Unit 12 - Documentary

What are the different forms of documentary?

Poetic Documentary -

The poetic documentary filmmaker arrives at its point by arranging footage in an order to evoke an audience association through tone, rhythm, or spatial juxtaposition.

Leni Riefenstahl’s Olympia (1938)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lLnGqMoNXRI

Expository Documentary -

Expository documentaries speak directly to the viewer, often in the form of an authoritative commentary employing voiceover or titles, proposing a strong argument and point of view.

Siria's fortress

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inzj5nihvrA

Participatory Documentary -

An encounter between filmmaker and subject is recorded and the filmmaker actively engages with the situation they are documenting.”The participatory mode aims for immediacy and often presents the filmmaker’s point of view.

2 Border's 1 Side

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUUDb-QYv2s

Observational Documentary -

Documentary maker follows the person around to observe the events that happen in their life Equipment can be informal, such as the use of hand-held cameras. There are usually no interviews and voiceovers.

MTV Cribs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmxoU0zujN0

Reflexive Documentary

The reflexive style of documentary is usually associated with experimental documentaries, where the viewer is just as interested about how the film is constructed as they are the actual content.

Lenny D

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3m1beasBjQ

Performative Documentary

The performative mode of documentary is the direct opposite of the observational where unobtrusive observation of the subject is the director's aim.Performative documentary emphasizes the filmmaker's own involvement with the subject

The confessional

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kW9Ic28qUM8

Examples of early documentary:

- Man of Aran (1934) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIWYXnxz968

In this blend of documentary and fictional narrative from pioneering filmmaker Robert Flaherty, the everyday trials of life on Ireland's unforgiving Aran Islands are captured with attention to naturalistic beauty and historical detail.

Author : Man

Article title:Man of Aran (1934)

Website title:IMDb

URL:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025456/

A Day in the Life of a Coal Miner (1911) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D581TDHFpmE

A coal miner says good-bye to his wife and children, and heads off to work. He reaches the mine, prepares his lamp, and then descends into the mine along with some other workers. As he and the others work inside the mine, the coal is sent to the surface, where others at the mining site are ready to process the coal and to prepare it for shipping.

Author: Snow Leopard

Article title:A Day in the Life of a Coal Miner (1910)

Website title:IMDb

URL:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0257522/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl

Night Mail (1937) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7SD6qt0EFI

Shows the special train on which mail is sorted, dropped and collected on the run, and delivered in Scotland overnight.

AuthorNight

Article title:Night Mail (1936)

Website title:IMDb

URL:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028030/

Triumph of the Will

Year of Production - 1935

Director - Leni Riefenstahl

Synopsis - The infamous propaganda film of the 1934 Nazi Party rally in Nuremberg, Germany.

Article title:Triumph of the Will (1935)

Website title:IMDb

URL:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025913/