The switch from short film to documentary was an unforeseen one, meaning my sister and I have had to act rather quickly regarding research and decision-making on what to infuse from our research to start creating our own documentary outline. Before touching on what we want to implement into our documentary, which so far is tentatively called "Intertwined" and is a sociological study on how local community forms naturally, reaching out to current-day viewers and hopefully remind them that there is opportunity for connection at their disposal if they are open to living and spontaneously develop it (I can pitch it better get back to me soon), this blog post is dedicated to the research we gathered while watching two different documentaries that our teacher recommended us to watch after discussing with her long and hard about which way to take our ideas: the Netflix docu-series Ugly Delicious and the 2002 documentary film Bowling for Columbine. While they're very different, they both offered insight into different ways to develop a narrative/ a sense of path regarding different type of topics, with structure and narration (creator input/involvement) being our main focuses when coming into watching these two pieces.
Ugly Delicious
This Netflix original docu-series, led by Award-winning chef David Chang, explores how different cultures blend and how they differ, combining travel, cooking, and history. It includes special guests that are friends of Chang, and confront cultural barriers and misconceptions with other well-renowned chefs.
Sofia and I watched about 3 episodes of the series, because we wanted to view the progression of episodes and also because it was entertaining. While watching both, we decided to take notes on specific observations, with specific choices that stayed consistent in all three episodes and some that evolved as the audience got more accustomed to the show. Below are a picture of some of my observations of the first three episodes of Season 1:
Overall, this series gave both of us a spark towards structure ideas and narration type that we want for our piece, but also proved to me that we can make the documentary as us as we want to, with Chang implementing his usual jargon and nature, showing up as his fully authentic and casual self (seemingly at least) as the experience is investigative for him and his friends. As we try to find our own balance of "formal" vs. "personal", I remember that we don't have to choose one over the other and that we can approach our docu-series in an extremely personal way, but still maintain professionalism and quality so that the audience will be willing and interested enough to want to watch it.
This documentary was released in 2002, written, produced, narrated, and directed by Michael Moore. It's considered biographical, as it covers the events leading up to the 1999 Columbine High Massacre that killed 168 people, confronting topics like the need of gun control/ the high homicide in America in a less sensitive and more parodical manner.
Although I didn't end up fully finishing this piece (I do plan on it), Sof and I went through a rollercoaster of emotions when we did watch it, feeling hesitant towards the open and completely casual nature of Michael Moore as he leads into discussing an unimaginable event. The way he alludes to things was effective, with his progression of events catching me Sofia and I off guard giving us ideas towards how we can keep our own piece surprising and well-driven by us as "narrators". Below are some of my observations while watching:
This documentary once again reinforced the narration type that includes the creator throughout the documentary, indicating the role he/she has in setting the tone (as he very much does so in this piece!). Aside form technical elements, the idea of setting a specific tone, with each topic and what one wants to say about the topic distinguishing the tone, is always a really big factor for me, as it was a major factor in my last group documentary project Does This Make You Uncomfortable?, being that the topic was one of comedy and even disgust in some of today's society, so developing a shift in tones was necessary to grasp the audience at the start and develop a more insightful conversation/points at the end (which we didn't fully execute but it's okay!). With this specific piece, we want to keep it light and entertaining like David Chang's Ugly Delicious, yet also balance the tone drawn in my our own voices and the bigger picture purpose of the doc, with a shift in tones being possible in editing.
Conclusions
Overall, watching the two documentary samples gave us ideas for our own narrative and chronological structure, that will obviously be affected by our interviewee responses but having a layout is helpful regardless. I will discuss our ideas in the next blog!
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