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A Term paper project on Topic : Sports Documentaries Submitted by: Name: Ponnada Kulteja Enrollment No: A2028710070 Under

supervision of: Ms. Nupur Srivastava Amity School of Communication Amity University

Preface:
Under this project I want to discuss about Sports Documentaries. I shall first discuss about the concept of documentaries, its different types. Then a detailed case study on two of the most acclaimed sports documentaries in history so far. Then the impact of sports documentaries on the audience, the film industry and other elements of cinema and then proceed to the various changes that have come about in sports documentaries.

Acknowledgement:
This project would not have been possible without the guidance of my Guide Ms. Nupur Srivastava who provided me with an insight into the whole concept of Electronic Communication, of which cinema plays a very dominant part and helped me carry out an effective research on the topic. I would like to sincerely thank my mentor for throwing light on the topic and helping me comprehend the theory and conduct a perception based research on the subject adhering to the guidelines. The research is a compilation of my learning experiences that I acquired from my mentor and the knowledge has been proved to be effective and useful in accomplishing my objectives and findings.

THIS IS TO CERTIFY THAT

The project study Topic Sports Documentaries submitted by Name Ponnada Kulteja in partial fulfillment for the requirement of three years full time under graduate program Bachelors of Journalism and Mass Communication in 2010-1013 is piece of original work carried out by him under my guidance as supervisor.

Name of the mentor Ms. Nupur Srivastava

Table of contents
Introduction Concept of Documentary Making Types of Documentary Changing Trends in Sports Documentary Case Studies on Sports Documentaries Impact of Sports Documentaries Page 2 Page 4 Page 7 Page10 Page15 Page 1

Introduction:
The main objective of my research is to study the making of documentaries. To know how popular documentaries are made. To know if the recent changes in Documentary making style has been accepted by the public and what are the changes that have occured. The direction of Documentary film is same as that of a motion film. It also involves three basic stages that include: Pre-Production, Production and PostProduction. It also includes the various lighting techniques, the various locations to shoot and the audio recording techniques are also the same. Sports documentaries are a popular genre in documentary film making. With various documentaries on the lives of many eminent sports personalities. They are widely viewed all around the world and attract a large number of film makers. Documentaries, especially sports documentaries hold special importance because of their ability to record events that can be referred to as history in the future. It serves various purposes and is widely used in the field of Sports journalism today. The viewer ship of documentaries today is very low as compared to movies. The number of documentaries that hit the screens every day is far less compared to full length movies. Moreover, documentaries do not enjoy the same popularity as full length movies. There is no promotion for documentaries and audience seldom know about the various documentaries that are being released everyday. These sports documentaries serve many functions. They are used for journalistic purposes. They are used as a record of history. They can also be used as a mode of entertainment. They can be used to create awareness.

Objectives:
The main objective of this term paper shall involve the basic understanding of the making of a documentary film. The various techniques used, the various softwares, the technical aspects, the script, and the various stages of the documentary film. This paper shall also guide me to know about the various functions of a documentary film and its uses. Its use in the field of journalism, in the field of entertainment, from the aspect of recording history, in terms of creating awareness and discovering many more purposes. Also, its importance in todays world shall be studied about.

While the Indian cinema grew in leaps and bounces over the past decade, there was another form of cinema, you can say, where observing life could be exploited in a new art form; that the original actor and original scene are better guides than their fiction counterparts to interpreting the modern world; and that materials can be more real than the acted article. This was called the documentary film making. According to Wikipedia, Documentary film describes a broad category of non fictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record.

Early film (pre-1900) was dominated by the novelty of showing an event. They were single-shot moments captured on film: a train entering a station, a boat docking, or factory workers leaving work. Today the modern documentaries, Box office analysts have noted that this film genre has become increasingly successful in theatrical release with films such as Fahrenheit 9/11, Super Size Me, Earth, March of the Penguins, and An Inconvenient Truth among the most prominent examples. Although the increasing popularity of the documentary genre, and the advent of DVDs, has made documentaries financially more viable, funding for documentary film production remains elusive. Within the past decade the largest exhibition opportunities have emerged from within the broadcast market, making filmmakers beholden to the tastes and influences of the broadcasters who have become their largest funding source. Modern documentaries have some overlap with television forms, with the development of "reality television" that occasionally verges on the documentary but more often veers to the fictional or staged. The making-of documentary shows how a movie or a computer game was produced.

