Documentary Films 2008

There has been much discussion in the literature – Barnouw (pp 240 ff and 253 ff) , Nichols (pp 117 ff), - in the lectures, and among students in e-mails this week to the instructor on the distinctions between Direct Cineme and Cinema Verite.’

Documentary scholars often argue about the definitions.   Let me attempt to clarify.  Various terms have been employed to describe innovations in documentary film from 1920 Russia to 1980 North America.   The terms include “Kyno Pravda,” “Cinema Verite,” “Direct Cinema,” “Free Cinema,” “Candid Eye.”   We should not get bogged down in too narrow definitions.

Historically, each filmmaker – usually an experimental, rebel documentary maker – coined a term that best fit his (or her) style.    Jean Rouch in France is credited with using the term Cinema Verite’ first in 1960.    “Kyno Pravda” of course belongs to Dziga Vertov.   It is unclear who first used the term “Direct Cinema,” but it came to be used in the United States and Canada between 1958 and 1962.

All these “schools” of filmmaking share several features in common.   All forms are made possible by the development of smaller cameras.  All record life and people with much natural sound (except of course Vertov did not have sound film technology).  All shun formal narrations.   Most filmmakers in this genre were rebeling against the narrated documentary and the limitations of rigid structures (often imposed by television networks and expected by audiences).   

Generally speaking – Cinema Verite’ has come to be seen as more interventionist in approach – allowing the camera to provoke and reveal with a certain degree of manipulation.  Direct Cinema has come to suggest a less interventionist and more strictly observational approach.

Each filmmaker differs in his degree of intervention and therefore shapes his own definition.   Wiseman does not do interviews.   The Maysle’s insert the occasional question within a situation.   Rouch had no problem provoking reality by setting up situations and engaging in a certain amount of “rehearsal.”   Other filmmakers try to be “invisible” and use their small cameras to record events as unobtrusively as possible.    John Drew was particularly influential in America in the area of POLITICAL documentaries.  He wanted to capture as “raw” as possible politicians. He profiles Kennedy and Alabama Governor George Wallace.  His film influences later films about Bill Clinton: “The War Room” (1993)

So as you view the various films under consideration in this course, reflect on the methodology.   Most of all – documentary work is that of experimentation, experimentation in the pursuit truth.  Filmmaker borrow from each other and from the past and then try to develop originality.