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academy feature
While
television
continues its
love affair
with so-called
‘reality’ shows
and cinema
maintains a
tenuous grip
on any sort
of truth,
documentary
occupies an
odd sort of
middle ground
between
the two.
Anwar Brett
reports.
Photos clockwise from top left: Michael Moore in Bowling For Columbine; Lost In La Mancha;
Dogtown & the Z-Boys; Biggie & Tupac; Contents page: John Grierson (left) at work
Documentaries are currently enjoying a serious revival in popularity, with seldom a month going by without a couple being released into our multiplex- es or art houses.
Even on the small screen, the programmes that seem to gener- ate the biggest headlines, that cre- ate debate amongst the chatter- ing classes, are documentaries or so-called docu-dramas – at least whenever C4’s Big Brother (the ulti- mate unreal ‘reality’ show) can be edged off the news pages.
ITV’s Shipman, a controversial (and dubiously scheduled) dramatisation of the case of Dr Harold Shipman is a case in point. Other examples this year include Granada’s Bloody Sunday – which received a cinema release after TV broadcast – and Channel 4’s Sunday, two films that recreated the unlawful shooting of 13 peace protesters in Londonderry thirty years ago.
Few genres have had the capacity to inflame emotions while at the same time contribut- ing to the ongoing debate. Add to that the natural allure of a well made film – the prime objective of which is to ask audiences to iden- tify with its protagonists – and you have a winning formula, it seems.
Cinema’s gain may well be television’s loss. For while docu- mentary strands that were once
stalwart features of the program- mer’s schedule have disap- peared, replaced by ersatz reali- ty shows that ‘makeover’ you, your home, garden or question- able culinary ability. By contrast the increased number of small film distribution companies fight- ing for product has stepped in to fill the breach.
“I greatly hope that there’ll be a revival of documentaries in cin- ema, which is where it all began in the first place,” says Edward Mirzoeff, an award-winning docu- mentary producer in his own right. “It’s thrilling that this should be in the air, that people are actually talking about it.”
As Vice Chairman of The Grierson Trust, and a BAFTA trustee, Mirzoeff knows what he is talking about. The Grierson Awards – subtitled the British Documentary Awards – were established in 1972, to celebrate the best in British film and TV doc- umentary, a genre whose very name was coined by Dr John Grierson, the man behind such landmark films as Drifters (1929) and Night Mail (1936).
In the beginning, documen- taries were used for education and enlightenment, propaganda and entertainment. Post-war, a new dynamic took over in earnest.
In Britain the Free Cinema movement led by the likes of
Lindsay Anderson, Tony Richardson and Karel Reisz sought to repre- sent life as it really was lived by the majority of the British popula- tion. The unblinking eye of their cameras inspired a similar social- realism in dramatic films too, and began to inform wider areas of commercial filmmaking.
Today, films like Every Day Except Christmas, We Are The Lambeth Boys and Terminus stand up as fascinating records of the time in which they were made. But they have dramatic appeal too, creating a sense of empathy for the lives they depict that is the benchmark of any quality film. Current filmmakers like Ken Loach, Michael Winterbottom and Peter Kosminsky are heirs to that tradition.
Truth is, inevitably, much more sensitive than fiction, and the debate still rages over how much a filmmaker could or should adapt the facts for what would normally be quite legitimate dramatic.
“This is a very longstanding question,” Mirzoeff continues, “going back to the earliest days of the cinema documentary. But it always happens when you choose one shot over another, or one angle rather than another. This might not make what you’re depicting any less true. This is what Grierson encountered when he made Night Mail, largely shooting it in a studio with all the
what’s up doc?
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