BEYOND MICHAEL MOORE: Different documentaries and critical approaches to use in the classroom.

BEYOND MICHAEL MOORE: Different documentaries and critical approaches to use in the classroom.

Introduction and History The documentary genre has had a varied and interesting history over the last hundred years or so. The first moving images from the late 1800s were, in fact, documentaries attempts to document reality. The genre has developed a range of styles such as cinemaverité, documentary as political weapon, the rockumentary and mockumentary.

Teaching Documentaries When teaching documentaries, often we focus on issues based texts that have a clear political purpose. Of course, these are useful in the classroom as students can clearly see the intention of the filmmaker. However, we would argue that we should not limit our study to these texts and should embrace a range of different documentary styles and consider new developments within the genre.

Our focus Studying a range of documentaries (or parts thereof) that work within and across different genres and styles. This approach allows the freedom to consider other elements that are sometimes lost when we focus of the contentious social issue at hand. For instance: The changing role of the filmmaker Different sub-genres of documentary and their conventions Common tropes, ideas or representations offered by documentary films

Documentary genres The Mockumentary and the unreliable filmmaker The Rockumentary and the romantic artist

The Mockumentary and the unreliable filmmaker We are familiar with the sub-genre of mockumentary and the attempt to borrow from the styles of documentary for comic effect, usually parody. Examples include Spinal Tap, District Nine etc Of course, often these films are using this form to make serious comments about society. For the purpose of this presentation, however, we would like to broaden our study of this sub-genre to include filmmakers who self-consciously present themselves as unreliable and, in so doing, question the very ability of documentary to document reality at all. We will look at two documentaries where the filmmaker self-consciously establishes themselves as untrustworthy. In the next two examples the documentary filmmakers fail to resolve the questions raised in the film and even fail to acknowledge whether there is a question. In so doing, the audience is encouraged within the documentary itself to critically evaluate the documentary form.

Forbidden Lie$ Forbidden Lie$ is a film directed by Anna Broinowski (2007) that traces the story of alleged literary fraud, Norma Khouri. Norma Khouri published a book, Forbidden Love in 2002, about the honour killing of her friend Dahlia in Jordan. After its publication, she was exposed as a fraud. She has always denied these allegations.

In the beginning Early in the documentary, the filmmaker positions the viewer to believe Norma s story about her upbringing in Jordan and the honour killing of her friend, Dahlia.

Repositioning This is then followed by a repositioning of the audience as we are presented with the alternative narrative, that Norma s story is, in fact, a lie.

Distrust of subject, filmmaker and genre The documentary filmmaker mimics the sense of betrayal readers felt when they were told that Norma Khouri s book, Forbidden Love, was a fake. We distrust Norma and her story but we also distrust the filmmaker who has set us up in the establishing scenes of the film. The rest of the documentary alternates between Norma s story and the opposing argument offered by Rana Husseini and Australian journalist, Malcolm Knox. As the documentary progresses, the filmmaker assumes the role of detective and tries to discover the truth about Norma. At the conclusion of the documentary, she is unsuccessful we are no closer to finding answers to the questions posed. The students, when studying this film, find it unsettling and unsatisfying. They feel initially tricked by Norma, and to some extent, the filmmaker and this distrust is heightened as the filmmaker fails in her mission to uncover the truth. This distrust allows students to see the documentary filmmaker and the documentary genre as inadequate and unreliable and this, in turn, allows students to reflect on their expectations when viewing documentary that a truth will be uncovered. This encourages a more critical approach to studying the genre.

Exit Through The Gift Shop Exit Through The Gift Shop is a film directed by Banksy, a worldrenowned street artist. The documentary asks the question What is authentic art and what makes an authentic artist? The film traces the meteoric rise to fame and fortune of filmmaker, turned graffiti artist, Thierry Guetta. Or does it? Is the film just an elaborate hoax?

All is not as it seems. The opening sequence of the film endeavours to establish the authenticity of the enigmatic figure of Banksy and the legitimacy of the art form he promotes.

Guetta s Quest Thierry Guetta is an amateur videographer. When he crosses paths with Banksy, he is led into the intensely subversive world of street art which he obsessively records with his video camera. Banksy eventually tasks Guetta with creating a film of his clandestine activities to help lift the profile of street art beyond the tag of common graffiti. Is this the film we are viewing?

Banksy s Betrayal Guetta s documentary Life Remote Control is ridiculed by Banksy. Banksy himself takes on the job of constructing the documentary, readily admitting he has no skills on which to rely. We realise that this is the real film we are viewing. We begin to question the credibility of the film AND the film-maker. We are forced to reassess our prior expectations of the documentary genre.

