Documentary Film

Description

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A Documentary Film is a motion picture  that manipulates and explains information for the entertainment or educational sectors. In one way or another, documentaries  have been produced in almost every nation and have made a substantial contribution to the growth of realism in movies.

The film of the 1917–18 Bolshevik rise to power was produced in Russia, and the images were utilized for propaganda. However, documentary form of film have been a favorite since the beginning of cinema. The first of many documentary films, Nanook of the North, was an account of Eskimo life based on the filmmaker Robert Flaherty's firsthand observations and was released in 1922. 

History of Documentary Film

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Prior to 1900:

Films made before 1900 were primarily focused on the novelty of depicting an event. Single-shot scenes, such a train pulling into a station, a boat docking, or employees leaving their jobs, were recorded on film. The phrase "actuality" films were used to refer to these short films; the word "Documentary" was not used until 1926. Due to technological restrictions, many of the early films, including those directed by Auguste and Louis Lumière, had a duration of about one minute or less.

Documentaries fron 1900 – 1920s:

The early 20th century saw a huge rise in the popularity of travelogue films.  Film distributors frequently referred to them as "Scenics". At the time, one of the most watched types of movies was a scenic one. In the Land of the Head Hunters (1914), a significant early film that transcended the idea of the picturesque, embraced primitivism and exoticism in a staged narrative portrayed as authentic reenactments of Native American life. The most well-known film producer of these movies worldwide in the early 20th century was Pathé. The 1909 film Moscow Clad in Snow is a striking example.

 

Romantic Documentary Films:

The 1922 release of Robert J. Flaherty's Nanook of the North marked the acceptance of romanticism in documentary film. During this time, Flaherty shot a series of elaborately constructed romantic documentaries, frequently portraying his subjects' lives as they would have seemed 100 years ago rather than as they actually were.

City Symphony Films:

The 1920s and 1930s saw the emergence of the avant-garde film genre known as "city-symphony." Modern art, namely Impressionism, Constructivism, and Cubism, had a significant impact on these movies. A city-symphony film, as the name suggests, is most often based around a major metropolitan city area and seeks to capture the life, events and activities of the city. It can use abstract cinematography (Walter Ruttman's Berlin) or may use Soviet montage theory (Dziga Vertov's Man with a Movie Camera). Most importantly, a city-symphony film is a form of cinepoetry, shot and edited in the style of a "symphony".

 

Newsreel Tradition:

In documentaries, the newsreel tradition holds significant value. During this period, newsreels were occasionally manufactured, but they were mostly reenactments of past events rather than attempts to control events as they were occurring. A significant portion of the combat video from the early 20th century, for example, was staged; cameramen would typically show up on the scene following a significant fight and reenact scenes for filming.

Documentary Films from 1930s-1940s:

Films produced specifically to influence viewers' opinions are known as propaganda traditions. Leni Riefenstahl's 1935 propaganda picture Triumph of the Will, which was ordered by Adolf Hitler and followed the 1934 Nazi Party Congress, is among the most well-known and divisive propaganda movies. Borinage (1931), a film about a coal mining district in Belgium, was made by leftist filmmakers Joris Ivens and Henri Storck. Las Hurdes (1933) is a "surrealist" documentary directed by Luis Buñuel.

 

Documentary Films from 1950s–1970s:

Lennart Meri (1929–2006), the second President of the Republic of Estonia, directed documentaries several years before his presidency. His film The Winds of the Milky Way won a silver medal at the New York Film Festival in 1977.

Cinéma-Vérité:

Cinéma vérité (or the closely related direct cinema) was dependent on some technical advances to exist: light, quiet and reliable cameras, and portable sync sound.

Cinéma vérité and similar documentary traditions can thus be seen, in a broader perspective, as a reaction against studio-based film production constraints. Shooting on location, with smaller crews, would also happen in the French New Wave, the filmmakers taking advantage of advances in technology allowing smaller, handheld cameras and synchronized sound to film events on location as they unfolded.

Although the terms are sometimes used interchangeably, there are important differences between cinéma vérité (Jean Rouch) and the North American "direct cinema" (or more accurately "cinéma direct"), pioneered by, among others, Canadians Allan King, Michel Brault, and Pierre Perrault, and Americans Robert Drew, Richard Leacock, Frederick Wiseman and Albert and David Maysles.

The film directors of the movement take different viewpoints on their degree of involvement with their subjects. Kopple and Pennebaker, for instance, choose non-involvement (or at least no overt involvement), and Perrault, Rouch, Koenig, and Kroitor favor direct involvement or even provocation when they deem it necessary.

