David Attenborough's Mandatory: Participatory Films

Firstly, it is important to understand how the documentary form is best suited to illustrate the film’s theme. In order to do this, one must have an overview of the documentary style of filmmaking. Documentaries concern themselves with the “exploration of

Shooting images of another helpless human being into the eyes of the audience. The audience has to see clips of horror that happened to another human being, this takes horror as we know it to a whole new level. A risk with a horror documentary is involuntary mental flash backs that resurface horror or memories similar to PTSD.

A documentary is a genre of film that provides a factual report on a particular story, viewpoint, message or experience. In this essay, two documentaries, Bowling for columbine by Michael Moore and Made in Bangladesh by CBC news will be explored to show how persuasive techniques are used to make an audience feel a particular way.

Richardson’s non-interventionist style is a prime example of observational documentary, and works specifically well in capturing and promulgating the subject of death. According to Nichols, observational documentaries started appearing in the 1960’s as result of more mobile and smaller equipment. Furthermore, observational documentary stresses non-intervention, as filmmakers objectively observe indirect speech, candidness in the form of long takes, and create a world out of historical reality not fabricated with

A documentary and a movie are two similar, yet different things. They both (re)tell a story, but have different purposes – most documentaries are made with the point to inform, and movies purely for entertainment. This means that certain parts of the movie may have

Documentary films in particular have been the preferred channel for the diffusion of propaganda because of its association with ‘a truthful cinema.’ John Grierson, coiner the term documentary, defined it as “the creative treatment of actuality.” However, Hilmar Hoffman talks about film’s illusory power by explaining that what exists to the viewer is only what the camera ‘sees,’ and due to the absence of alternate perspectives, the viewer conventionally perceives the images shown as reality. In this regard, documentary films are able to influence, represent, and create a particular consciousness by doctoring events, thus making it untrustworthy and, ultimately, the ideal medium to communicate

One of the most widely used documentary techniques is interviews. Interviews reflect opinions from different viewpoints creating an almost 3 dimensional story. Its helps the audience feel more engaged as it is coming from a person 's point of view who was involved in the events making it feel more realistic. The audience can be assured that the story is not made up. Interviews give a sense of realism. Man on wire is a good example of the interview style being used to reflect feelings of the time Petit was on his way to making his dream come a reality. The emotions at some point were exaggerating maybe because he is a performer. But this made us as viewers feel apart of the film being able to sympathize with the characters and storyline. Marsh uses a technique where we see the subject talking on screen but we do not hear the interviewer talking or asking questions.

Journalist Stephanie Collins addresses the worldwide phenomenon of the 2013 documentary Blackfish and discusses the constructed truth we are persuaded to believe. The bias presented in this documentary works very effectively and the audience is left to feel the pity for the killer whales of SeaWorld. However, can we believe everything director Gabriela Cowperthwaite presents to us? Have we just fallen victim to the constructed truth of extreme animal activists? Documentaries are known for constructing their own version of the truth they wish to portray.

Documentaries also include films which are intended to ‘expose’ and often carry interviews, for example Michael Moore’s films on social concerns

6. What aspects of this film fit into the documentary film genre, and what aspects appear more purely propagandistic?

The entire documentary itself is a narration. Due to the documentary being in the format of a narration, it set up the entire film to incorporate anecdotes and other modes of discourse. Through the use of anecdotes of multiple activists throughout the entire film, specifically the one on Daniel McGowan, the viewer is able to get a good idea of how far these people are willing to go for their cause. For example, Daniel was telling his story of his last operation with the ELF, and he had to put gasoline around the entire house and in all of the vehicles which are hooked up to an explosive device. Daniel knew about the consequences of this action and yet he still went forth with it.

There are many different definitions of the word documentary. One definition I found is, according to wisegeek.org, “a documentary film is a movie that attempts to document reality…the scenes are carefully chosen…may rely on voice-over narration to describe what is happening” which sums it up pretty well and is very clear in my mind. It was difficult

A multitude of persuasive techniques were implicated within the documentary to sway the audience. Such devices are as follows: repetition, music, anecdotal evidence, inclusive language, rhetorical questions, statistical evidence, jargon appeal to emotion, appeal to trust and appeal to authority. These persuasive utensils aided in influencing the audience to agree with the documentary.

Every night when we sit down to watch our much loved Grey’s Anatomy or Desperate Housewives, we know for a fact they are fictional dramas which allow us to escape the reality and boredom of our lives. We also realise the scripted shows use many tactics to manipulate our thinking. The producer does this to position us towards a specific view of life. But what do we expect from a documentary? We know documentaries to be faithful recounts of events; however, these events may be subject to just as much manipulation as the intriguing plots in our addictive shows.

The purpose of a documentary is to promote one's views or beliefs, in order to provoke change in society. This is evident in Michael Moore’s documentary Bowling for Columbine and Louie Psihoyos, The Cove. Both documentaries manipulate the audience into taking the composers side of the argument. Bowling for Columbine uses satirical humour and interviewing techniques to make an extremely persuasive argument highlighting issues such as gun violence levels in America and the Columbine High School massacre itself. Louie Psihoyos’ The Cove uses statistics and archival footage to persuade the audience that dolphins are beginning unnecessarily slaughtered, and there is something underhanded going on in Taiji, Japan.