Personal review

Michael Renov’s book is mainly a key collection of essays that looks at

the specific issues related to the documentary form. He has collected essays
by nine scholars(one of them is also Bill Nichols), essays who approach
documentary cinema from ‘historiography, postmodern theory, and
philosophy’ perspectives. Postmodernism has posed a lot of challenges to a
number of fundamental assumptions on which documentary theory has
traditionally been based, which includes the ideas of a single unified truth,
fixed meanings and social democratic vision of some of the earliest theorist
of the documentary mode. The issues that these essays discuss can range
widely, from ethical, to ideological to formal. Renov’s anthology on
documentary takes up a number of these issues. The questions addressed
include 'What is documentary?' and 'How fictional is nonfiction?' What it is
notable about the book itself it is the fact that all these essays, except
one(‘The totalizing quest for meaning’ by Trinh T. Minh-ha’s) are published
here for the first time.

The book has a introduction called ‘The Truth About Non-Fiction’,

continues with a chapter about poetics of documentary, then he take a look
at the documentary film as ‘scientific inscription’, then in a new chapter
discuss about documenting the documentary, from an historical point of
view, rising few important questions like ‘What is a documentary?’, ‘What
does a documentary do?’ then we face an essay - ‘The totalizing quest for
meaning’ by Trinh T. Minh-ha’s, who appeared in a earlier form in her own
1991 collection, ‘When the Moon Waxes Red’.

At the outset of his introduction, because documentary cinema raises the

same theoretical question as fiction film, Michael Renov boldly declares: ‘It
may well be that the marginalization of the documentary film as a subject of
serious inquiry is at an end’, with which I personally disagree, because a lot
of money are still invested in fiction feature movies and this the fundamental
option when it comes to entertainment, and people they are still looking for
entertainment in a unprecedented manner. But, whether or not it is the case,
for sure Renov has in mind the pioneering work of Bill Nichols, particularly
his analysis of the discursive similarities between documentary and fiction.
So, in this chapter, Renov states that truth declares itself in the structure of
fiction, that fiction and non-fictional forms are enmeshed in one another.
Particularly in terms of narration and questions of performance, so regarding
semiotics, the documentary shares characteristics of fictional films and the
term non-fiction signifies that we can discount its fiction elements. It is not that
the documentary consists of the structures of filmic fiction as it is that ‘fictive ’
elements insist in documentary as in all film forms. Indeed, nonfiction contains
any number of ‘fictive’ elements, moments at which a presumably objective
representation of the world encounter the necessity of creative intervention.
Among these fictive ingredient we may include the construction of
character(with Nanook as a first example), emerging through recourse to ideal
and imagining categories of hero and genius, using poetic language, narration,
musical accompaniment in order to heighten the emotional impact or creating
suspense through embedded narratives - telling stories by interviewed
subjects. Also Renov made use of other examples whose effects have been
conventionalized in fiction film and television, like the use of high or low
camera angles, close-ups which trade emotional resonance for special
integrity, use of telephoto or wide-angle lenses which squeeze or distort space,
the use of editing to extend or shorter the time, expand or become rhythmic.

In my opinion, this raises the questions; are we really constructing

character in a documentary film? Are they not already a character fully formed
once the camera registers the person and the shared experience – of that
between the subject and filmer? From the book of John Ellis: Documentary:
Witness and Self-revelation I read that documentaries are a negotiation
between filmmaker and reality and, at heart, a performance. Is it correct to
assume that the ‘performance’ is also the ‘construction’?
However, reservations grow out of an awareness of the exploitation of ‘the real’
as currency in an all devouring image culture…The documentary form – the
artful reshaping of the historical world has struggled to find its place between
truth and reality, scene and art, history and theory.

In my opinion, this raises the questions; are we really constructing character in a

documentary film? Are they not already a character fully formed once the camera
registers the person and the shared experience – of that between the subject and filmer?
Readings from John Ellis, Documentary: Witness and Self-revelation....Documentaries
are a negotiation between filmmaker and reality and, at heart, a performance. Is it
correct to assume the ‘performance’ is also the ‘construction’?

