Select from one of the readings and briefly describe two points that you have taken from it. Points that interest you, something you could apply to your own documentary.
Cunningham, Megan. The art of the documentary : ten conversations with leading directors, cinematographers, editors, and producers, (p. 88-89, 149-175, 277, 284). Berkeley, CA : New Riders, 2005.
I read the extracts from Cunningham’s The art of documentary: ten conversations with leading directors, cinematographers, editors, and producers. I loved this reading. It was enlightening and enjoyable. I am going to talk about the interview with Kirsten Johnson because (1) that was the thick part of the reading and (2) Johnson is an incredibly articulate and clever filmmaker with a plethora of fascinating things to say. The other reason is that I can relate to Johnson in my similar interest in both directing and cinematography (yet lack of experience, especially with camerawork), my love of being on set, my understanding of the scarcity of female camera department members and the (unexpectedly common) prejudice associated with being a female camera department member on film sets. I was also DP (first time, YAY) for our documentary, the majority of which we shot last weekend.
One thing that struck me in this reading was Johnson’s discussion of connecting “how [she’s] shooting to what [she’s] shooting”. The way she dedicates the cinematography to the story or the meaning of the film. How she finds something important about the film and looks for a way to represent it / incorporate it into the film’s visual style. And then this style becomes distinguishing for her film. In shooting Derrida, for example, Johnson was always filming Derrida’s reflection and looking for obstructions. This style was inspired by the fact that Derrida didn’t allow himself to be photographed for years. Johnson also discusses “getting the detail” in filming Derrida – for example, the way he puts the caps back on the pens while he’s talking on the phone.
I feel like my group approached our film’s visual style in a similar way. Prior to filming Theano, we had decided upon a self-conscious shooting style – or at least a shooting style where we didn’t conceal the fact that this was a film. This meant that I wasn’t obliged to frame out the crew. I had license to point the camera at the other crew members – Tiana, our director and interviewer, and Will, our producer and sound recordist – as well as Tiana’s own mother who was there for support. The reasoning behind this is that our film is personal to our director as well as our participant. Our director is a part of the story. There is an intimate, familial connection between her and the participant. We thought it’d be foolish to exclude such an intriguing element from our film. The presence of Tiana’s mother during the shoot was just the icing on the cake – three generations sharing stories, discovering new things, and reflecting on their history. What worked brilliantly was that it was just Will and I who made up the rest of the crew. There were only two of us who weren’t familiar to Theano, and she warmly invited us into the discovery process (despite the fact that we couldn’t understand Greek). We tried Greek tea for the first time, were showed around her home, were fed chocolates, looked through her old photos, discovered her giant box of old letters, sat around her table eating pastries that she’d just made from scratch, and tried to listen to her stories through her body language. It was a humbling experience. We were all gathered in Theano’s kitchen while she made food for us and told her story. And so much of it was new information to both Tiana and Catherine. I think the final film will be as much about Theano’s life as it is about all of us learning about her life – discovering and reacting and interacting with her. There’s something really powerful in showing the filmmakers and the family and the subject all learning. I think this intimate atmosphere will translate on film. I think it will serve as a space for the audience to vicariously participate in the discovery and feel similarly close to the subject matter.
What made it translate even more so on camera (and apparently also on sound) was Theano’s utter dismissal of the camera presence. She seemed unconscious to the fact that there was a camera pointed at her face, even when it was ridiculously close. She seemed not to notice the equipment and the technical things that Tiana, Will and I were doing. They all just flew right by her. She was not at all concerned about her appearance or how she was coming across on camera. She did not put on a show, nor did she withdraw. This made it even more authentic: we were recording the real Theano. The real way she spoke, moved, behaved, interacted with people. In Cunningham’s interview, Johnson talks about realising that “you are documenting things that will not stay the way they were”. This resonated with me in terms of the film that Tiana, Will and I are making. We are documenting memories and old letters and old photos. We are documenting the story of an elderly woman. We are documenting the interactions of Tiana and Catherine and Theano. We are documenting moments, past and present. Traces of old moments and ephemeral present moments. This will be a film particularly important to Tiana’s family, since we are recording and preserving their history. And this realisation makes it even more humbling to be making this film.
Returning back to the discussion of connecting how you’re shooting to what you’re shooting, Theano spoke mainly in Greek, and I should have considered this more in regards to the visuals before shooting. I didn’t think much about leaving frame space for subtitles, so that will be interesting when we get deeper into the edit. But I did anticipate that I would have to be very observant. The situation forced me to listen to what was happening with my eyes. To look for when the story was becoming lighter or darker. To present Theano in her environment – her framed photos, colourful curtains and crochet tablecloth. To capture the relationship between Tiana and Theano. And Tiana and Theano and Catherine. To emphasise Theano’s facial expressions and hand gestures and body language. To foreground the ring on Theano’s finger when she’s cooking and using the rolling pin. I was looking for ways to visually spell out things for the audience.
(Sorry for the oddly structured response. I felt that everything I wanted to say was sort of intertwined, so I didn’t want to discuss the points discretely.)