Chapter Seven

Question 7: How Can We Describe the Observational, Participatory, Reflexive, and Performative Modes of Documentary Film?

Continued from chapter six, Nichols goes deeper in to describe the last four modes of documentary film observational, participatory, reflexive, and performative.

           The observational mode was discussed in chapter one, “emphasizes a direct engagement with everyday life of subjects as observed by an unobtrusive camera” (Nichols 31). Unlike poetic and expository modes of documentary, the observational does not scarify direct engagement with specific individuals to construct formal patterns or compelling perspectives. Nichols brings up a good question, “What if the filmmaker were simply to observe what happens in front of the camera without overt intervention?” (172). That in a nutshell is basically what observational mode is. Some specific qualities of observational mode are:

•      It is an alternative to classic oration and poetic expression.  
•       It is limited by what occurs in front of the camera (hard to represent historical events).  
•       It treats knowledge as tacit sense of what we learn by watching, listening, observing, and making inferences about the conduct of others.
•       The sound is tied to the image by the indexical link of synchronous recording. Filmmaker gives up full control of sound to record what is said and heard in a given situation; refrains from voice over.
•      Time and space is continuous, with a strong sense of continuity that links the words and actions of subjects from shot to shot.
•      When it comes to ethical concerns, passive observation of dangerous, harmful, or illegal activity can lead to serious difficulties for subjects. Questions of responsibility toward subjects can become acute.
•      The voice characterized by patience, modesty, self-effacing. Willingness to let audience decide for itself about what it sees and hears. (Nichols 210-11)

            The participatory mode was discussed in chapter one, “emphasizes the interaction between filmmaker and subject” (Nichols 31). First appearing around 1960 due to the new technologies that allowed for sync sound recording on location. Unlike the observational mode the filmmaker does interact with his or her subjects rather than simply observe them. Some specific qualities of participatory mode are:

•        It is an alternative to passive observation and classic oration.
•         It is limited because it may cede control and point of view to others, lose independence of judgment.
•        It treats knowledge as what we learn from personal interactions; what people say and do when confronted or engaged by other; what can be conveyed by interviews and other forms of encounter.
•        The sound stresses the speech between the filmmaker and subject, especially in interviews. Heavy reliance on sync sound but may also utilize voice over; filmmaker retains only partial creative control of sound.
•       Time and space is continuous, it may interconnect a present tense time and space with a past tense (historical time and space).
•        When it comes to ethical concerns, manipulate or goad other into confessions or actions they may regret; a strong responsibility to respect the right and dignity of subjects. Questions of manipulation and distortion arise. 
•        The voice characterized by engagement, strong investment in the encounter with other or in presenting a historical perspective. (Nichols 210-11)

            The reflexive mode was discussed in chapter one, “calls attention to the assumptions and convention that govern documentary filmmaking” (Nichols 31). This intensified level of reflection on what representing the world involves distinguishes the reflection mode from the other modes.  Some specific qualities of reflexive mode are:

•        It is an alternative to realist representation that ignores that formal process of representing the world or social assumptions about the nature the world.
•       It is limited by increased sense of formal abstraction, detachment, loss of direct engagement with social issues.
•       It treats knowledge as contextual. Always framed by institutional constraints and personal assumptions that can be exposed and charged; ask what we learn when we ask how we learn.
•       The sound may metacommunicate about how communication takes place. Talk about talking about something as well as sync or nonsync sound.
•        Time and space is contextualized. Draws attention to how time and space may be manipulated by systems of continuity or discontinuity.
•       When it comes to ethical concerns, use or abuse subjects to pose questions that are those of the filmmaker and not the subjects.
•        The voice is characterized by self-quoting, a voice of doubt, even radical doubt about the certainty or fixity of knowledge. (Nichols 210-11)

                Lastly, the performative was also discussed in chapter one, “emphasizes the subjective or expressive aspect of the filmmaker’s own involvement with a subject; it strives to heighten the audience’s responsiveness to this involvement” (Nichols 32). Much like poetic mode of documentary representation, the performative mode raises questions about what knowledge actually amounts to. For example, what counts as understand or comprehension? Some specific qualities of performative mode are:

