Documentary And Narrative Filmmaking

Documentaries are produced in such a way that positions the audience to accept a version of reality. As Tim Hetherington, a British photojournalist once said, “You can construct whatever story you want to. Documentaries are constructions, as is all journalism.” In Fahrenheit 9/11 specifically, viewers are presented with a critical analysis of the political agenda surrounding America’s decision to wage war on Iraq. Directed by American political commentator and filmmaker Michael Moore and released in mid-2004, the documentary’s central premise is that US President George Bush is, and has been from the start of his term, unfit for office and does not act in interests of the American public. Moore presents the idea that President Bush, as a result

The documentary “Fed Up” provides some important and disturbing details of the food industry. The 1977 heart disease and diet study known as the McGovern Report warned that the obesity rate was increasing rapidly due to American diets in fatty meats, saturated fats, cholesterol, and sugar. The food industry vehemently denied these claims, but the American people still demanded lower fat food products. The food manufacturers found that the fat removal made the food bland and unpalatable so to address this they replaced the fat content with sugar. Both the documentary and the Harvard Nutrition Source discuss the role sugar has in health conditions such as obesity and type 2 diabetes. They both link the consumption of sugar as the causality for

Michael Moore’s documentary has a very clear point to make. Moore will persist in asking until he gets the answer he must sense is waiting for him. For example, when he is talking to a friend of the columbine shooter, he continues asking him about why the school would have thought that he would have been likely to create violence. He asks 3 or four times to make sure that he gets the answer he is looking for. Michael Moore allows his subjects to speak, but he is the one forming the questions. Similarly, he chooses what will be shown and in what order so as to create associations and meaning from the raw images as

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.

The idea of a documentary being an artistic or even personalised expression of a director is long gone, or so it seems in recent times. In Michael Moore’s latest documentary, Bowling for Columbine, he attempts to get across to viewers his, and essentially only his point of view, on the topic of gun laws. Although what Moore is trying to say is not necessarily wrong, he is at the same time not taking into account the other side of the argument either; all he is trying to do, essentially is hypnotise viewers into thinking

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

There are many strengths and weaknesses in this film. One of Moore’s strengths was that he uses many entertainments to portray most of his argument. Moore uses interviews with the public and celebrities, history of our country, crude humor, footage that was extremely ruthless and alarming, as well as hands on experiments Another strength is that he provides evidence as to what he’s saying. One weakness is that sometimes he goes off topic, or sometimes he also contradicts himself. Moore uses many pathos, ethos, and logos through out the whole film. First off, this film is filled with pathos, it is all very emotional due to all the tragic events mentioned. With ethos it does show a lot of credibility through out the whole movie. Lastly, the film does state many facts, statistics, and evidence. For example, the correlation of people killed all around the world and the laws that each country has. On fallacy found in the documentary is how he always tries to prove something from what he says. This is called or also known as Ad Hominem fallacy. He

The Holding Ground documentary was powerful and highly effective in showing the struggle of the Dudley Street and the Roxbury neighborhood and their struggle to in effect take back their neighborhoods. The people in the video were passionate about their community and faced many obstacles like illegal dumping and arson for profit as well as a committee of people who had no idea about the community making decisions without having anyone in the community representing them. In the documentary, Robert Holmes, Jr a Trustee at the Riley Foundation discussed how the board was having a community meeting. He originally thought that Che Madyun was sent in as an agitator. He then realized that she was just passion about her community and had valid points.

To support this claim, I will present two very popular yet controversial documentaries that were aimed to educate viewers on a couple of compelling societal issues. I will explore how the inclusion of pathos, logos and ethos in ‘Sicko’ by Michael Moore and ‘Supersize Me’ by Morgan Spurlock clarified their messages and made their arguments very convincing. These two documentary films show that the values adhered to by the two filmmakers, and probably by the media firms they work with as well as their corporate sponsors often influence the kind of information and at which angle it is presented to the

The film portrays President Bush, and indeed the entire United States government during the time, as engaging in acts of crime. Moore recollects the Bush’s administration response to 9/11, which included the war in Afghanistan, the enactment

Michael Moore's latest film, "Fahrenheit 9/11," presents a critical look at the administration of George W. Bush and the War on Terrorism. In this film Moore investigates the rapid growth of the United States government and its trend of trampling the rights of individuals, and the corporatism that is spawned out of the close ties between big government and big business during wartime. Michael Moore may not convince all audiences, but is successful for its factual accuracy in which the evidence spoke for itself, and at the same time proclaimed Moore's artistry in transposing and splicing scenes to create impressions that supported his allegations and opinions. Michael Moore has employed two main techniques in an attempt to successfully

The Movie I chose to reflect on is Spotlight, which follows a group of journalist as they try to prove the cover up of sexual abuse involving the Catholic Church and their priest. The spotlight team from the Boston Globe was faced with multiple ethical issues, however, I feel SPJ Code of Ethics in section seek truth and report it stating, “Recognize a special obligation to serve as watchdogs over public affairs and government. Seek to ensure that the public’s business is conducted in the open, and that public records are open to all.” is the most prevalent throughout the movie. The team works effortlessly in trying to bring the scandal to light by finding reliable witnesses, as well as getting legal documents unsealed which ended up proving

The obvious bias illustrated throughout Michael Moore’s film certainly does detract from the messages conveyed however when presented in the right circumstances it adds more value to the messages. The obvious bias leaves many people questioning the credibility of the director’s message as it doesn’t show the full spectrum of the situation, which is what documentaries are for, and ultimately this detracts the films message. However, in some circumstances the obvious bias brings more light on important aspects which should be acted upon thus adding more value the message being portrayed. Michael Moore has directed over 12 documentaries and a handful of them have been awarded with prestigious film awards. “Where to invade next”, “Sicko”, “Bowling for Columbine”, “Capitalism: a love story” and “Fahrenheit 9/11”, these are just half of the documentaries in which Michael Moore has directed. The purpose of a documentary is to present a nonfictional motion picture which aims to promote or

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

The extraordinary film The 400 Blows (Francois Truffaut, 1959) skillfully uses cinematic devices appropriately within the context of the theme. Part of the underlying theme of this movie as explained by Truffaut himself is, “... to portray a child as honestly as possible...”(Writing About Film, 1982). It is the scenes in this movie that are most helpful in disclosing the overall theme of the film. Within the scenes, the camera angles in this film play an important role in accentuating the emotions behind the scene. The camera angles used in this film will be the primary focus of this paper. The high angle shots utilized in The 400 Blows are effective in helping to develop the overall feel of a scene. This movie