Distrust of subject, filmmaker and genre It is with shock that the cameras are reversed when Banksy rejects Guetta s documentary and takes on the challenge of filming it himself. We start to question the reliability of the film and we struggle to define what is truth and what is fiction. By nature of its construction the film becomes a parody of the genre to which it belongs. By the end of the film the viewer has no concrete answers to the problems raised in the documentary. We distrust Banksy as we still really have no idea about who he is or what he was trying to achieve. We distrust Guetta as most of the film has set out to discredit and lampoon him to be the unwitting representation of the superficiality that is pervading modern art. Focusing on the notion of the hoax provides an interesting analytical perspective from which to approach this film.

The Rockumentary and the romantic artist The first mainstream rockumentary, Don t Look Back directed by Pennebaker, was released in 1967. It is shot in the style of cinema-verité, documenting the young Bob Dylan on tour in the UK. It establishes the musician as a rebel icon.

The origins of the romantic artist trope It may be argued that this sub-genre of documentary is working with an old idea one that privileges the artist as a romantic figure a Wordsworthian or Byronic hero. It may be seen that the rockumentary is the contemporary manifestation of this trope.

Searching for Sugarman Searching for Sugarman is a documentary directed by Makil Benjelloul in 2012. It follows the search for enigmatic and forgotten folk artist, Rodriguez, and his eventual recognition in South Africa.

Rodriguez as romantic artist It is possible to see the presentation of Rodriguez as linked to the romantic tradition of the artist. He is presented as living apart from mainstream society and more connected to the natural world. This separation allows the artist the ability to see the injustices of society and give voice to the disenfranchised. Rodriguez is also presented as mysterious and enigmatic further encouraging us to see him as separate from mainstream society.

The corporate world and consumerism In contrast, the music industry is seen in opposition to the romantic artist the celebrity driven, corporate monolith that limits and controls the work of the artist. In this documentary this faceless, exploitative world is personified by Clarence Avant, director of Sussex Records. In this interview with Rodriguez when we eventually meet him, 60 minutes into the film, we are encouraged to see him as above the grubby world of money and fame.

The Filth and The Fury The Filth and The Fury is directed by Julien Temple. It presents the rise and fall of the 1970s band The Sex Pistols, told from their own perspective, and it serves as a counter-documentary to Temple s earlier film The Great Rock n Roll Swindle that presented their manager s take on their success. It is quite confronting.

The Filth The Filth and The Fury continues the tradition of representing the artist as a rebel icon; this premise is established from the outset. The documentary makes the claim that The Sex Pistols were the voice of the disenfranchised, putting the angst and the anger of the lower classes into their music.

The Fury However, the reality of The Sex Pistols image contradicts any romantic representation of the artist with which they hope to align. This is revealed in the infamous Bill Grundy Interview.

The artist as a romantic figure The band s rapid rise to popularity and their subsequent fall from grace took a mere 18 months. Their creation was at the hands of Malcolm McLaren, a high society fashion store owner who considered the band his little artful dodgers, a social experiment. They drank, swore, took drugs, destroyed property, were deliberately provocative and obnoxious and, ironically, ultimately became the mainstream fashion icon they set out to destroy. The documentary aims to retrospectively redefine the perception of the band by challenging the role of McLaren and emphasising the social context the band members were trying to overcome. It endeavours to reinstate the trope of the romantic artist and, in doing so, cleans up history. In the hands of Julien Temple, Sid Vicious is no longer an offensive heroin addict who, in a drug-fuelled rage murders his groupie girlfriend then dies by overdose before being brought to justice. He is the tragic hero, vulnerable and misunderstood, manipulated by McLaren and exploited by Nancy Spungen. The challenge for students writing on this text is to refer to the text The Filth and The Fury not the band The Sex Pistols. It is a great discriminator.

Using these texts in a response Is a documentary without an issues focus of any use in a WACE examination?

The Writing Section Q4. Many people are still up for stories that don t have easy answers, that don t have completely likeable characters, but that do represent things that go on in life.

Viewing Section Q9. The construction of a visual text can reinforce or critique dominant representations of identity. Q10. Explain how an audience s attitudes or ideologies may be altered by the way a visual text is constructed.

Email and contacts Maggie McPhee: Maggie.mcphee@pc.wa.edu.au Shannon Allen: shannon.allen@pc.wa.edu.au We can email your our resource packages for these documentaries and we will also make our presentation available on the ETA website. Thank you!