Contemporary Cinematic Documentary and the Rebirth of Content. Through an Understanding of the Histor
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Contemporary Cinematic Documentary and The Rebirth of Content. Through an understanding of the historical context and the structuralism of new cinematic documentary, does the renaissance in documentary released for the cinema redefine the boundaries of factual filmmaking to have a positive effect on society or is it simply superficial technique that ultimately cheapens the potential message? By Jeremy Owen MA Media, Communication & Critical Practice Table of Contents: Abstract Page 01 Acknowledgements Page 02 Introduction Page 03 Chapter 1. Form and Language in Documentary Page 06 Chapter 2. Defining Documentary from an Historical Perspective Page 10 Chapter 3. Exploring the Observational: Page 18 Questions of Science, Art and Reality Chapter 4. Reading Documentary, Hoop Dreams Page 25 Chapter 5. Reading Documentary, Dogtown & Z Boys Page 29 Conclusion Page 34 Bibliography Page 39 Appendix Page 44 Abstract. Documentary suggests ‘fullness and completion, knowledge and fact’ (Nichols, 1994:1). A documentary text can provide a representation of life that an audience will read as a truthful expression of an actuality. The last fifteen years of film production have witnessed an explosion in the number of documentary films being made for cinema exhibition, a direct result of a categorical rise in the number of people actively attending the cinema to watch a documentary film. Critics have suggested that this unprecedented popularity is solely down to savvy selection of topic, easy to follow narrative structures and visual techniques derived from narrative film as entertainment for the masses. By using such populist techniques the films are said to be attempting to guarantee box office success but in so doing are destroying the integrity of the documentary text by undermining an ideology established over 100 years of evolution. This research project explores this criticism by gaining an understanding of the form and language of documentary film, as expressed by key theoretical approaches developed by Bill Nichols and Michael Renov. Through an extensive exploration of the history and context that has informed the development of documentary as cinematic form, the paper engages the notion that the unprecedented popularity of the new films maybe a signifier that a new method of documentary has been established, a form that is able to distil the many disparate approaches down into one extremely effective principle for the provision of an exact representation of the reality of a given subject as experienced by those involved. This discussion is applied to close textual analysis of two case study texts: Hoop Dreams (1994) and Dogtown & Z Boys (2001). In so doing, the research demonstrates that the evolution of documentary has indeed given rise to a technique that has become a byword for authenticity in a filmed context. Rigid, observational filmmaking has become a ubiquitous approach that has informed documentary since the Second World War, is an applicable surface style used by fictional filmmaking but also may explain the rise of Reality TV. Its apparent incorruptibility has led the critics of new cinematic documentary to believe that any other approach is suspect. Through a thorough dismissal of this notion, the conclusion of the research acknowledges that the new films are not functioning in a way radically different to earlier forms of documentary, but rather provide a post‐modern rethinking of established modes and conventions. Far from destroying the genre the new films actually facilitate survival of documentary in a changing cultural landscape. 1 Acknowledgements. Thank you to all those with a hand in putting this together: Lynda Dyson Tim Horsburgh Callum Macrae Peter D Osborne Shane O’ Sullivan Stacy Peralta PC Allan Sharp Jonathan Wright 2 Introduction. Over the last 15 years there has been a rise in the popularity of documentary film exhibited in the cinema. Theatrically released documentary has enjoyed surges in audience enthusiasm before but it has generally remained a marginal interest (Renov, 2007). In contrast, films such as Bowling for Columbine (2002), Super Size Me (2004) or Capturing the Friedman’s (2003) have achieved a near mythical status within popular culture. Their rise is easily identifiable by box office statistics and the omnipresence of said films in Amazon.com style ‘Top Ten Films Ever’ lists. If further proof was needed, the discussion around documentary has grown out of industry media and academic texts and into more unexpected carriers, as exemplified by the influential subcultural style magazine Lodown publishing its own canon of documentary films (Klein & Klein, 2007). The fact that documentary is now popular with the fashion conscious suggests popularity with a sector that likes to view itself as being more informed than the average citizen. A 2008 study certifies that deduction by revealing that the films audience consists mainly of viewers of ‘Art House’ films (Hardie, 2008). In that way new cinematic documentary audiences are not the general cinema‐going