Better term than "documentary?"

F

fu-pow

Active member
Anyone know of a better term than documentary. Its kind of misleading term because a documentary filmmaker doesn't simply document something....he/she shapes or molds it into an "analog of reality" to use a Barry Hampeism.

Maybe at the vary start of filmmaking people were documenting things but that was because filmmaking was a novelty in and of itself....look a train on a camera!!! Whohooo!

Non-fiction filmmaking might work but that kind of describes it by what it is not.

Video journalism? Maybe, but that would include news as well and documentaries can be very different from news.

I think that might adequately describe it though.

Any opinions?

Eric
 
I see what you're saying. At the same time, I think people refer to a type of filmmaking as documentary in the same way that they will refer to an entirely digital piece as a "film", or the process as "filmmaking". It's not, technically, correct, but it refers to an art form that is now actually more about the recognized elements and sensibilities than the physical medium itself.

When someone refers to a documentary film, we all have an idea of what that might be (though as the dogma of what a documentary must be has changed over the years, and will likely continue to change, we may be challenged by what, in fact, it actually is).

It's interesting to note that in Fernando Rossi's book about making a documentary fundraising trailer, Trailer Mechanics, several funders and distributers accept documentaries and moc-umentaries for equal consideration. Obviously, one is ostensibly non-fiction, and the other is clearly fiction, but the structure and sensibilities of both fall within what is recognized as the "documentary style" and are therefor, in significant ways, considered by some funders and distributers (and some audiences as well) to be one and the same.

I don't know about "video journalism". I think it may be technically correct, but it doesn't feel like some of my favorite documentaries. It feels like 60 minutes. To say that Benjamin Smoke is a piece of video journalism simply feels incorrect. The filmmakers created a very textured, aural and non linear film that may well have documented their subject much more accurately than anything bearing the designation "video journalism" could ever hope to accomplish.

Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky freely admit that their films "Brother's Keeper" and "Paradise Lost" follow the emotional trajectory of their own discovery process. So while they are "documenting" a specific incident, they are building the telling of that story on their own experiences.

Hmm - how about "Experiential Cinema"?



"What do you do?"

"I'm an experiential filmmaker"

"Yes, I've heard of that"


Could work!
 
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there's a term in french currently used... I think is very accurate... It's been around for a long time...Documentaire de Création (Creative Documentary, Creation Documentary... perhaps)...
 
One prominent and controversial character in this field refers to his creations as not documentaries, but "Op-Ed pieces."
 
Op-ed is generally an essay arguing the superiority of one person's opinion.

From Wikipedia:

An op-ed, abbreviated from opposite editorial due to the tradition of newspapers placing such materials on the page opposite the editorial page, is similar in form and content to an editorial, but represents the opinion of an individual contributor, who is sometimes but not always affiliated with the publication.
 
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Right -- it's an opinion. Presumably based on the person's actual beliefs and point of view, to the point that presumably they believe it's factually based, but the point is that they're not asserting it as unbiased factual documentation, but as their personal opinion of the issue.
 
Fu-Pow,

Even at the very beginning of filmmaking the "documentarians" were shaping the material to their own perspective. The granddaddy of the documentary, Robert Flaherty, had to re-create much of his classic "Nanook of the North," because most of his original footage burned up in a storage shack fire. He also re-created most of his "documentary" "Man of Aran, " because the whale hunting he wanted to depict hadn't been done by the people of Aran for decades.

I think audiences have come to expect that "documentary" is different than strict reporting and have accepted that a documentary is based on facts viewed through the filmmaker's perspective.

We use the word "movies" all the time, too...and we all know they don't move.
 
What a great thread. This has been on my mind for years now as the term 'documentary' has been so bastardized. There have been so many genre-bending films (and bad TV) that have rendered the term almost pointless.

I think that it's gotten so broad, we're reduced to its flavors: peronal, cinema verite, historical, political, etc.

"Sherman's March" was supposed to be about that very event. Instead, Ross McElwee tries to find love, gets lonely and looks for ex-girlfriends {among other things}. He also made a much better film in the process.

