Filmmaker's theories (S9)

• Key documentary features:

  -Contemporary footage/actuality footage

  -Archive footage 

  -Interviews

  -Narration

  -Stills 

  -Posters

  -Long takes 

  -Montage 

  -Director as participant 

  -Handheld camera 

  -Unscripted dialogue 
• What are the three key documentary modes?

  Poetic, Observational and Participatory
• What's the poetic documentary mode characterised by?      


  - Lyrical, rhythmical

  -  Mood/tone created 

  -  Soundtracks and performances –key structuring device 

  -  Visual rhythms –slo-mo, freeze frames, captioned lyrics
• Which documentary maker uses poetic mode?

  Kapadia
• What's the observational documentary mode characterised by?      

  -Objective

  -Filmmaker not present/don’t influence action

  -Realism/immediacy

  -Handheld camera 

  -Long takes

  -Minimal editing 
• Which documentary maker uses observational mode?

  Longinotto
• What's the participatory documentary mode characterised by? 

  - Interviews

  - First person accounts

  - Director involved in film

  - Voice of God narration
• Which documentary maker uses observational mode?


  Broomfield
• What are the key features of Longinotto's work?

  -Focus on female-lead stories

  -Likes the people in the film to feel it's more theirs than hers

  -Likes people in the film to acknowledge camera as it directs the point to the audience

  -Unobtrusive style --> silent witness

  -Avoids zooms/pans in camerawork --> camera is eyes of audience

  -Avoids interviews

  -Real time storytelling
• Quote from Longinotto about why she uses observational mode:


  "I try to make them as like the experience of watching a fiction film as possible”
• What are the key features of Broomfield's work?


  -Aims to tell stories in a unique way

  -'In your face' style

  -Focus on celebrities and the media surrounding them

  -Uses his documentaries as a mode of representation as opposed to unmediated reality
• Quite from Broomfiled about why he uses participatory mode:

  It's "more honest to make your presence felt than to hang back furtively on the other side of the room...what’s important is the interaction between the filmmakers and those being filmed"
• What are the similarities between Longinotto and Kapadia?

  -Diegetic sound and voiceovers

  -Observational --> Kapadia observes Amy through V.O 

  -Focuses on simply capturing the life of female subject --> Kapadia doesn't claim to present a more objective ‘truth’ in this way
• What are the differences between Longinotto and Kapadia?

  -Kapadia doesn't use minimal editing

  -Kapdia uses actuality footage 
• What are the similarities between Broomfield and Kapadia?

  -Archival footage (news, concerts, police stills)

  -Intertitles and onscreen graphics

  -Presence of filmmaker/ personal imprint 

  -Juxtaposition of images in editing 

  -Interviews 

  -Diegetic music of the artist
• What are the differences between Broomfield and Kapadia?


  -Subjective voice of God narration

  -Non-linear narrative 

  -Presence of the filmmaker –being in the shot 

  -Exposing the process of making the film