Documentaries as a Representation of Reality - Coursework Example

Documentaries as a Representation of Reality s Submitted by s: Introduction Capitalism: A love story premiered in the year 2009 as a documentary detailing the events of the economic crisis that had been evident over the world. The documentary narrows down the effects and counter effects of the economic melt-down to the happenings of the American market. It takes a look at the insurance sector, the credit industry as well as much of what was happening in the Wall Street and the larger American financial aspects. This essay looks into the representation of documentaries such as Capitalistic: A Love Story in relation to the reality or rather the fictional motion pictures that are made for the purposes of entertainment. As much as the documentaries available for various audiences, there are those that are made out of real life events while others for enjoyment purposes. Capturing Reality through Documentaries According to Kilborn & Izod (1997, p 8) watching documentaries has become a more engaging experience and this has been proved so by their growing popularity as part of a backlash against reality television. Most of the audiences wishing to have their downtime in theatres express the need to get the most out of it and hence prefer documentaries to fictional movies. This is because documentaries have a way of capturing the reality and bringing it to the screens; this can be the explanation as to why the number of documentaries released at cinemas has almost doubled since 2007 in the United Kingdom. Producers such as Vanessa Berlowits have worked on documentaries such as the one called landmark television, ‘A World Beyond Imagination’ which is an expression of people getting to love their environment. And as such, this documentary has a way of engaging in a more caring way as it incorporates the natural world and the audience. The documentary has events from tacking whales in the Antarctica to searching for snow leopards in the Himalayas, some of the extreme locations that have been filmed in the world; just the discovery of some of these stimulating places on the earth brings about the reality of the world to the human eye, though many would not get a chance to visit such places. Other film works of Vanessa include ‘Frozen Planet’ showing some of the extreme weather experiences on earth with the fastest winds on earth going to as fast as 130 miles an hour. Such filming is too dangerous to even think of but some of the daring producers have brought such to the screens for the love of the environment and exploration. Other exiting work of this producer were shot of orcas hunting together and creating giant tsunami waves to catch seals in the far north of the planet. Some of these works can be regarded as the engaging in the most dangerous activities, while at the same time a thrilling experience of bringing the reality to the majority of the population, (Macdonald & Cousins, 1996, p 49). The above are some of the documentaries that have successfully brought about some of the world’s most daring realities to be experienced. Capitalism: A Love Story As a documentary based on the financial crisis that took place in the late 2000s, Capitalism: A Love Story explores the events in a review of the critical happenings in America. It covers a wide range of issues that took place in the economy such as the casino mentality in Washington DC. The poverty levels evident by the wages of the many workers made life difficult and this was worsened by the large wave of home foreclosures that was experienced. As a documentary, the film focuses on the real happenings of the American economy at that time as it further brings about a religious component where Moore examines whether or not capitalism is a sin and if Jesus would be a capitalist. Some of the widely expressed ideological contradictions in the documentary are not a reflection of reality but a personal view of the way the situation should have been. The film rather starts with a series of bank robberies just to hasten the idea of the critical situation that was occurring in America. Much of it is a comparison of the golden days where capitalism was the order of the day and advanced by figures such as President Jimmy Carter who warned the Americans of the dangers of worshiping self-indulgence and consumption. Other presidents such as Ronald Reagan came up with the laissez faire policies to propel trade to see the emergence of big corporations to gain political power. This is the current situation and it can be said that the film here depicts the reality as opposed to the fictional assertions in majority of films this days. This brought up the wage bill issues, insurance perspective of losses as well as religion in an imagination of what would happen if Jesus was a capitalist who wanted to maximize profits, deregulate the banking industry and wanted the sick to pay out of pocket for their pre-existing condition. This is just a wild imagination of the real issues from a rational perspective which brings about the America’s young generation and their attraction into finance instead of science. Other critics of the documentary have it that the scenes are more of an abstract representation of reality and dubious in nature such that it leaves the audience with more questions