The films Chronicle of a Summer (Jean Rouch), Dont Look Back (D. A. Pennebaker), Grey Gardens (Albert and David Maysles), Titicut Follies (Frederick Wiseman), Primary and Crisis: Behind a Presidential Commitment (both produced by Robert Drew), Harlan County, USA (directed by Barbara Kopple), Lonely Boy (Wolf Koenig and Roman Kroitor) are all frequently deemed cinéma vérité films.

The fundamentals of the style include following a person during a crisis with a moving, often handheld, camera to capture more personal reactions. There are no sit-down interviews, and the shooting ratio is very high, often reaching 80 to one. From there, film editors find and sculpt the work into a film. The editors of the movement – such as Werner Nold, Charlotte Zwerin, Muffie Meyer, Susan Froemke, and Ellen Hovde – are often overlooked, but their input to the films was so vital that they were often given film co-director credits.

Famous cinéma vérité films include Les Raquetteurs, Showman, Salesman, Near Death, and The Children Were Watching.

 

Types of Documentary Films

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Poetic Documentary:

This method helps filmmakers experiment with all the aspects of producing documentary films by identifying imaginative compositions, thought-provoking juxtapositions, and unique narrative techniques. Poetic subgenres can be quite unorthodox and experimental in form and substance, abstract and loose with narrative.

Expository Documentary:

They most likely resemble Documentary Films, as most people define them. The simple explanatory approach is the most direct in documentary storytelling, therefore consider using it. It is among the most effective techniques to disseminate information or a message.

Observational Documentary:

Observational documentaries provide audiences with direct access to some of the most significant events in the subject matter in an effort to provide voice to both sides of a debate. The most well-known instance of this is the Barbara Kopple-directed documentary Harlan County, USA.

 Participatory Documentary:

In participatory documentaries, the film director is a part of the story. This involvement might range from something little, like a filmmaker asking questions or giving signals to their subjects while they are filming, to something significant, like a filmmaker actively directing the plot's events.

Reflexive Documetary:

Comparable to participatory films, reflexive documentaries frequently feature the filmmaker as part of the story. But unlike participative, most reflective documentarians don't even try to go into a non-related topic. Instead, they are completely preoccupied with the process of filmmaking and themselves. This may be seen in contemporary times in Kirsten Johnson's role as Cameraperson. The way this documentary tells the narrative of the filmmakers themselves is intriguing. Johnson creates a portrait of herself as a person and what she sees as a filmmaker by using only images from cameras that she has used on assignments throughout her career.

Performative Documentary:

Performative documentaries are an experimental combination of styles used to stress subject experience and share an emotional response with the world. They often connect and juxtapose personal accounts with larger political or historical issues. This has sometimes been called the “Michael Moore-style,” as he often uses his own personal stories as a way to construct social truths.

Modern Documentaries

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The documentary film genre has been gaining popularity in theaters, according to box office experts. Some of the most well-known instances of this trend include the movies Fahrenheit 9/11, Super Size Me, Food, Inc., Earth, March of the Penguins, and An Inconvenient Truth. Documentaries usually have far less budgets than dramatic narrative films, which attracts studios since even a limited theatrical distribution may be quite profitable.

Historical documentaries convey not only a unique voice but also a perspective and point of view. Examples of these include the groundbreaking 14-hour Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years by Henry Hampton, 4 Little Girls (1997) by Spike Lee, The Civil War by Ken Burns, and the UNESCO-awarded independent film on slavery 500 Years Later. Certain movies, like Errol Morris's The Thin Blue Line, use stylised reenactments, whereas Michael Moore's Roger & Me gives the filmmaker far more creative freedom. Some critics wonder if these films can really be considered documentaries; they sometimes term these works mondo films or "docu-ganda." This is because the economic success of these documentaries may be a result of the narrative change in the documentary form.

With the rise of "reality television" which sometimes straddles the line between the fictitious and the staged, modern documentaries have certain similarities with television formats. A "making-of" documentary explains the process of creating a video game or film. Typically produced for marketing, it resembles a commercial more than a traditional documentary.

Documentary filmmakers have benefited immensely from the advent of lightweight digital video cameras, computer-based editing, and the sharp decline in equipment costs. Voices of Iraq, directed by Martin Kunert and Eric Manes, was the first movie to fully utilize this development. During the conflict, 150 DV cameras were transported to Iraq and distributed to Iraqis so they could record themselves.