Andrei Allen UCA Broadcast Media Blog

I've been looking more into the modes and styles of documentaries to get some influence into how i want our documentary to look like, where at the moment, i'm still trying to decide as to how the story should be told, where i've not done something of this nature before, so every-time i research, i'm finding out something new, and changing my decision.

Here are some examples of stylised, observational, experimental documentaries that i've came across, which are character driven, using the expository mode, in a Cinéma vérité style, in that it's letting the narration tell you a different side to the visuals that your being shown, to give you a different look on the subject matter, possibly one that you would't of thought about, whilst using a poetic mode to help emphasise this notion.

City of Cranes

Made by Eva Weber

2007, 14 Mins.

http://www.4docs.org.uk/films/show/17/City+of+Cranes

Summary

A companion piece to our other film ‘The Solitary Life of Cranes’, ‘City of Cranes' is a poetic look at the life and work of crane drivers. Originally made for Channel 4, ‘City of Cranes’ is divided into four chapters: 'The City Above", "The Last Topman", "Ballet of Cranes" and "Solitary"; with each chapter accentuating a different aspect of the drivers’ world.







The full version of the documentary http://youtu.be/a8bZEFuszDM

Self-storage units are windows into human histories: their discarded objects and dust-covered furniture are inscribed with past dreams, secret hopes, and lives we cannot let go of.




What i particularly like with the way in which Eva Weber presents her documentaries is, she shows a lot of visuals, in an artistic/experimental way, and whilst showing them, lets her contributors narrate the visual by telling us their emotional feeling towards/concerning the scenario we're viewing, not by them telling us what they're doing, but rather telling us a story concerning the subject matter, and what it means to them.

The contributors she features as well, she shows them on screen, but not showing them in an rehearsed, or in your face interview type of reveal, but rather in an actuality style, where by you know that it's the contributor, because when the scene changes, the voice would change, but they would not introduce themselves to the camera, they would just commence with their "activity" of what they're doing, not paying attention to the camera viewing them, and in some cases this would be carried out in a first person view.


The way in which the story is directed is meaningful as well, where it emotionally draws us in to how the narrator feels, using a mixture of wild-track sounds plus music, and the way how the shots are composed, in regards to the lighting, colour palette and grading, the perspective of the shots, and also what the contributors are doing within the shots.
For example in the Steel homes, you feel a sense of emptiness because of the way how the shots are displayed, they're not up close and personal, but rather observational from a distance, showing the surroundings of where the contributor is. Supplemented with the audio it helps to further more give you this sense of loneliness and emptiness.



With the stonemason apprentice documentary, i want to try and incorporate some of the elements from this documentary to help show the apprentice's at work, within a natural and un-altered environment due to the presence of a camera being there.