Defining Documentary film

One of the aspects that I find the most interesting about documentaries is that although it is oftentimes seen as objective truth or reality, this is not necessarily the case. Documentaries breed powerful responses in many cases because of the subjective nature of the film making style. While they do document a reality, the way that I have always looked at documentaries is as a lens by which filmmakers document their own reality. That is, regardless of how unbiased or observational a filmmaker may want a film to be, all past experiences and current ideals may seep into a story by means of film style or through editing. This subjectivity is either unintentional or intentional. Michael Moore’s films are examples of intentional biased “truth”, where he frames situations and interviews in a way where he already knows the outcome. Nanook of the North is another example where the plot and characters are fabricated in order to create a truth or reality. Ziga Vertov’s Man with a Movie Camera is an example where some bias may have been unintentional and can vary from viewer to viewer. Some people take away either pro or anti-communist rhetoric through the avant-garde style of the film. All films, or other forms of mass communication, can generate any number of opinions and one person may take away something completely different from their peers. The same is true for documentaries. Since documentaries are meant to convey reality however, the filmmakers must often use the medium to persuade the viewers into aligning themselves with their view or reality. Documentaries are specific rhetorical texts in this way because the main goal, of many, is to persuade the audience into believing something after seeing the facts. The concept of reality is also fuzzy because unless the subject has no idea they are being filmed, they will act differently in front of the camera; which affects the reality as the subjects are always performing to some degree. This is one of the reasons it is hard to categorize this particular genre. While audience members are easily able to determine what a documentary is when they see one it is harder to get them to pinpoint what the conventions of the genre actually are. In the first chapter of Bill Nichols’ book, Introduction to Documentary, he goes through three common misconceptions of documentary film and what they actually portray. Through these, he has determined a more precise definition which takes into account all of these things:

“ Documentary films speaks about situations and events involving real people (social actors) who present themselves to us as themselves in stories that convey a plausible proposal about, or perspective on, the lives, situations, and events portrayed. The distinct point of view of the filmmaker shapes this story into a way of seeing the historical world directly rather than into a fictional allegory.”

– Bill Nichols

This definition is helpful in determining what documentaries seek to accomplish and how frameworks are instrumental in producing a successful documentary. Although some Documentary filmmakers seek to avoid these filmmaker frameworks and are strictly observational, like Frederick Wiseman’s High School, the editing of the film creates a narrative that the audience can then draw conclusions from.