After getting feedback from my documentary and presenting to our class - I made the executive decision to join forces with Elise on her Zoo style documentary. I felt that my Grassroots Football idea had potential but I was worried that I wouldn't have a deeper meaning to talk about. The zoo though has a deeper meaning with the captivity of animals. Elise has already started to plan hers but I will add to the decisions as we now start to plan our documentary together.
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This documentary is about the ex Manchester United starts Paul Scholes, Gary Neville, Phil Neville, Nicky Butt & Ryan Giggs who bought their local club Salford City and have the ambition to take the team up the leagues and redevelop the club. The documenatry focuses on the football club but really it is about the deeper meaning and follows the plauers, club volunteers, fans, managers and board members around their life as well. It is really effective as it shows the bigger perspective of how working at a football club can be.
It has been really useful to watch as it shows key shots of football games, stadiums, training facilities and it will help my develop my understanding in what I want for my documentary. ![]() Blackfish is a documentary film about SeaWorld in the USA and the orcas they keep for shows to the public. It was a controversial documentary at the time however it showed the inside on the captivity of and the sad story of orca killing one of the keepers during a show. Blackfish conveyed important parts of what a documentary should look like with the following conventions of a documentary product (Its also worth bearing in mind that this was a documentary film - not a television documentary or docu-series like I propose for my final product). Blackfish conveyed the following conventions of a documentary:
Today we pitched our documentary to our class in an 'Apprentice' style way. It was a perfect opportunity to share our ideas and give feedback on each others provisional ideas. Below is the presentation: Documentary Pitch Feedback:
The idea itself is good but it needs more information and a deeper meaning to it. I need to plan more shot types and storyboard exactly what I want. I stated in my presentation that I want to include the football in the title with match footage and the idea was recieved well and people liked it. I need to develop the idea firther however otherwise it isn't going to be a structured documentary. As my idea is starting to shape, football is the likely topic of choice for my documentary, I have therefore started to look at football documentaries. Leicester's Impossible Dream aired in Amy 2016 and was a BBC Documentary on the team in blue incredible title win last year. Gary Lineker talks us through the fairytale season and how Leicester defied the how odds and won the Premier League. It has helped me with how I want to meet the codes and conventions of documentaries as this programme meets a lot of them. Below is the main codes and conventions of documentaries and for each I have analysed if it met them.
![]() The documentary series Louis Theroux Weird Weekends sees Louis go into different lifestyles or topics to see what they are like and give us (the viwer) an insight to something we wouln't normally. Usually the topic has controversial views or is quite negatively portratyed in the media. For example there are episodes on Wrestling, UFO's, Porn, Body-building, Swingers. Louis Theroux Weird Weekends - Series 2 Episode 2 "Swingers". Louis travels to South California and meets a couple who host Swinging parties. The way the show is set up is to mock the people involved but in a sarcastic way so Louis gains knowledge of the subject. There is a sarcastic tone involved which makes the viewers engaged and gain knowledge on a sensitive or frowned about subject. The title sequence from the start is set up to mock as it is very happy and quite witty with Louis walking round the world like he is James Bond in the opening sequence - when clearly Louis isn't as he is quite a skinny, tall and intelligent man. It follows some codes and conventions of doucmentaries such as Voice of God, Interviews (it is mainly based round interviews), Archive footage, Stock footgage, non-diegtic/digetic sound. It has helped with my understanding of my documentary and how I want mine to come across to viewers. ![]() Sex Pistol Bill Grundy 1976: This infamous interview in 1976 will never be forgotten for all the wrong reasons. Bill Grundy (TV host) wanted to create bad reputation of the band 'Sex Pistols' by being rude. He staged this interview by supplying the band alcohol, cigarettes and even drugs. The set did not supply enough chairs which resulted in many members standing looking unprofessional and informal. This triggered a very poor quality interview and put an instant bad name to the band. Also the camera-man were filming with poor techniques, where by the camera were focusing on irrelevant things creating a construction of poorly filmed interviews, to further the image of negativity. This is something I don’t want to use in my documentary as it is an extremely bad interview and I believe I can learn from this. At the time this interview was massive and it was all over the media, it caused moral panic and consequently Bill Grundy eventually lost his job. Martin Bashir and Princess Diana: This interview is totally different to the Sex Pistols shambles of an interview. This entire documentary has multiple retakes, ensuring there is no damage to the peoples Princess' reputation. Everything about this documentary has been places or adapted to influence the audiences portrayal of the documentary interview. The mise en scène of the backgrounds et has been adapted to allow a connection with the audience as it is apparently "in the Princess' house" and that she is a real 'normal' person with personal opinions and emotions, lowering her status to allow the viewer to relate her. However, this is further emphasised by the Princess' body language looking sad to gain emotional support by the audience member. She uses very timid body language and due to this is just post her divorce from Charles. This style completely ruins the authenticity and realism of the interview as it is quite clearly set up. I like the mise en scene set up but for my idea – I won’t pay this much attention to the mise en scene and all the body language like this particular interview in 1995. ![]() The documentary Amy directed by Asif Kapadia totally relied on archive footage which is why looking into this film was so important. I wanted to see how the director had portrayed this film as it is a unique style of documentary - it breaks some of the main codes and conventions but it is effective and it works perfectly (not a dry eye whilst watching it). Kapadia presents Amy as an ambitious woman, someone with strength but she has problems and in the public life that it is hard. He uses techniques with interviews that you never see the person speaking face (unless it is archive footage). This is powerful as one of Amy's friends she said that Amy "was lost and just couldn't stop" (referring to her drug use) whilst on screen there is footage of Amy struggling with drug abuse. This is powerful as we (the viewers) feel empathy for her and look to blame others around her even though it was partly her own fault. This is something to bear in mind when making my documentary is the message Kapadia puts a subjective style view towards it. Codes and Conventions met in the Amy Elements that are in: Archive footage and Stock footage Interviews; use of sound bridge for effect - helps Kapadia give us his message Text introductions to each bit of new footage Use of music -diegetic and non-diegetic Elements that do not feature: No voice of God - only interviews tell the story (extremnely powerful) Its subjective Todorovs Narrative Theory:
Elements of a documentary:
Challenge: Don't follow the conventions Comply: Follow the conventions Codes and conventions:
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Dan AyersCandidate No: 0008 Archives
April 2017
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