Usually made for promotional purposes, it is closer to an advertisement than a classic documentary. Modern lightweight digital video cameras and computer-based editing have greatly aided documentary makers, as has the dramatic drop in equipment prices. The first film to take full advantage of this change was Martin Kunert and Eric Manes' Voices of Iraq, where 150 DV cameras were sent to Iraq during the war and passed out to Iraqis to record themselves. This way, Documentary film making constitutes a significant part of todays electronic media, which has attracted me to study on the topic in depth.

Concept of Documentary Making:


Documentary film is gaining popularity and soon becoming a personal favorite type for many directors and film enthusiasts. Few even feel it is challenging and more interesting than producing a scripted film on a subject that has enough depth for detailed coverage. Documentaries are fact oriented, information driven videos. They are dependent largely on interviews with people affected by the topic or any expert at the topic. Such interviews are called talking head videos. Documentaries also contain individual portions or snippets of the interview, called sound bites. Documentary films have a low budget and a small crew. Nothing is staged in a documentary. Theoretically speaking, it is documenting reality. There is no light set up or lighting arrangements made. Very often, natural light or a simple 1-3 light set-up is used. Documentary crews commonly use a shot gun microphone running to pick up whatever natural sound, or ambient sound might occur. Documentary style is different from high end Hollywood or Bollywood style movies where sets are made and a lot of planning is done before shooting a scene. Documentary style has evolved beyond real documentaries that are a work of journalism. Its known as a production method that might be incorporated into a music video or fictional work. The style of newsy, reality based production method can be used anywhere. There are no set rules on how broad the topic can be. It can be covered in an hour show as well as in a 5-10 minute show. The first step in making a documentary is to have a basic subject matter topic to make a documentary. Adding to this, vast research is necessary to get a clear picture of the whole issue. Then the documentary can be carried about by talking to experts, the main heros or the movers and shakers are on that particular topic. Talking to as many people as possible and taking opinions and inputs from all the sources gives us a better angle on the main issue. Covering those aspects of the topic that have an impact on the lifestyle or the thinking or have an impact in any form what so ever, also is an integral part of the documentary. Reportinging real world examples adds an in depth insight on the subject. The best sources for any topic on a documentary are usually experts or professors in that subject. In the final video, the real people might be important, but the pre-production phase usually begins by locating experts. And the best

place to find is at : Academic institutions, professional associations, government offices, support groups, businesses etc. After all this research is done, a rough layout of the show can be got. Make a plan, prepare a schedule- Pre-production phase is done with. Production stage involves whatever interviews those are shot and transcribe them word for word. Your interviews or talking heads can be taken to start by of every single person being interviewed. Shoot their video of whatever it is that they do, that will relate directly to the story and help in narrating it better. If you are interviewing a scientist, get video of them working in the lab. If you are videotaping a boxing expert, get video of them working out and practicing their moves in the ring.

Types of Documentaries:
After considering many books and talking to many experts in the field, documentaries can be classified into six categories. In a book Nichols, a PhD in documentaries, proposes six typesor modesof documentary.

1. Poetic documentaries, whose first appearance came in the 1920s. They were like a counter
against the content and grammar of the pre 1920 fiction film. These documentaries abandoned the use of editing and instead managed images of the world by means of associations and patterns, both in terms of time and space. Real people were shown in these films, just like us that are found in the real world. According to Nichols, The films were fragmentary, impressionistic, lyrical. Their disruption of the coherence of time and spacea coherence favored by the fiction films of the daycan also be seen as an element of the modernist counter-model of cinematic narrative. The real world was broken up into fragments and aesthetically reconstituted using film form. Examples: Joris Ivens Rain (1928); Laszlo Moholy-Nagys Play of Light: Black, White, Grey (1930),

2. Expository documentaries talk to the viewer, like commentary, favoring an argument or a


point of view. Such films tend to influence and change the mind of the viewer. The commentary sounds very objective influencing. Visuals are not exaggerated, and they are used to support the argument. The rhetoric insistently presses upon us to read the images in a certain fashion. Historical documentaries communicate in such unproblematic account and help in understanding the events of the past. Examples: Ken Burns The Civil War (1990); Robert Hughes The Shock of the New (1980); John

Bergers Ways Of Seeing (1974). Also, Frank Capras wartime Why We Fight series; Pare Lorentzs The Plow That Broke The Plains (1936).

