Now that our documentary is finished I thought it would be nice to do a series of reflective blog posts on different areas, which will also include reflections on other people’s documentaries after the screening. I am going away on the 3rd of November, so I really need to get these done before I leave.
I didn’t write a blog post on our own in class assessment because I thought it would be more worth while to write this after the editing process had finished so I could talk about my role as producer, director and also editor, and then reflect on my changed attitude to filmmaking or really what I’ve learnt about group work and the processes of a documentary production.
Producer
I would probably say that this role was the most difficult and frustration, especially when your subject is constantly on a rollercoaster of massive mood changes and therefore made the process of organising film dates almost to the point of impossible. I think I did well to deal with this myself, yet didn’t really communicate the difficulties I was having to my group members, which I assume would have been very frustrating for them. Producing is the most stressful because people are busy and you have to finalise dates and always be on the ball communicating between your subject and group members. It is also about being on top of all that pre-production stuff and being extremely organised. In having produced our drama last semester I have to say that producing drama is a lot easier because it’s formalaic, with everything lined out. Your director gives you a shot list and you strategically and practically go through it to create a schedule you cann actors who legitimately want to be in your film for rehearsals and everything is very formalaic you can write a step-by-step list of everything you have to do. In documentary because it’s less structured, a lot of the information is in your mind and you write down some shots that you need but all in all you have to work around your subject who is often unpredictable. What I learnt was a large degree of patience and that it is more important to make your subject happy than really anything else because you have a great crew that will organise everything else in terms of technical requirements. Especially, with Maggie it was about reassuring her making her feel as comfortable as possible in front of glowing lights and a camera.
Director
Perhaps I’m not cut out for this role, because it’s really difficult. I worked really well with Meenal to come up with a visual style and then was happy to let her go with the camera because I had built a trust with her and was fully trusting of her capabilities to use a camera. This is one area of the group work I was really happy with as it made me way less stressful on the day because all I had to worry about was communicating with Maggie and making sure we got the stories and information we wanted. Again, with documentary this is unpredictable; things that she had talked about previously with me she didn’t want to talk about to the camera. Yet, I was happy with this as she seemed in control of what she wanted and didn’t want to say, which was one of the ethical things Liam brought up when you’re dealing with vulnerable subjects- that they told you things that they didn’t want to. I would always say I don’t want to trick her into saying anything because that is being unethical and taking advantage of that vulnerability. In the first interview I probably didn’t go in as hard as I would have liked and talked to my group about what we NEEDED from the next interview, which made it a lot easier, except that Maggie wasn’t in the best place. Ultimately, what I learnt is that you need a lot of time with subjects like Maggie and heaps of flexibility so maybe if this was not a uni subject and I had infinite time to interview we would have kept building the trust and got a lot of information. However, I think all my previous research into aesthetics and what we were dealing with really made me prepared for what Maggie was going to offer.
Editor
I really loved editing. I literally edited as much as I could and it really paid off on the final days of editing where we could really focus in on fine-tuning. What I learnt: editing makes a film. That is it and also mastering Final Cut to a higher degree. I really understand now the reliance Observational doco makers have on editing because it allows you to embed meaning and make what your subject says more important mimicking how you saw it on the day. This goes back to all that pre-production stuff of really knowing your subject and being able to use your editing to convey what they want to say as truthfully as you can, because sometimes when they say something important to them they rush it and it now emphasises something unimportant. This was all about timing. What I also learnt: give your subject time. When we started editing we knew that Maggie was very spaced with her words or rushed through them and I think we were too eager to cut everything down to being really precise and fine, when we really needed to give Maggie’s words space, to let her ponder and let the audience wait to hear what comes next. When we gave Maggie space everything was a lot clearer, you could hear Maggie clearer and her words meant more, which was really important.
