Cards (12)

  • Observational mode
    Longinotto is absent from the screen filming life as it happens, without interference. Her presence is not hidden on the set (the cameras she uses are very large), but her absence from the screen helps us focus on the narrative without distractions.
  • Longinotto's films
    • Not about passive victims and their suffering, but about survivors who actively confront their oppressors with the help of other women
  • Longinotto: 'I don't think of films as documents or records of things. I try to make them as like the experience of watching a fiction film as possible, though, of course, nothing is ever set up.'
  • Performative mode
    Moore's films are highly personal. He is a larger-than-life presence on screen, using his everyman, all-American persona to gain the audience's allegiance. His films are personal quests, generally involving controversial themes of social injustice and targeting particular institutions in the process. They are also heavily anchored by his undisguised left-wing bias and can be controversial.
  • Moore's films
    • Use of humour, accessible language, as well as creative filmmaking techniques not often associated with documentaries has widened his audience. Making him one of the most successful documentary filmmakers of all time.
  • Moore: 'People don't want medicine, they want popcorn. Entertainment is the big dirty word of documentary. 'Oh no! I've entertained someone. I've cheapened my movie!'''
  • Docudrama
    Watkins creates re-enactments of historical events using mock newsreel style techniques, direct modes of address and amateur actors for authenticity.
  • Media and reality
    Watkins' main concern is the relationship between the media and its audience, which is one of manipulation. The 'monoform', as he describes it, is a linear and repetitive formula used by both TV and mainstream cinema, with heavily anchored ideologies that promote only one interpretation.
  • Watkins: 'With few exceptions, the Hollywood 'monoform' has been adopted by virtually all creators of commercial films, most documentary films, and by all aspects of television production including news broadcasting. This global adoption of one language form – in effect a standardisation of the mass audiovisual media – is a central issue of the media crisis. It means, for example, that a documentary film can basically have the same form and narrative structure as a Netflix drama series.'
  • Broomfield
    • Makes films in various documentary modes
    • Most renowned for his participatory/performative titles
    • Puts himself in front of the camera and directly mediates the narrative
    • His films are as much about their subjects as they are about Broomfield's own journey to unearth the truth
  • Broomfield's filmmaking style

    • Expert interviewer and fearless when asking hard questions
    • Chaotic filming style with use of handheld, unsteady camerawork, oblique angles and other unusual techniques
    • Often made necessary by the controversial nature of his unauthorised biographies
    • Subjects are often less than willing to contribute
  • Broomfield: 'If you're making a film, it's more honest to make your presence felt than to hang back furtively on the other side of the room, because no-one really benefits from that. That approach really is, to use the dread word, voyeuristic. You're there with all your equipment but pretending you're not there.'