•         It is an alternative empirical, factual, or abstract forms of knowledge.
•        It is limited by personal POV or vision may become private or dissociated from more broadly social perceptions.
•        It treats knowledge as embodied, affective and situated. What we learn from direct, experiential encounter rather than second-hand from experts or book.
•        The sound often relies on filmmaker’s own voice organize the film; stress introspective, testimonial, essayistic forms of speech and dialogue. Mixer sync and nonsync; use music and sound expressively.
•        Time and space varies according to the expressive goals. May stylize time and space to emphasize its affective dimension.
•        When it comes to ethical concerns, degree of honesty and self-scrutiny vs. self-deception; misrepresentation or distortion of larger issues, lapses into wholly idiosyncratic.  
•          A strongly personal, engaged orator pursuing the truth of what it feels like to experience the world in a particular way characterizes the voice.  (Nichols 210-11)

Chapter Six

Question 6: How Can We Differentiate among Documentaries? Categories, Models, and the Expository and Poetic Modes of Documentary Film

   

Within this chapter Nichols discusses the need to classify documentaries, documentary film and its relationship to other kinds of film, models for and mode of documentary film, the poetic mode, and the expository mode. He starts with differentiating between documentaries. To do this we need to review a few definitions:

           1.    We define documentary as a form of cinema that speaks to us about actual situations and events.

          2.   Documentaries involve real people (social actors0), who present themselves to us in stories that convey a plausible proposal about or perspective on the lives and situations, and events portrayed.  

          3.   All with distinct points of view of the filmmakers which shapes the story.

These definitions help us distinguish different types of documentaries. We also might see films clustered into both fiction and non-fiction films. A few examples of this are neo-realism, reenactments, mockumentaries, and docudramas. This goes for documentary and non-documentary as well, including mere footage, newsreels, TV news reports, industrial or sponsored films.

Next, Nichols gives us two major ways of dividing up documentaries:

           1.    Preexisting nonfiction models. Documentaries adopt models such as the diary, biography, or essay. These continue to change and evolve, for example, reports, manifestos, blogs, etc.

          2.   Distinct, cinematic modes. Documentaries adopt modes such as the expository or observational mode. They select and arrange sounds and images in distinct ways, using specifically cinematic techniques and conventions. (Nichols 148)

Emphasis lies with the modes of documentary, however we can classify any one documentary in either of two ways: 

•        What model it adopts from other media
•          What mode it contributes to as Cinema

The classifications are not mutually exclusive they are complementary (Nichols 148).

Pages 146-153 list some of the major models and modes for Documentary films. However, this chapter focuses on two, the poetic mode and the expository mode. The Poetic Mode was discussed a little bit in the first chapter; “it emphasizes visual associations, tonal or rhythmic qualities, descriptive passages, and formal organization” (Nichols 31). It also shared a common terrain with the modernist avant-grade. Some specific qualities of poetic mode are:

•      It is an alternative to fiction and exposition.
•      It is limited by formal abstractions that lose touch with historical reality.
•      It treats knowledge as affective, a new way to see and comprehend the world; see the familiar in a fresh way.
•      The sound is expressive, used for pattern and rhythm but with filmmaker holding a high degree of control as in the expository mode.
•      Time and space is discontinuous, uses images that build mood or pattern without full regard for their original proximity.
•       When it comes to ethical concerns, poetic mode uses actual people, places, and things without regard for their individual identity; may distort or exaggerate for aesthetic effect.
•         The voice is characterized by an expressive desire to give new forms and fresh perspectives to the world represented. (Nichols 210-11)

The Expository Mode was also discussed in the first chapter; it “emphasizes verbal commentary and an argumentative logic” (Nichols 31). This mode assembles fragments of the historical world into a more rhetorical frame than an aesthetic or poetic one. It is the mode that first combined the four basic elements of documentary film, indexical images of reality, affective association, story-telling qualities, and rhetorical persuasiveness. Some specific qualities of expository mode are:

•      It is an alternative to fiction and avant-garde.
•        It is limited by didacticism.
•       It treats knowledge as disembodied or abstract ideas, concepts, or perspectives. 
•        The sound is expressive and cognitive, fully under the control of the filmmaker; no indexical link to the image it supports; often in a voice-over form. 
•      Time and space is discontinuous, uses images from many different times and places to illustrate a perspective or argument.
• ·     When it comes to ethical concerns, historical accuracy and verifiability; fair representation of other, avoid making people into helpless victims; develop the viewer’s trust.
•         The voice is characterize by a classic oration in pursuit of the truth and seeking to inform and move an audience. (Nichols 210-11)

Chapter Five

Question Five: How Did Documentary Filmmaking Get Started?