Overall
I want to edit. If I spent my life editing I would be happy. Editing is when you can really just think about everything and get to know your footage, whether it is good or bad and just let it speak for itself. It allows you to be 100% creative without having to worry about technical limitations, things going wrong, etc. It is also very inspiring and I often found myself going home and just thinking about the footage how we could structure it and how everything could link together to create a whole. I think I like editing the same way that I like writing essays or watching films, it’s about analysing each bit of footage and then putting it into a context that gives it meaning. It’s like making your own topic sentence and then filling in the gaps that convey that topic. Except, with the structural freedom that you don’t get with an essay. Editing is right up my alley it’s about seeing what isn’t there, what is there and then analysing it, creating and forming meanings that you didn’t think were there in the first place. It’s like being utterly shocked and suprised when that film makes that fatal twist.
Filed under: tv2 | Tags: approach, director, questions, reading, review, treatment
This blog post is going to be a big combination of a few things that have happened this week. I guess I will call it a sum up of week three, bringing everything together in order to write the treatment that is due in a few week’s time. This post will be made up of a list of questions taken from this week’s reading by Bernard Curan on ‘Approach.’ This reading forces you to make decisions and will work towards me writing my directorial approach. I will answer these questions in reference to my group meeting on Thursday and a documentary I watched, well stumbled across today called ‘On the Ball,‘ which was about the Homeless Soccer World Cup.
The first section of this reading asks you to watch docos and ask yourself; which elements you like or don’t like, and which might best serve the project at hand?
In relation to ‘On the Ball’ I thought they treated the idea of homelessness in a highly ethical manner, letting all the men that are or would be homeless experience something that is ‘normal,’ a contrast to their everyday experience of living on the streets. The thing that I really liked about this documentary were the different perspectives of all the homeless men, showing their delight in playing soccer, without avoiding the hard journeys these men face along the way and how difficult their lives it. However, what I didn’t like was how they romanticised soccer as being the epitome of freedom from their lives for these men. I also thought that the documentary built up a high degree of seperation between the homeless and the non-homeless, which works on one level because as the documentary states itself these men do feel on the outskirts of society. However, by creating this degree of difference it felt that these men were very much at the whim of the non-homeless people in charge.
In terms of our documentary it is obviously a very different take on the issue, very obviously it will deal with women instead of men, which forces it to be different in numerous ways. What I learned was the importance of getting a rounded scope of the characters in your doco. You want to get as much material as possible, where ‘On the Ball’ got a lot of information on what soccer means to this men, yet didn’t avoid the hard questions of their state of homelessness, how they got there and what it means to them? Therefore it created this great tone and mood, where there are the highlights of soccer, yet the sadness and tragedy of their lives. I think this is something that you need to capture when thinking about homelessness. As I have discussed earlier I really want to break down the barriers between the homeless and the non-homeless and therefore incorporate a more collaborative approach.
This leads on to other questions, some that I can answer now, some that are more murky.
Do you want to create an intimate portrait or a stylized whodunit?
We talked about this in our meeting and are going towards an intimate portrait rather than something that is stylized. We agreed that if we made a stylized documentary it would contradict the women’s lives, which are rough. We want to let our style not overwhelm the content of our film. However, when we talked about audience we discussed the screening and that it would have to in some respect appeal to all us media students. Therefore, our style will have a filmic quality to it, where even though the audience may not be able ot realte to the subjects they will appreciate the style. Therefore it will be slightly stylized.
Who will tell the stories in your film? What will drive the narrative?
The drive of our narrative will be a non-conclusive journey, a sort of day in the life of. The stories will be told by the once homeless women with a direct emphasis on one of their stories that will drive the narrative and push it forward. We don’t want it to be a rounded happy ending, which is what happened in ‘On the Ball’ where a lot of good things came out of the experience. We appreciate that even though these women are off the streets they still have lots of problems to overcome.
Do you want some of your film to be observational?
Well we also talked about this in our very productive meeting. We decided that are approach will be to obtain as much footage as possible. I think this is impossible to do without the use of observational footage. What I learnt from the pre-production reading was you need to look for what is usual and what is unusual, and you cannot possibly capture this without the use of observational footage. The audience needs to get a sense of ‘what things are really like’ away from the ‘interview’ situation. I also think you need it for cutaways and filler to make your documentary come together as a whole.
