Critical Reflection
Great Events and Ordinary People
Raúl Ruiz documentary film maker in 1978, turning the camerea on documentary form itself. Great Events and Ordinary People was to create a television documentary on the French elections from the view point of a Chilean exile in Paris, however he seized the anti climax to make a documentary about nothing but itself, going back to his Chilean experiences in the 60's.
Plato and Documentary Film
Platonic Tradition is where it draws us away from something we ought to behold more directly. Distortions impose in ways that can't be ascertained. Cinema presents us with the images of things that are mimetic distractions and counterfeitings. These images can't engage our reason or answer our question of truth.
Grierson Doumentary
John Grieson was a scottish documentary film maker who was considered father of the British and Canadian documentary film. Grierson argued that the principles of documentary were that cinema's potential for analysing and observing life could be exploited in a new form of art. Grieson's definition of documentary was "Creative treatment of actuality".
Axiographic Space of Documentary Film
Axiology is the study of values. For Example, ethics, aethetics, religion. These have a particular reference to the manner in which they can be known and experienced. Axiographics show how values, particularly an ethics of representation, come to be known and experienced in relation to space.
Responsibility and Photography
‘The act of photographing is more than passive observing … it is a way of at least tacitly, often explicitly, encouraging whatever is going on to keep on happening’ - Susan Sontag.
Susan's work opened an awareness that photography facilitated ethical and social relationships, boradcasting repsonibilty had lost it's own meaning. Fake promises were made by photographers, to awaken the public to of the social consequences the world had made. Barthes also described depicting an image to be a 'painful labour' and the physical responses of the audience were too complex to tell the truth of reality.
Representation of International News and Third World Countires
In the depths of third world countires, they are being suffocated with the representations created by multi-national media conglomerates. These mainstream media outlets were relied on by thousands therefore leaving a very strong interpretation on the view of theworld, because a countires image is dependant on the news. Photographic representation switched from neutral to symbolic, creating a national identity between 'us' + 'them'.
Autobiographical Journey
Source Path Goal is the schema structure based on the journey concept of the subject within documentary moving from A-B, creating a quest. Representation of movement shows the narrative where the protagonist plays a big part in representing the journey. We can match the Source (1) Path (2) Goal (3) theory to Todorov's theory of disruption and equilibrium.
Real Reality of Documentary Film
Ann-Louise Shapiro investigates into the truth behind documentary and how it interperate's reality. She looks into how the contrast of art and history can resemble what actually happened hundreds of years ago, stating how true are the facts that have been passed on to us real? How do we know that propoganda has been used to create social and ethical problems? She also refers to the audience's view on documentary, thet they're objective journalistic presentations of social problems leaving the audience made to feel unease.
Honest Truths Documentary Filmmakers on Ethical Challenges and their Work
This document discusses many concerns over the ethics within documentary. It talks about whether documentary film makers were producing histories for television, nature programes or independent political and social documentaries, directors and producers found themselves facing not only economic pressure, but scrutiny for the ethics within their practises.“Do no harm” and “Protect the vulnerable.” Directors never felt obliged to protect their subjects who they believed had done no harm. The document also stated that when filmmakers come against ethical conflicts, they often resolve them in an 'ad-hoc' way, keeping a strong relationship with their subjects and a different relationship with the viewers in balance.
 | Todorov's Theory of Equilibrium This theory best describes the defined structure within narrative. Todorov explained that most mainstream media congrolments have: A beginning - introducing the plot to the audience, A disruption - somthing happens to change the plot, A resolution - something in the plot that resolves the disruption, Restored order, the plot goes back to how is was structured in the beginning, and a new equilibrium explaining the new sotrylines in the plot. |
Nanook of The North Nanook of the North is a 1922 silent documentary film by Robert J. Flaherty. The documentary is based upon telling the lives of Nanook and his family, which are eskimo's living in the Canadian artic. Flaherty was criticized for staging several sequences and thereby distorting the reality of his subjects lives. It's as if throughout the documentary he 'mocks' the eskimo's lives. He using comical humour to explain the lives of nanook and his family. By doing this he is creating more of a mockumentary than a docufilm. |
Aesthetics of Realism
This document tell about how digital techonology plays a significant role in forulating new aesthetics for long lasting hybridity, which is formed by fact anf fiction in the genre. Hybrid is described as being an over exaggerated perception of reality, and an example of this is CSI: Las vegas. Digital cinematography contributes to the challenges between reality and fiction in the hybrid documentary form. The document also describes how viewers are swapping from documentary to fiction because they believe that it is fiction that tells them the truth, or what can be percieved as being their truth.
