The first thing in this chapter that caught my eye were the two different types of forms that can be found in documentaries- Categorical form and Rhetorical form.
Categorical form- A fundamental technique that is used in many documentaries. This is simply a form of grouping information to keep the viewer engaged, and not make anything too confusing. There was an example in a book using butterflies as if it were a nature documentary. The book states that this categorical-form documentary may include one type of butterfly in the first part of the film and go over everything specific in detail about that certain butterfly. Then, the next part will be about a different type of butterfly and include everything unique about that specific one. There are so many more examples that can be used of this technique.
Rhetorical form- This technique is a different type of documentary where the filmmaker is trying to persuade the viewer of their opinion being represented in the film. So, these documentaries are more opinion based which can become controversial if they should be then considered documentaries or not. In the book viewers state that “documentaries are unreliable if the events being recorded are in any way manipulated by the filmmaker.” And using rhetorical form, based solely on opinions is being manipulated by the filmmaker. The book states that often the opinion isn’t even brought up as an opinion, it’s brought up as the actual truth so that the viewer starts to believe it.
In my personal opinion, I don’t think that rhetorical form is very trustworthy to make documentaries, or if they should even be considered documentaries at all. From what I understand about documentaries they should be unbiased and try to inform the viewer of facts without any opinions involved.
Something else that I found interesting while reading this chapter is documentaries versus fiction. It is often presented that in fiction films everything and every setting that is shown will be an imaginary made-up place, as fiction is defined as “not real.” However, according to the textbook, this isn’t necessarily true. Fiction films can have real elements in them such as location, historical events, and even people. A film that I think shows this is a film that I watched a while ago called JoJo Rabbit. This film is fiction, although being based on World War II and set in Nazi Germany with Adolf Hitler as one of the main characters, this film does have some “real” elements to it. But is this film a documentary? Nope! Its still a fiction film because the storyline and plot, what the characters are going through, are all for the story and didn’t actually happen.
A question that I have after reading the chapter- Are documentaries that are completely untouched, only filmed, no actors or any reenactment, simply just filming what is happening such as nature documentaries…do these types of documentaries technically contain mise-en-scene if what is behind the camera is not supposed to be intentional like in a documentary? These films still have settings, different types of lighting, clothes that people are wearing, composition… But what I’m wondering is does it matter that they technically aren’t intentional… can it still be described as mise-en-scene?
Im excited to dive into watching our own documentary this week and hopefully answer some of the questions that this reading raised!