AJ's Doc Talk

Both the participatory and the reflexive modes of documentary take on their own characteristics unique to their style of film making. In regards to the observational mode, participatory inserts the film maker into the film in some fashion. Nichols best sums this up by stating, “when we view participatory documentary we expect to witness the historical world as represented by someone who actively engages with others, rather than unobtrusively observing, poetically reconfiguring, or argumentatively assembling what others say and do.” The participatory modes deviates because it acknowledges the presence of the film maker. It acknowledges that the film maker is not only the person behind the camera, they too become a social actor of sorts because they are also people in the world having their own experiences. Nichols says that this moves a film to the “I speak about them to you” form to the “I speak with them for us (me and you)” form. Participatory films are characterized as by interview sequences that, in turn, become conversation focal points for the film. This is something that is true of almost every Michael Moore film as well as films like Sherman’s March by Ross Mcelwee. In both of these films the film makers physical presence is a big part of the film over simply just getting the shot.

Reflexive documentaries take a spin on participatory by shifting the focus from film maker to other social actors, to film maker and viewer. Nichols says that this “intensified level of reflection” on what actually represents our world distinguishes the reflexive mode from other modes of documentary film making. A really good point made about this mode is that reflexive documentary represents not only how the world is represented but also what gets represented. We no longer are looking through documentaries, we are asked to look at what the documentary is which Nichols says is a “construct or representation.” This is something seen throughout the film Surname Viet Given Name Nam. This film relied on interviews with Vietnamese women who are thought to be in Vietnam but later reveal that they are immigrants and living in the US. The interview responses were transcribed from actual oppressed women in Vietnam. Nichols also connects Man with a Movie Camera to the demonstrative impression of reality in the beginning scene as reflexive.

The similarities in these two modes of documentary ultimate come from the perspective they take. No longer is the film maker a fly on the wall capturing life as it happens. No, the film maker is now fulfilling a social acting role themselves with insertion and interaction with the film however not enough where the real sense of reality is lost. By inserting the film maker into their films there is a new sense of realism as well as a different perspective of the social issues in the films. The major differences between the two I believe lie within the way the film maker interacts with the film. The Participatory has the film maker conversing with other aspects of the film while the Reflexive has the film maker conversing with the audience. Overall the Participatory mode has the most real interaction and acknowledgement with the person making the film while the Reflexive mode is the most self-conscious and questioning mode of documentary.