our world today.
There is one way of categorising documentaries; this is by the degree of creative treatment of the recorded material. There are three sub genres in total. The first one is a realist documentary which imposes minimal treatment on the recorded material- fly on the wall. However if the film maker imposes minimal treatment of the recorded material than this implies they simple wish to record and reveal what they have recorded.
The second is a formalist documentary which imposes a particular narrative structure on the recorded material-fly in the soup. If the film maker wants to impose a particular narrative then this implies a mild sense of expression and possibly persuasion to the viewer. Lastly, a subjective documentary, which expresses the film makers personal vision. If the film maker would want to express their own personal vision then this may imply that they want to persuade the viewer in some way to their way of thinking of whatever the topic is. It would mean they feel very strongly and passionately about the subject and wants to fully express this throughout the documentary. Any one documentary can mix these techniques. The choice of using any of these constructs is completely the decision of the film maker, to whether they want their vision to be known to the viewer or whether they want to create a documentary with little personal input.
There are many conventions of a documentary. There are six common conventions. Firstly, interview techniques. There are three different customs of this, to show the interviewer on a screen to give authority to him/her, to enable the interviewee to stare straight out the audience In order to engage the audience with them and to film the interviewee from behind or above to underscore the validity or otherwise of their statements. Another common convention is film techniques; the use of ‘cutaways’ to disguise times in the interviews where interviews had to be re-shot. In conventional interviews there is often a cut a way to the interviewee that disguises such manipulation of the recorded material; to establish recognisable settings for each of the people we see interviewed and filming subjects in clear-cut environments, one way of making them memorable however fleeting their appearances.
Additionally there a title sequences; a good introductory sequence will set the pattern for the whole piece, it should be immediately apparent to the viewer what the documentary is about and the clarity of purpose is all important. The titles and effects is also a common convention where there is use of captions and highlighted words which is an effective way of providing information that is not immediately apparent, for example names, facts and figures. Rapid montages are also used which often fulfil a role at the end of a production and allow the audience to recap what they have seen. Images are also important; still images often play a very important role in the unravelling of a narrative or theme. Images in newspapers and magazines often feature in documentaries alongside other archive material. Sound in documentaries are also important; the choice of music track needs to be carefully considered, a voice used in voiceover must have the correct ‘weight’ for the subject matter and interviewers need to be recorded in the best available conditions for clarity of sound. Lastly, transitions, where you can add audience interest by using transition cuts from scene to scene.
One Day in September is a 1999 documentary film directed by Kevin Macdonald examining the 5th September 1972 murder of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany. Michael Douglas provides the sparse narration throughout the film. The assault is described by Al-Gashey as well as by some of the German security staff present. Footage of ABC anchor Jim McKay is interspersed, along with sound clips of Peter Jennings, to give an impression of events unfolding as they happened. General Ulrich Wegener, founder of the German counter-terrorist unit GSG 9, was also interviewed during the film. The film offers evidence to the allegation that the rescue operation was poorly planned and executed, suggesting the snipers were not prepared and were poorly positioned. The film implies that had the German government prepared better, the athletes might have been saved. The use of common conventions such as images and sounds are used through graphic photographs of the dead Israelis and Palestinians shown to the viewers in a photo-montage to the Deep Purple song ‘Child in Time’.
The construction of ‘One Day in September’ is a formalist documentary as it imposes a particular narrative on the structure of the recorded material. The narrative implies that the athletes’ deaths could have been avoided if the government were more prepared. The narrative is not strong enough to be a subjective documentary as it is just hints and implications that lead it to be a formalist documentary. I think the purpose of the documentary is to reveal the events of the massacre and also to analyze in depth the circumstances of what occurred. I would imagine the preferred reading of the representation would be an informative view of the events that occurred that day and how maybe something more could have been done in order to avoid the deaths.