            In this chapter Nichols considers how documentary filmmaking found its voice. He points out that no one set out to invent this voice or build a documentary tradition. Today, it comes with the desire of filmmakers and writers to understand how things got to be the way they are. The goals of those before them were to make a film that answered their own needs and intuitions about how to represent the subject of their choosing. There are two origin myths of documentary filmmaking, they are:

      1.    The filmmaker was a hero who travelled far and wide to reveal hidden corners and remarkable occurrences that were part of our reality 

      2.   Film images possessed the power to reproduce the world by dint of a photomechanical process in which light energy passed through lens onto a photographic emulsion. (Nichols 122)

         The combination of these two qualities forms the mythic foundation for the rise of documentary film. However, like many mythic origins there are problems that arise within them. One example Nichols gives, the capacity of film to provide rigorous documentation of what comes before the camera leads in at least two other directions besides documentary: science and spectacle (124). Nichols then provides us with four key elements that form the basis for documentary film.

     1.    Indexical Documentation (shared with scientific images and the cinema of attractions)

     2.   Poetic experimentation

     3.   Narrative story telling

     4.   Rhetorical oratory (Nichols 128)

       The next three sections focus on the last three elements of the four key elements. Poetic experimentation in cinema comes from the cross-fertilization between cinema and the various modernist avant-gardes that flourished in the early part of the 20^th century. As well as poetic experimentation, the development of an even more dominant narrative element cinema continued after 1906. History and biography usually take the form of narratives but in a nonfiction mode. Next, rhetorical oratory, a classic voice of oratory sought to speak about the historical world, addressing questions of what to do, what really happened, or what someone or something was really like. 

Chapter Three

Question 3: What Gives Documentary Films a Voice of Their Own?

            Within this chapter Nichols discusses the qualities of voice, categories of voice, and documentary and the voice of the orator. According to Nichols, “having a voice involves more than using the spoken word” (Nichols 67). For example, when using the “We speak about it to you” approach, it speaks through its composition of shots, its editing together of images, and its use of music, etc. Everything that is seen or heard in a documentary represents not only the historical world but also the why the film’s maker wants to speak about that world. The voice of a documentary can make claims, purpose perspectives, and evoke feelings. It seeks to persuade or convince us by the strength of their argument or point of view and the power of their voice. However according to Nichols, the voice of documentary is not limited to the voices of unseen “gods” and visible “authorities” those who speak in the film. The voice speaks with all the means available to the filmmaker. The following decisions can create the voice of the documentary:

      1.    When to cut, or edit, and what to juxtapose

      2.   How to frame or compose a shot (close-up or long shot, low or high angle, artificial or natural lighting, color or black and white, whether to pan, zoom in or out, track or remain stationary, and so no) 

      3.   Whether to record synchronous sound at the time of shooting, and whether to add additional sound, such as voiceover translation, dubbed dialogue, music, sound effects, or commentary, at a later point

      4.   Whether to adhere to an accurate chronology or rearrange events to support a point or mood  

      5.    Whether to use archival or other people’s footage and photographs or only those images shot by the filmmaker on the spot

      6.    Which mode of documentary representation to rely on to organized the film (expository, poetic, observational, participatory, reflective, performative). (Nichols 72)

When it comes to categories of voice there are two forms of Documentary voice. First is direct address, if embodied meaning you see a person or social actor, it is usually either the voice of the authority (news anchor reporter) or an interview. If it is disembodied meaning you do not see the speaker, it is either the “voice of god” (voice over commentary) or titles/inter-titles. The second is indirect address, if embodied in this case meaning conveyed by social actors, is just observation. You just watch the actors live their lives, much like reality television. If disembodied in this case meaning conveyed by film technique, is film form, where the filmmaker tells us things by means of editing, composition, camera angle, music, effects, etc. Leaving it up to the audience to interpret how these choices add up (Nichols 76).

According to Nichols, “the voice of documentary is often that of an orator, or filmmaker, setting out to take a position or offer a proposal regarding an aspect of the historical world and to convince us of its merit” (77). However, he asks an important question, “how do we proceed when we proceed rhetorically? The classical rhetorical thinking identified three divisions and five “departments” each of which carries over to documentary film, they are invention, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery. Nichols then reviews these five departments which are discussed in chapter four (see chapter four).