Codes and conventions of Documentaries Patrick Rule

The three types of documentaries are: -Realism -Dramatisation -Narrativisation

Narrativised Documentaries These are documentaries with narration over clips to help guide the viewer and give an insight into whats happening in the documentary. If the documentary is in the form of a story for example, the narrator will be telling the story over clips. An example of a Narrativised Documentary is Farenheight 9/11 These Documentaries make the audience feel shocked with unbelievable facts and shocking statistics. An example of these shocking facts are from Michael Moore’s documentary on the 9/11 attacks explaining how there were deals made between Bush and the Taliban and how he did very little travel or hard work during the week of the terrorist attacks (7.25 minutes in the video) suggesting the countries president didn’t care. The difference in a narrative documentary is that the narrator can change the way the audience see the footage by talking over it. They can completely change the truth which is worrying because there are some sections of Farenheight 9/11 where the Narrator bent the truth slightly. There were also readily available figures exaggerated for effect in Fahrenheit 9/11. The claims have a basis in reality, making them believable, but are false nonetheless. In the film, Moore asks Craig Unger, author of House of Bush, House of Saud, “How much money do the Saudis have invested in America, roughly?” to which Unger responds, “Uh, I’ve heard figures as high as $860 billion.” The Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy reports that worldwide Saudi investment approximated $700 billion – a figure much lower than Unger alleges the Saudi government to have invested in the U.S. (Tanya C. Hsu, Institute For Research: Middle Eastern Policy, “The United States Must Not Neglect Saudi Arabian Investment,” www.irmep.org, Accessed 07/11/04) The Institute reports that 60 percent of that $700 billion – roughly $420 billion, less than half of what Unger “heard” – was actually invested in the United States by the Saudi government. Source: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1169995/posts http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYYKLnFRA4s

Dramatisation http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_873Hr6Pc0 Recreation or representation of actual events, historical or current. There are techniques used to expand a story using facts and reports. For the sake of dramatisation and making the programme more engrossing for the viewer, some acting is not entirely accurate to make it flow better and look more realistic. Work off known facts, however no facts should be fabricated for dramatic effect They make the audience react by making the story or concept more dramatic and a lot of the times with documentaries such as walking with Dinosaurs, it will shock the audience because dinosaurs have never been seen alive before and a dramatisation would recreate what they what look like walking the Earth so for the first time seeing them alive it may scare some people Well known examples: Walking with dinosaurs, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_873Hr6Pc0 As we know the dinosaurs have to be dramatised because they no longer exist. You can tell its computer generated imagery from the start because the surroundings and the scenery looks slightly surreal and the setting is always in the prehistoric ages where cameras didn’t exist.

Realism http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkB9VJdu27M Representation of real life Based on real life event or occurrence No facts are made up consists of live action documenting examples including VICE Documentaries or David Attenborough nature documentaries. Similar to dramatisation http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkB9VJdu27M News reports examples prove that this was a real life story was the news reports from over 10 years ago (1.27).

Documentary formats: Expository Documentaries that expose an unpublished story, bear in mind that this format is most prone to libel or misjudgement so the facts must be 100% true otherwise the subject that is being exposed is exposed as faulty. It is also dangerous to produce an expository documentary during a court case it is better to gather the facts once a court case has finished and a sentence has been given. Examples of these documentaries are farenheight 911 and the inconvenient truth. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOrHnctozrY

Documentary formats: Observational The Documentary maker would follow a subject or person for example louis Theroux following the family of West borough baptist church. Often the shots are long and informal interviews with few cuts or edits. Sometimes a voiceover will add extra information not already included in the observational footage. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ86dDWtnHc

Documentary formats: Interactive Interactive documentaries engage the viewer by having the documentary maker someone who is representing a “normal viewer” so that the audience can relate to him/her. They usually participate in the event itself and document what they found first hand such as Louie Theroux participating in gambling in Las Vegas to get an insight into how players get hooked. There is a closer connection here for the audience because they can see someone participating first hand in a “guinea pig effect” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-ex8bAnl5U 16 seconds in Louis explains that it his his own money to put the audience in his position if it was there own money what would they be feeling

Documentary Formats: Reflexive When the entire crew get involved in the production of the documentary, examples include bowling for Columbine. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XORCYavjhk0 43 minutes into the documentary you can see the crew interviewing Marilyn Manson and including his defensive opinion about what his music preaches and what it should mean to his listeners as it has been misconstrued by the mainstream media.

Documentary formats: Performative When the documentary maker makes comments about his/her documentary as it is playing, the subjects are usually surrounding gender or sexual orientation rather than factual happenings. An example of a performative documentary is David Blaine’s ‘Frozen in time’ documemtary. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CSnGlRoJOck at 28:20 Blaine explains that he’d rather come out dead than come out before the time limit. This is an example of a performative documentary because David Blaine is performing the stunt as well as talking to the viewers about what his mindset was and what his attitude is towards failing a stunt or a magic trick.