History of Documentaries

History of Documentaries

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  History of Documentary ShannonEdgington
• 2.
  1895 This is theyear documentary began when the first films were invented, this was invented by the Lumiere brothers. The Lumieres created a camera that could only hold 50 feet worth of film and their films were very short and unedited. These film documentaries were called ‘Actualities’. Un Train Arrivee also 1895 their most famous film which simply shows a train pulling into a station, however the audience where so shocked seeing a moving photographs with so much detail.
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  1922 Documentary that weknow of today began with Nanook of The North and this was made by Robert Flaherty. The word documentary in fact was invented by a man called John Grierson to describe this style of film. The film ‘Nanook’ was the first feature length factual film and the first to use ‘ the creative interpretation of reality’. This meant that in the Nanook Flaherty had staged most of the scenes for the camera in order to make the film more dramatic and enjoyable for the audience.
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  1930’s Grierson went onto head the GPO film unit in England he became a major exponent of this poetic realist approach to documentary. Nightmail began as an international film about the mail train, however the filming and editing emphasised poetic elements of the film form, such as : movement, rhythm, light and sound.
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  1950’s – 1960’s Thenext major development of documentaries was called ‘Direct Cinema’. It began in the Unites States Of America. Its aim was to present social and political events directly, in an unmediated so people thought that the footage is recorded exactly as the events happen, without the use of a film maker. Camera’s also developed in this time allowing them to be hand held, this meant that the recording could be more spontaneous.
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  1950’s – 1960’s CinemaVerite was dependent on some technical advances in order to exist: light, quiet and reliable cameras, and portable sync sound. Other similar documentary traditions can be seen, in a broader perspective way, as a reaction against studio-based film production. The use of Cinema Verite techniques can make a film seems more ‘real’ and truthful to an audience Cinema Verite is a minimalist style of film making that conveys the sense that the viewer is given a direct view of what was actually happening in front of the camera without the artifice usually incorporated in the film-making process. Cinema Verite favours hand-held camera, natural lighting, location filming, and direct sound.
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  Jean Rouch wasan important documentarian working in this style in the 1960’s. However Cinema Verite techniques have also been used by drama film makers.
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  From as earlyas the 1960’s Mockumentaries were about as early as the 1960’s however wasn’t really seen until the 1980’s. Mockumentaries use the typical codes and conventions of documentaries and makes the audience think that it is factual when it actually isn’t. As it is so easy to fake theses codes and conventions of documentaries it often makes its audiences question whether we can even trust the documentary style.