Documentaries and TV Pt. 2• Television from 1998 to 2008• More channels more opportunities• Technology and smaller budgets• Economics of film making• First a look back• A follow-up to the Robert Drew lecture before

the New Year Break

Robert Drew• 1961 - “The Reason many docs

• Are dull is because traditionally they have been little more than ILLUSTRATED LECTURES.”

• Drew in TV wanted to change that tradition

• Traditional TV resisted

Robert Drew• “Real life never got out of the film. never came to the

television set. We [must] drop ‘word logic,’ find a dramatic logic in which things really happen. If we could do that we would have a whole new basis for

a new journalism. It’s hard to define.  But … it would be a theater without actors. Plays without

playwrights. Reporting without summary & opinion.  The ability to look in on people’s lives at crucial times

from which you could deduce certain things and see a kind of truth that can only be gotten by personal experience.  In order to do that we need to re-engineer the equipment and style of film making….”

In America: Change at the Big Three US Networks

• 1988 ABC “Close Up” & others • shut down• public service requirement diminishes• Staged Reality shows develop• Documentaries become multi-subject

magazine shows or long form programs of a more sensational nature – focusing often on crime or celebrities

American TV Networks• CBS Sixty Minutes• ABC Prime Time• 20/20• NBC Dateline• Magazines• Have replaced the TV documentary

form at traditional US networks

TV Documentaries Today• In America• Public Service Broadcasting commissions

much of the best documentary making• Plus Cable Television airs many films HBO, Canada’s Documentary Channel CNN, Discovery Channel, Nat-Geo,

Sundance, History Channel, A and E, others

• At PBS – Frontline – worth noting

PBS Series• “Frontline”: - variety, traditional • Sometimes controversial• “The Jesus Factor” 2004• International Subjects• Independent Series

• “China from the Inside”[2006] (in 4 parts ) politics, women, pollution, justice

• http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/

Range of BBC TV docs• Index to BBC Docs –

• http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/

• BBC produces dozens of documentary films each year. Styles differ. Often multi-part in the tradition of “Civilisation” (1969)

• Sometimes cultural but more often topical or investigative - still traditional style

• [show excerpt “New Al Qaeda” (2005)]

British Documentaries• Arguably more attention paid to long form

non fiction film on Television in Britain than in America

• Channel Four London archives• http://www.channel4.com/fourdocs/archive/a_to_z.html

• More than 30 British films on line from 1906 to 2001.

• A powerful one in 1995• Dying Rooms http://www.channel4.com/fourdocs/archive/the_dying_room_player.html

Cable TV makes possible more graphic films

• VIEWER DISCRETION ADVISED• Two films on similar topic – Iraq War• CNN – Combat Hospital (2006)

• HBO – “Baghdad ER” (2006) veteran film maker Jon Alpert HBO • www.hbo.com/docs

POV: Docs with clear political agendas

• Ex: Robert Greenwald American political documentaries “Outfoxed” (2004) “Iraq for Sale” (2006)

Beyond TVDocumentary Distribution

• Some experts predict DVD, e-cinema and the Internet will replace Broadcast TV or theatres/film festivals for documentary distribution.

• Interview with Robert Greenwald. • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kd0L3fhG4w

Next Week• Elements of Style• Some very original film makers• Ken Burns• Errol Morris• Nick Broomfield • February 29 – Cinema Verite’• Thank you

Footnote:

See ABC News Report about Greenwald and “Iraq for Sale:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGPLchIl6p4