Poetic Documentary (Ivens, Bunuel & Dali. Fischinger, Menken) 1.

Does not use continuity editing, sacrifices sense of the very specific location and place that continuity creates 2. Explores associations and patterns that involve temporal rhythms and spatial juxtapositions 3. Social Actors rarely become fully-fledged characters 4. Opens up possibility of alternative forms of knowledge to straightforward transfer of knowledge NEGATIVE: LACK OF SPECIFICITY Expository Documentary Grierson, Flaherty, Ivens. 1.Arose from dissatisfaction with distracting entertainment qualities of the fiction film 2.Voice of god commentary, poetic perspectives sought to disclose information about historical world & see that world afresh, even if ideas seem romantic or didactic 3.Addresses viewer directly, w/titles or voices 4.Advances argument about historical world 5. It takes shape around commentary directed toward the viewer; images illustrate the verbal commentary builds sense of dramatic involvement around need for solution to a problem. 6. Nonsynchronous sound prevails (historical circumstances) 7. Editing generally establishes/maintains rhetorical continuity more than spatial/temporal NEGATIVE: OVERLY DIDACTIC Observational Documentary Paradigm: depiction of everyday life ** Often described as either direct cinema (Eric Barnouw) or cinema verite (Mamber). Barnouw says that verite is interventionist/interactive mode. Nichols (source for these notes) sidesteps this issue by creating two different modes that cover this topic: the observational and interactive modes of representation Examples of filmmakers: Leacock, Pennebaker, Wiseman, Maysles/Zwerin 1.Arose from available lightweight portable synchronous recordin equipment & dissatisfaction with moralizing quality of expository documentary. 2.It allowed filmmaker to record unobtrusively what folks did when not explicitly addressing the camera.

3.It stresses the nonintervention of filmmaker 4.Filmmaker cedes control of events more than any other mode. 5.Editing doesnt construct time frame or rhythm, but enhances impression of lived or real time. 6.This mode limited filmmaker to present moment and required disciplined detachment from events themselves. 7.It uses indirect address, speech overheard, synchronous sound, relatively long takes. 8 Its sense of observation comes from a. Ability of filmmaker to include representative & revealing moments b. Sounds and images recorded at moment of observational filming in contrast to voice-over of expository mode c. Illustrations do not serve generalizations but a specific slide of reality. d. Presence of camera on scene NEGATIVE: LACKS HISTORICAL CONTEXT Interactive Documentary Examples: Rouch, de Antonio, Connie Field It arose from the availability of same mobile equipment & desire to make filmmakers perspective more evident. 1. This mode wants to engage w/individuals more directly while not reverting to classic exposition interview styles 2. It allows filmmaker to account for past events via witnesses and experts whom viewer can also see 3. Archival footage becomes appended to these commentaries to avoid hazards of reenactment & monolithic claims of voice of god commentary NEGATIVE: EXCESSIVE FAITH IN HISTORY, TOO INTRUSIVE Reflexive Documentary (Vertov, Godmilow, Raul Ruiz) 1. Arose form desire to make the conventions of representation themselves more apparent & to challenge the impression of reality which other three modes normally conveyed unproblematically. 2. It is the most self-aware mode - its reflexivity makes audience aware of how other modes claim to cosntruct "truth" through documentary practice. 3. It uses many of devices of other modes but sets them on edge so viewer attends to device as well as the effect. 4. It tears away veil of filmmakers illusory absence 5. Becomes technologically viable in 50s with emergence of portable synchronous sound equipment makes interaction more feasible NEGATIVE: TOO ABSTRACT, LOSES SIGHT OF ACTUAL ISSUES

Performative Documentary (Resnais, Julien, Riggs) 1. Like Reflexive Documentary, it raises questions about knowledge 2. Endorses definition of knowledge that emphasizes personal experience (in tradition of poetry, literature) 3. Tries to demonstrate how understanding such personal knowledge can help us understand more general processes of society 4. May "mix" elements of various documentary modes to achieve link between subjective knowledge/understanding of the world, and more general understandings, i.e. historical ones.
Documentary - A Definition for the Digital Age Documentary texts are supposedly those which aim to document reality, attempting veracity in their depiction of people, places and events. However, the process of mediation means that this is something of a oxymoron, it being impossible to represent reality without constructing a narrative that may be fictional in places. Certainly, any images that are edited cannot claim to be wholly factual, they are the result of choices made by the photographer on the other end of the lens. Nonetheless, it is widely accepted that categories of media texts can be classed as non-fiction, that their aim is to reveal a version of reality that is less filtered and reconstructed than in a fiction text. Such texts are often constructed from a particular moral or political perspective, and cannot therefore claim to be objective. Other texts purport simply to record an event, although decisions made in postproduction mean that actuality is edited, re-sequenced and artificially framed. The documentary maker generally establishes a thesis before starting the construction of their text, and the process of documentary-making can be simply the ratification of their idea. Perhaps, to misquote Eco, the objectivity of the text lies not in the origin but the destination? The documentary genre has a range of purposes, from the simple selection and recording of events (a snapshot or unedited holiday video) to a polemic text that attempts to persuade the audience into a specific set of opinions (Bowling For Columbine). Audiences must identify that purpose early on and will therefore decode documentary texts differently to fictional narratives. Documentary Modes In his 2001 book, Introduction to Documentary (Indiana University Press), Bill Nichols defines the following six modes of documentary 'reassembling fragments of the world', a transformation of historical material into a more abstract, lyrical form, usually associated with 1920s and modernist ideas 'direct address', social issues assembled into an argumentative

The Mode The

Poetic

Expository

Mode

frame, mediated by a voice-of-God narration, associated with 1920s-1930s, and some of the rhetoric and polemic surrounding World War Two as technology advanced by the 1960s and cameras became smaller and lighter, able to document life in a less intrusive manner, there is less control required over lighting etc, leaving the social actors free to act and the documentarists free to record without interacting with each other the encounter between film-maker and subject is recorded, as the film-maker actively engages with the situation they are documenting, asking questions of their subjects, sharing experiences with them. Heavily reliant on the honesty of witnesses demonstrates consciousness of the process of reading documentary, and engages actively with the issues of realism and representation, acknowledging the presence of the viewer and the modality judgements they arrive at. Corresponds to critical theory of the 1980s acknowledges the emotional and subjective aspects of documentary, and presents ideas as part of a context, having different meanings for different people, often autobiographical in nature

The Observational Mode

The Participatory Mode

The Reflexive Mode

The Performative Mode

These roughly correspond to developmental phases in the genre, when new generations of documentary makers have challenged the forms and conventions that have gone before, and re-invented what documentary means for them.