Alan Berliner's "Wide Awake" {now on HBO} is a personal take on insomnia and sleep patterns as seen against the backdrop of his having his first child.

A documentary I worked on played a lot like military propaganda.

Documentary just gets thrown at most anything that doesn't have actors speaking written dialogue. Recently, you had reality producer / writers arguing that their format isn't 'non-narrative' because they are creating narrative out of hours of footage.

So, basically, I just threw a bunch of stuff out there. I have no right answer. There simply isn't one. What's interesting is seeing new films that make us re-evaluate genres-in-general. Hopefully, this thread can continue.
 
Bus No. 8 said:
I see what you're saying. At the same time, I think people refer to a type of filmmaking as documentary in the same way that they will refer to an entirely digital piece as a "film", or the process as "filmmaking". It's not, technically, correct, but it refers to an art form that is now actually more about the recognized elements and sensibilities than the physical medium itself.
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Ok fair enough.

When someone refers to a documentary film, we all have an idea of what that might be (though as the dogma of what a documentary must be has changed over the years, and will likely continue to change, we may be challenged by what, in fact, it actually is).

It's interesting to note that in Fernando Rossi's book about making a documentary fundraising trailer, Trailer Mechanics, several funders and distributers accept documentaries and moc-umentaries for equal consideration. Obviously, one is ostensibly non-fiction, and the other is clearly fiction, but the structure and sensibilities of both fall within what is recognized as the "documentary style" and are therefor, in significant ways, considered by some funders and distributers (and some audiences as well) to be one and the same.
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So you are arguing that a documentary is based more on aesthetic sensibilities rather than content? I'd disagree with that. Usually what passes for an aesthetic sensibility in documentary is really a limitation of the technology. For example, a jerky camera shot. The filmmaker would probably love to have had a nice dolly shot but it wouldn't be practical in most run and gun situations. So we start to associate that with the "documentary style" which end up in "mocumentaries" but it brings us not closer to defining what documentary IS.

I don't know about "video journalism". I think it may be technically correct, but it doesn't feel like some of my favorite documentaries. It feels like 60 minutes. To say that Benjamin Smoke is a piece of video journalism simply feels incorrect. The filmmakers created a very textured, aural and non linear film that may well have documented their subject much more accurately than anything bearing the designation "video journalism" could ever hope to accomplish.
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Well let me theorize a little, borrowing heavily from the art of writing there are two main types of articles that get printed. There are essays and there are expository pieces.

Barry bringing up Op-Ed is perhaps a good example of an essay. Essays have more of an opinion or point to them.

An expository piece simply introduces a topic or story, almost from a 3rd person perspective. It's a more "newsy" type of piece (the facts ma'am just the facts.)

I think that this is true of documentary as well. On one end you have a video essay (Op-Ed) on the other end you have a video "expose" (video journalism.)
You can also have something toward the middle of that spectrum.

What determines where on the scale it lays is how much of the filmmaker's presence is in the film. An essay has a lot and a expose has very little. So we can both claim to do "documentary" but we may be doing very different types of documentary....one an essay/Op-Ed another a purely news piece.

The only thing those have in common is that they are based on actual events and there is some kind of story...sometimes not.

I still think that documentary kind of misses the point though. Whether you are creating an essay or an expose you are not simply documenting an event.

If that were true then wedding videographers would be considered documentarians because they are documenting weddings.

A documentary is always a story that's shaped by the creator whether its to make a point, an essayist or to educate or inform, ie a journalist.

Hmm - how about "Experiential Cinema"?
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I don't think that works because the experience that the filmmaker has is not what is represented on film. That's the same reason that documentarian is a misleading term, its not documenting, its shaping.
 
I'm making a film (video) about consumerism. I call it a shopumentary. Words are inert in that they only have the meanings we give them. Now that more and more people are making documentaries, it becomes harder and harder for one name or phrase to mean the same to all people but I think documentary is still the best descriptor.
 
"Commentary" and "Essay" come to mind.
I knew someone once who called her film a "Musing".
"Narrative". "Enucleation" (archaic surgical term).
 
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