This is possibly part of my research question I am interested in – the collaboration

between filmer and subject; as a matter of ‘behind the scenes’ negotiation of how the
character’s character will perform or intends to perform. Would it be correct to suggest
that as soon as a camera registers a character, they are automatically performing?

It seems to me I am grappling with a few lines of approach and wondering if the is any
relationship of this notion of the performing and trust. Is there any value exploring the
dialogue between the filmer and subject? Is as-close-to natural or authentic
performance dependent upon the trust between the subjects and the filmer? I want to
explore an idea of the filmer being embedded or initiated into the subject’s world or
tribe.
As Trinh T Minh-ha points out; The films are my response (as a filmmaker) to a
certain experience…films are a fair reflection of the experience of making them.
Subjectivity – I am making it.

Once I question the rules of engagement on my own documentary about negotiation

between filmer and subject, performance and trust, and, encouraged when I discover a
short statement by Frederick Wiseman; the way I try to make a documentary is that
there’s no separation between the audience and the events in the film. However, I am
constantly reminded of ‘truth’.

In chapter 5; The Totalizing Quest of Meaning, by Trinh T Minh-ha “truth is produced,

induced, and extended according to the regime in power. Truth lies between all
regimes of truth.

I am interested in what Renov outlines the “introduction of the use of poetic language,
narration, music and obviously choices in camera angles – cinematic conventions used
in fiction film - interestingly, he argues that all discursive forms – documentary
included are, if not fictional, at least ‘fictive’. I tend to come back to the issue of pure
collaboration between filmer and subject; would this collaborative effort produce a
more truthful ‘fictive’ language? Contradicting my idea; Lindsay Anderson says, if the
material is ‘actual’ it is documentary. If the material is ‘invented’ it is not
documentary. Franju talks about recreating reality because reality runs away; reality
denies reality. You must first interpret it, or re-create it… - a documentary aware of its
own artifice is one that remains sensitive to the flow between fact and fiction. It does
not work to conceal what is normalised as non-factual in the process of filmmaking.
But then argues that ‘Documentary at its purest and most poetic is a form in which the
elements that you see are the actual elements….is a closer framing of reality a more
artificial one?

Renov makes points about poetics, the poetics of the documentary – those principles of
construction, function, and effect specific to non – fiction film, the four tendencies in
the active voice; to record, reveal, or preserve; to persuade or promote; to analyse or
interrogate; to express.

Renov mentions Hans Richter’s argument;

With the documentary film it gets back to its fundamentals; by selection, elimination
and coordination of natural elements, a film for evolves which is original and not
bound by theatrical or literary tradition. The documentary film is an original art form.
It has come to grips with facts on its own original level. It covers the rational side of
our lives, from the scientific experiment to the poetic landscape study, but never moves
away from the factual.

Errol Morris argues,

I believe cinema verite set back documentary filmmaking twenty or thirty years. It sees
documentary as a sub-species of journalism…There’s no reason why documentaries
can’t be as personal as fiction filmmaking and bear the imprint of those who made
them. Truth isn’t guaranteed by styler expression. It isn’t guaranteed by anything.

Feedback

The predominant topic I see coming out of your summary is the question of trust in the
relationship between interviewee and filmmaker, and how this effects the 'truth value'
of documentary. Trust is actually a topic I have dealt with in a different arena (museum
representations - I work with museums understood as multimedia complexes). It is a
very rich topic, and when the time comes I will point you to some key resources there.
But at this stage the readings you are doing on Nichols and the Oxford Companion
should come first.

I like this set of questions you propose:

- Is there any value exploring the dialogue between the filmer and subject?

- Is as-close-to natural or authentic performance dependent upon the trust between the
subjects and the filmer?

- Would it be correct to suggest that as soon as a camera registers a character, they are
automatically performing?

- Would a collaborative effort between filmer and subject produce a more truthful
'fictive' language?
1.