3. Observational documentaries closely observe lived life without any interference, letting it
be as if we never existed. These documentaries are purposed for immediacy and exploring human character in ordinary life situations. Observational documentaries were made in the 1960s. There were much technological advancement that made such documentaries possible, such as lightweight cameras and portable sound recording equipment for synchronized sound. Such documentaries include voice-over commentary, post-synchronized dialogue and music, or re-enactments. Examples: Frederick Wisemans films, e.g. High School (1968); Gilles Groulx and Michel Braults Les Racquetteurs (1958); Albert & David Maysles and Charlotte Zwerin's Gimme Shelter (1970)

4. Participatory documentaries believe it is absolutely necessary for filmmaking to change


the events being shot. These documentaries imitate the behavior of the protagonist. Nichols: The filmmaker steps out from behind the cloak of voice-over commentary, steps away from poetic meditation, steps down from a fly-on-the-wall perch, and becomes a social actor (almost) like any other. (Almost like any other because the filmmaker retains the camera, and with it, a certain degree of potential power and control over events.) The encounter between the director and subject becomes an important aspect of the film. Examples: Vertovs The Man with a Movie Camera (1929); Rouch and Morins Chronicle of a Summer (1960); Ross McElwees Shermans March (1985); Nick Broomfields films. I suspect Michael Moores films would also belong here, although they have a strong expository bent as well.

5. Reflexive documentaries, according to Nichols are not like the transparent window on the
world; they draw attention to their own contractedness, and the fact that they are representations. How does the world get represented by documentary films? This question is central to this subgenre of films. They prompt us to question the authenticity of documentary in general. It is the most self-conscious of all the modes, and is highly skeptical of realism. It may use Brechtian alienation strategies to jar us, in order to defamiliarize what we are seeing and how we are seeing it. Examples: (Again) Vertovs The Man with a Movie Camera (1929); Buuel's Land Without Bread; Trinh T. Minh-has Surname Viet Given Name Nam (1989); Jim McBride & L.M. Kit Carson's David Holzmans Diary (1968); David & Judith MacDougalls Wedding Camels(1980).

6. Performative documentaries add sense of emotion and subjective ness. It is very


personal, poetic and experimental, and may involve imaginary events to make us feel what it would be like to have a new perspective on the world. This sub-genre might also lend itself to certain groups (e.g. women, ethnic minorities, gays and lesbians, etc) to speak about themselves. Many new techniques adopted by looking at fiction films, are used. Performative documentaries try to create a link between personal experiences with larger political or historical realities. Examples: Alain Resnais Night And Fog (1955), with a commentary by Holocaust survivior Jean Cayrol, is not a historical account of the Holocaust but instead a subjective account of it; its a film about memory. Also, Peter Forgacs Free Fall (1988) and Danube Exodus (1999); and Robert Gardners Forest of Bliss (1985), a film about India that Ive long heard about and look forward to seeing.

Changing Trends in Sports Documentaries:


