The two most recent modes of documentary that have been discussed in class are the participatory and reflexive modes. The main characteristic of the participatory mode is that it emphasizes interactions between filmmaker and subject. The filming may be an interview or other forms of direct involvement that show interaction and conversation. As Bill Nichols describes, sometimes a participatory documentary involves archival footage in order to examine historical issues (31).
A prime example of a participatory documentary is Photographic Memory by Ross McElwee, a film in which a majority of the filmmaker’s time is spent interviewing (arguing with and bothering) his son, Adrian, in hopes of reaching some conclusion about their relationship. The film is proof that technological overload renders communication. Throughout the entire film, Adrian is constantly on his phone and/or computer, unable to fully communicate with his father and causing the “interviews” to take much longer than they should. His father complains that his son’s addiction to the virtual world via technology is an ultimate distraction and puts a wall up between the two of them. The irony of it all is that Ross is essentially doing the same thing – his camera has been between himself and his son for Adrian’s entire life, and he is using it now to try to get closer to his son and pull information from him, when I think all Adrian really wants is for his father to put the camera down and just talk to him because he wants to, because he enjoys it (instead of for some filmmaking purpose).
In a participatory documentary, relationship between filmmaker and subject becomes much more complex and personal. Nichols explains it very well in saying that a viewer can sense that the images they are seeing are “not just an indexical representation of some part of the historical world but also an indexical record of the actual encounter between filmmaker and subject” (157). In this mode, the filmmaker is entering into the social actor’s world and does so through conversation, interview, provocation, etc.
I really enjoyed Chronicle of a Summer, a participatory documentary that does an excellent job of pulling information from complete strangers by confronting them and engaging with them in the middle of the streets of Paris, posing the question: “Are you happy?” It is very interesting to see how the camera can cause people to react differently.
On the other hand, the reflexive mode, the most self-conscious and self-questioning mode, “calls attention to assumptions and conventions that govern documentary filmmaking” (Nichols 31). This mode is known to increase our awareness of the way a film is constructed to represent reality in some way. Man with a Movie Camera and Stranger with a Camera are perfect examples of this mode.
Stranger with a Camera, as Nichols puts it, prompts a reflexive awareness, one of sociological assumptions that involved fieldwork – research on the film’s two main subjects – Hugh O’Connor, filmmaker who travelled to film Appalachian residents, and Hobart Ison, the local resident who shot and killed him. Filmmaker Elizabeth Barret instinctively questions how misunderstandings and stereotypes across cultures can potentially lead to unnecessary deaths. She does an excellent job of taking away viewer’s assumptions about the poor and disadvantaged residents as well as the “entitled” filmmaker, and instead, stimulates a deeper contemplation and reflection of any and all underlying issues.
As mentioned before, Man with a Movie Camera also fits into the reflexive mode. It places attention on the filmmaking process and how a filmmaker can cinematically create an individual perspective. I think this is one way the reflexive and participatory modes may be similar – though in different ways, they both have the ability to create an individual perspective. Participatory does this by means of conversation with others and how the filmmaker chooses to portray their subject (distortion and misrepresentation sometimes occur, depending on the morality of a filmmaker), while the reflexive mode does this by engaging the filmmaker with his or her viewers. Because the reflexive mode attends to a filmmaker’s engagement with us, the viewers, it differs from the participatory mode in that it does not follow a filmmaker in his or her engagement with others (social actors).
Another aspect to point out about reflexive documentaries is that they challenge the techniques of realism as a style. Surname Viet Given Name Nam is a perfect example. This film relies heavily on interviews with Vietnamese women who describe their oppressive conditions since the end of the war. However, as the film progresses, the viewer learns that they were staged interviews with women who are actually immigrants to the U.S., and they were reciting accounts that had been transcribed and edited by someone other than the filmmaker herself. This goes to show that documentary filmmaking, depending on the filmmaker (and morality of a filmmaker), can cross a line and make itself out to be something entirely different than what it’s portraying.
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I appreciate where you point out at the end of the article about the reflexive mode of documentary crossing a line, is definitely something that merits examination. I think where I struggle in particular is wondering if there is a certain point in the reflexive documentary where one can state that the film maker is taking liberties with the truth. If a documentary is a piece of film that is bent on exposing the truth, whether it be that of an foreign world, unfamiliar lifestyle or experience, is it possible that if the piece edits the reality of a situation so much that it can no longer be called documentary? Sometimes I feel like there is a blurry line in this genre where a film maker is almost tempted into crossing into the genre of fiction. I feel like if they stretch the truth too much, their product can end up being something else entirely. Is it ethical then to make a reflexive film? Yes, I think so in that it exposes the viewer to different emotions that before would not have been accessible to the audience. A the same line though I think that it is important to note that there is a very fine line the film maker must tread so that the truth is not entirely compromised.
Thanks, Aryelle. I appreciate your feedback and thoughts.
I love that you brought up the fact that a documentary filmmaker is “almost tempted into crossing into the genre of fiction.” I think that definitely rings true. It’s a blurry line for sure. I think the truth is stretched quite a bit in documentary filmmaking, and this class has opened my eyes to that. However shocking or frustrating it may be at times (ex: finding out that Nanook of the North was essentially all a lie), I do believe that, oftentimes, it is necessary, and we have seen many examples in class of how stretching the truth has resulted in outstanding works of documentary film (Stories We Tell being one of my favorites).
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