public but a smaller demographic interested by what they perceive to be more challenging work as is evident in their taste for productions that stand aside to mainstream entertainment product. With such coverage these new films are clearly in the public mind. This could easily be dismissed as the collective audiences’ short memory but that ignores the fact that something must have peaked the audiences’ interest enough to establish this renaissance. It would seem that something within their structure is capturing the publics’ imagination more effectively than earlier films. In that way they could emerge as standing apart from earlier films. The rise in popularity of new cinematic documentary has been consecutive with a noticeable influx of general documentary theory, as my bibliography demonstrates. Although useful in gaining an overview this writing does not engage with the contemporary cinematic form as a separate entity. In preparing this research proposal I encountered only one theorist covering the new work specifically and at any length, namely Stella Bruzzi with ‘New Documentary’ (2006). In the light of such unprecedented success it would seem that a dedicated academic thesis would be useful to determine whether a contemporary cinematic documentary might function differently to what might be described as a standard ‘documentary’ text. Within this general documentary academia certain names have appeared as prolific thinkers on the subject, Bill Nichols emerges as the main exponent. He has published a number of key texts on the topic and is often discussed within other writers work. His notable input has been his distillation of the many varying approaches taken by documentary down to a system of five modes. Michael Renov has taken a similar route and defined four fundamental tendencies 3 of documentary that attempt to understand their motivation. I will return to both of these theories in Chapter 1. Taken collectively the many discussions in these publications demonstrate that a documentary is a problematic text that stands alone from other film types. Problems in definition of documentary occur because individual films each tackle a different subject or when they do cover a similar subject they will do so in different ways. Classification of a fictional narrative film is a simpler proposition. A number of texts can share common elements such as storyline, character types, setting, mood and so forth. These singular films become part of a recognisable genre when seen beside films that share similar elements. Although problematic, Nichols has defined one constant; collectively all documentary is an attempt at historical representation with a social responsibility derived from the contribution the form makes to popular memory. The pleasure for an audience is its capacity to suggest an objective view of its subject (1991). In a similar attempt at defining genre traits of the contemporary cinematic form Nichols has outlined potential signifiers. In his view the films: “retain the persuasive qualities that first distinguished documentary but do so with unashamed borrowings from the repertoire of the fiction filmmaker, such as individuals who possess star quality, point of view shots to build character identification, flashback, suspenseful dramatic structure, subjective interpretations of past events or states of mind, reenactments that may depart from historical record, and powerful musical scores.” (2007:82) That Nichols is correct in his identification is corroborated by Paul Arthur’s comments on Capturing the Friedman’s, a film that ‘trafficks in grossly manipulative dramatic structures and effects of a kind usually associated with classical Hollywood’ (2003, p5). Arthur and Nichols seems to be suggesting that a common link between the many films is an apparent need to take a populist approach, a thought echoed in comments made on Michael Moore’s award winning Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004), a film that has no qualms to “layer on the music, ratchet up the montages and strap their audience into the rollercoaster ride of outrage” (Rich, 2004:15). It is criticism such as this that seems to be the only formal approach taken to identify common traits in the contemporary form. Such criticism is in opposition to any kind of Brechtian ideals of “pleasurable learning” (1974:73). For these critics a more apt statement might read; “All too often the beautiful form has been chosen to conceal the reality.” Indeed, this could be another quote from a contemporary critic but in fact it is 1930’s Avant‐Garde filmmaker, Hans Richter, detailing the habit of early filmmakers to record the picturesque over authenticity (1986:47). As modern critics seem to be suggesting, the aesthetics of contemporary cinematic documentary are a similar attempt to ‘beautify’ their content, rendering it palatable for an audience used to multiplex entertainment. In this view documentary must be true to its social responsibility and be a serious affair devoid of frivolous technique. It seems impossible to 4 discuss structural and aesthetic aspects of the films without deeming such approaches as going some way to destroy the integrity of the film.