Do you want to set up sequences?
To some degree I think this is unavoidable. You need to get certain information and therefore you need to ask questions. However, when we watched The Nest it mainly relied on observational footage and really worked and seemed to avoid the need to set up sequences. In terms of our documentary I want to get some good interview footage, however done very casually, yet they will need to be setup in a certain place and context.
Will you interview people alone, together, inside, outside, informally?
To some degree I answered this question above. I want the interviews to be done informally otherwise I am scared of overpowering the women with cameras and lights, etc. I don’t think this would be helpful in getting the women to answer more truthfully and therefore disadvantage our doco. As much as we want it to look good, we don’t want it to look perfect.
Will the interviewer be on camera or off screen? If off screen will the interviewer be heard by the viewers?
I think we will mix this up a bit. I don’t want us as filmmakers to dominate the film, yet I want it to be to some degree reflexive. Therefore I think we will need to test this to see which works better. To have the interviewer on screen limits editing options as you will need to keep the question in the finished doco, otherwise the audience will be wondering who is that sitting next to the person being interviewed. Having the interviewer off screen gives us a lot more editing options.
This blog post was mainly for my own benefit to think about the directorial approach we will take and therefore form a base for writing the treatment. It is more a scramble of thoughts, rather than a truly developed idea. Sorry about how ridiculously long it is.
References:
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Curran Bernard, S. “Approach”, Documentary storytelling for film and videomakers, (p. 75-79). Burlington: Focal Press, 2003.
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Chloe Cassidy,”On the Ball,” http://ten.com.au/video-player.htm?vxSiteId=cb519624-44a2-4bf7-808b-3514d34e96e4&vxChannel=DOCOS&vxClipId=1427_doco-tldc185-ball-seg1-050509&vxBitrate=300&CMP=LEC-DANCEgetVideoLink
In regards to the Lenny exercise I have taken over the role of Director, which is quite challenging because I am the creative force behind the production. It is also challenging because I am producing it as well. I’ve decided to film it a dark, almost film-noir style of film, where I want to take advantage of doing extreme shots, either extreme close-ups or extreme wide-shots. I have torn the script apart and plotted out what each shot will be (it may be slightly ambitious, but we’ll see). The hardest part has been scene 3, which is the dialogue section- I want to stick with two camera angles for this section due mainly because of the time restriction. This is the overall shot breakdown of the script:
1. EXT. BOULEVARD – DAY
- Establishing shot- WS of Lenny weaving between buildings (if possible from a high angle if time permits). Lenny will stagger towards the camera.
- If time permits- CU of Lenny’s feet staggering
- If time permits- CU of Lenny’s eyes in pain
2. EXT. LANE – DAY
- CU of box clasped by a hand with painted fingernails (indicating a woman), camera tilts downwards and focuses on high heeled clad feet
3. EXT. BOULEVARD- DAY
- MCU of a puddle of blood, camera tilts upwards to show Lenny colapsed on a bench. In the background you hear and see heels approaching.
- MS Sharon cast above peering down at Lenny (camera remains at the same level as Lenny, angled up to show Sharon)
- MS over-the shoulder looking down at Lenny from Sharon’s perspective
- MS camera pans to show Sharon exiting the frame after dialogue finishes and pans back to Lenny with the box in focus, Lenny exerts all energy to unclasp and open the box as the box springs open Lenny colapses.
- if time…The camera widens above Lenny from a high angle to emphasise his death.
NOTE: Dialogue will be filmed from shot 2. and 3. of this scene, and in editing will be alternated.
I know that this seems like a lot of shots, however I have made it easier for my DOP because there is minimal camera movement- the camera does not actually need to be moved for a tracking or dollying shot. All of the camera work will be done on the tripod. Overall, I hope to create a dramatic dark film that encapsulates the power that Sharon has over Lenny. In terms of scheduling I will do scene 3 first because it will take the most amount of time to perform. I will then do scene 1 followed by scene 2.