to ask than answers. There are strongly made points in the documentary of the capitalistic economic disasters and the cleaning up of such a mess is rather an issue to ponder about as you walk out of the theatre. Lack of a clear understanding brings about a debate of the whole nature of documentaries and the aims expected to be achieved and the message to be passed on to the general public, (Nichols, 2010, p 51). Documentaries and Fiction There have been efforts to incorporate drama and fiction in documentaries (Ward, 2005, p 18) where producers such as Bart Layton have gone further and done this successfully. One of his works ‘The Imposter’ that premiered in 2012 sees the inclusion of suspense and tension. Could this be termed as a representation of reality? This producer is of the opinion that documentaries should not be just a representation of reality but should also be able to incorporate drama and re-enactments, (The Stylist, n.d.). Drama and fiction can be used to enhance the screen play of documentaries that are exploring crime and the events that lead to capturing the perpetrators. It will not be realistic for a producer to organize crime and capture it on camera but rather the analysis of crime done can be brought back and role played in form of documentaries. In this case, every part wants to tell their story, both the perpetrators and the victims involved in such a scenario while others may not be willing to worries of being ridiculed. Some other documentaries do not express reality but are rather asking questions in order to get answers to some of the world phenomena experienced. ‘The Imposter’ looks into getting answers but ends up in concluding a load of possibilities in crime scenarios, all of which could not all add up. Hence this can be given as one of the examples of documentaries that are rather a reflection of investigative nature as opposed to the expression of reality. In return the producers allow all these stories to co-exist and be in conflict of each other rather than try and draw a conclusive end. This leaves the viewer to come up with an objective decision on his own as the dilemmas expressed there in have significant weight. On the other hand, life stories have been role played in drama and fictional movies in a bid to offer life experience lessons to audience. Cynthia Wade’s ‘Monday at Racine’ tells of a story of two sisters who opened up salons and beauty shops for the sole purpose of serving women who are undergoing chemotherapy for free. This documentary was nominated for an Oscar award due to its representation of the human nature and passion shown in helping those in need. This could not be a reality representation but speaks of some of life occurrences that could make a difference. Conclusion Capitalistic: A Love Story is a documentary screened about real time events and the role play of financial crisis that was observed largely throughout the world. This financial crisis had a trickle effect to as far as the developing countries and this documentary is just a sneak peak of the adverse effects the crisis escalated. Part of the documentary is an exaggeration of the real life events all in the name of generating the required attention to pass across a message, (Ames, 2012, p 13). Documentaries can thus be rated as a reflection of a historical event, although there is really no way to have the exact reality on film as it happened. Documentary can depend on narrative structure for its basic organization as American cinema at times demonstrate by taking shape around a crisis, Nichols (1991, p 10). Whether reality or not, documentary form may also incorporate concepts of character development and subjectivity, continuity or montage editing, and the invocation of off-screen space depending on the preference of the producers in bringing out the story. Just like fiction, documentary can also suggest that its perceptions and values belong to its characters, or adhere to the historical world itself and thus deviating from reality. No documentary can be loved if seek the platonic truth; nor can it be loved if we reject the platonic ideal forms but swing instead to a condemnation of simulations and simulacra. From the above discussion we can conclude that documentaries are a representation of reality, although some of them have been incorporated with fiction and drama. Further, other documentaries have gone a step further to stimulate the thinking of the audience and give a possible environment that generates further debates. References Ames, E. (2012), Ferocious reality: Documentary according to Werner Herzog, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis. Kilborn, R. W., & Izod, J. (1997), An introduction to television documentary: Confronting reality, Manchester University Press, Manchester. Macdonald, K., & Cousins, M. (1996), Imagining reality: The Faber book of the documentary, Faber and Faber, London. Nichols, B. (1991), Representing reality: Issues and concepts in documentary, Indiana University Press, Bloomington. Nichols, B. (2010), Introduction to Documentary, Indiana University Press, Bloomington. The Stylist, (n.d.), The New Reality TV: Documentaries, Accessed on April 21, 2014 http://www.stylist.co.uk/life/the-new-reality-tv#image-rotator-1 Ward, P. (2005). Documentary: The margins of reality, Wallflower, London. Read More