Study Questions
Documentary Tradition 2010
Assignment # 1
Due: September 27 in class
• Define documentary mode:
• ½ page paragraph -- double-spaced
Agree or disagree with lectures, readings; use
examples from films viewed inside or outside
class if that helps.
Week 1: Sept. 13
Discussion Questions for discussion section, Week 2
based on Nichols, Ch. 5; Juhasz, “Documentary on YouTube (A&deJ);
Barnouw, Ch. 1; lecture, screenings
1. Where, in Barnouw’s reference to historical documentaries do you think the description most
requires the reader to see the moving image? Why? What point would be confirmed or
disputed?
2. Why does Nichols say of the Lumière films that they “seemed” to record and “appear” to
reproduce the event before the camera?
3. How does the documentary “what you see is what was there” work as rhetoric, ie. help
filmmakers to make an argument about the world?
For example: How does Capturing the Friedmans go against our beliefs about the world? What
argument about the world does the documentary treatment make in this case?
4. Nichols says that documentary uses the same narrative devices as fiction. Test the following on
Capturing the Friedmans:
a. Problem leads to solution
b. Viewer’s desire for solution-out come delayed (suspense = delay)
5. How is the documentary interest appealed to in Why Mrs. Jones Got a Divorce (1900) like or not
like the documentary interest encouraged by Capturing the Friedmans?
6. What, in Juhasz, seems contradictory about using Eisenstein’s definition of the “slogan” to
describe the politics of work posted on YouTube?
7. Where does Juhasz think YouTube fails, as exemplified by the “Lesbian Community” search term
and the videos it yields? What search term example would you give to illustrate the politics of
YouTube?
8. See, on YouTube, the documentary footage from “Needa Before She Gets Shot.” Consider how it
rallied Iranians living outside Tehran in the aftermath of the rigged 2009 elections there. How
does the footage of Needa qualify or confirm Juhasz’s position?
Study Questions Week 2. Sept. 20: Documentary Voice
Nichols, Chs. 3 & 4
1. How is “voice” akin to “style”? List 4 ways.
2. What is meant by the ethical dimension of documentary voice?
3. What are the means available to the maker for the conveyance of
“documentary voice”? List 6 (1 of your own)
4. How is the viewer called upon to “infer” the voice of the perspective?
5. Consider the documentary voice in Capturing the Friedmans in terms of the
3 Cs of rhetorical discourse. Which “C” does it use?
6. What does he mean by film may “refuse to compel belief in the truthfulness
of its representation”? Describe and give examples.
1. How does Nichols use Hospital (Frederick Wiseman, 1970) to illustrate the
difference between examples and concepts?
2. What definition of documentary does Nichols need to use in order to say
that documentary “activates our social consciousness” ?
3. Nichols says that The Body Beautiful (1991) argues that “Family life is like
this.” Read his description of the film (to be screened on 9/27 in class).
How can this family be said to work (or not work) as a metaphor?
Week 3: Defining Documentary: China
Study Questions for Discussion Week of Sept. 27:
Nichols, Ch. 2 “How Do Documentaries Differ?”;
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
What do you think is the difference between a reproduction of reality and a
representation of the world?
How do we know that 60 Minutes is documentary reportage rather than
docudrama?
What do reflexive strategies “unsettle” and “undercut”?
What assumptions do spectators bring to the viewing of a documentary
that they do not bring to a film based on an imaginary situation?
Why does Nichols argue that documentary (in contrast with the fiction film)
relies less on continuity editing to create a credible world that the viewer
perceives as “real”?
What is the impact of the “indexical whammy” and why can the fiction film
not claim this?
What is epistephilia and how do you think documentary stimulates it?
1. Review: a. Documentary Codes
Solution to Problem of Documentary Realism:
Documentary = codes of realism signify “authenticity”
or
stylistic conventions used by makers & recognized by viewers
1. Voice-of-God narration
2. Long takes
3. Synchronous sound
4. Black and white film stock
5. Archival footage
6. Hidden camera and
microphones
7. Apparently unrehearsed
moments
8. Hand held camera
high shooting ratio
invisible editing = erasure
location sound
ambient noise
visible camera & microphone
video diary mode:
acknowledgment of camera