Films and sports were uneasy bedfellows for quiet some time now. The history of both is marked by a series of rather weird social convergence. For instance, Football has always been considered as something to pick upon in the film industry, but after the worldwide acceptance of Escape to Victory, and Ali in the early 2000s sports movies, just like action movies have been widely acclaimed. May be sports and movies are poles apart. Like an oil-and-water collision. That might change now . This year three British-made sporting documentaries were released on a high note, on a cinematic scale. Two of which are films on cricket. They are: From the Ashes charts the cricketing summer of 1981 is the incredible story of English cricket s greatest ever comeback. It s the summer of 1981 and in the midst of a heated Ashes battle, iconic all-rounder Ian Botham is sacked as England Captain with England 1-0 after two tests. Having been told by selectors that if he hadnt resigned, he would have been sacked anyway, not only is his career on a tightrope but English cricket is on the verge of total humiliation. Fire in Babylon tells the story of the great West Indies cricket team of the 1980s and its effect on Caribbean cultural identity. Also famous among them is TT3D, a documentary on the Isle of Man TT motorbike race that was an unexpected hit at the box office, earning the highest UK weekend gross of any documentary since 2004. From the Ashes and Fire in Babylon are considered to be very successful cricket films of all time. Also they should be released in a general fashion that too in the same month suggests at worst a bubble that might pop any moment, or at best a movement. Sport, for a long time has been a bystander in the multiplex theatre. It is finally beginning to take its seat in the main screen.

Fire in Babylon makes a jump for the audience, using cricket as a tool to explore issues on culture and race. Many people who have watched this documentary feel it was a great idea for a documentary. After doing so much research on the issue, getting under the skin of the West Indies players, there's so much to know about: black power, black pride, apartheid, postcolonialism, etc. This was one unique way to reveal such issues in the form of a documentary apart from just discussing cricket. Fire in Babylon has a very major asset at its disposal. It narrates beautifully modern cricket's most convincing story that keeps the audience glued to their seats: the magic of West Indies' 20year domination of Test cricket owing to a generation of amazing fast bowlers. Exaggeration is always a risk when something like sport makes its way to the screen. As acclaimed director, Steven Riley says: "Sport is such rich territory for film-making. The stakes are so high, individually and in terms of social movement, culture, religion. You find the story starts to transcend the actual sport and becomes simply a vehicle. In Fire in Babylon the cricket is almost incidental to the story." That is pretty much the key to sport's ongoing acceptance in the world of cinema. The soft pedal, and the actual sport; make up for acting and the cinematic qualities present in human dramas. This concept has worked wonders for TT3D: Closer to the Edge, a great success story about the Isle of Man TT motorcycle race: that is very evidently going to become one of the most rewarding documentaries. There seems is a built-in audience," says Steve Riley in an interview with Fox Media. "But it's not huge. Frankly, we are a bit surprised by how well it's done. I think it makes the crossover. The purists haven't embraced it. They think there's not enough bikes or racing. We've broadened it out into the human stories." For James Erskine, director of From the Ashes, also the maker of the successful Italia 90 World Cup documentary titled, One Night in Turin, there has been a great change in what he did way back in 90s and what the makers of TT3D's have done. "I wouldn't actually characterise TT3D as a documentary," he says. "That's not to denigrate it at all. They've done a fantastic thing and they deserve their success, but it's not on the same intellectual level as a proper documentary film. A documentary is about the choices we make, it tells a story. I would imagine the average age of the people going to see TT3D is probably about 15. It is a computer game writ lchangearge. It's genius in lots of ways, but it's not a movie. It's a film for the PlayStation 3 generation." It has certainly been the success of sporting cinema. In 1971 Steve McQueen speed freakout Le Mans; the horsey schmaltz of Seabiscuit; the Brylcreem and plimsolls potboiler Chariots of Fire; the basketball-based real-life tale Hoop Dreams; the hugely involving Leon Gast

documentary When We Were Kings, and Senna, a documentary biopic of Ayrton Senna, one of the most captivating drivers of Formula One, There's one more thing that these films have in common, not just heroism, its the use of advanced technology, the use of easy-editing softwares as compared to old documentaries, bedroom-DJ accessibility that allowed film makers to distill from over 500 hours of primary footage. It is all about the use of technology. Digitalizing the screens has made the making of films very cheap. Use of film to record has become obsolete. Filmmakers can shoot high-end footage in HD that looks great with the kind of technology present today. And it's a lot more accessible. You can edit it at home on a Mac. It's easier and cheaper than it would have been before. From a different of view, these sports films convey nothing more but just relentless sportification of every medium. Sport, has in the recent years has come to the fore front and has gained wide acceptance. Once music had played a keen role as a form of entertainment in countless movies, documentaries and plays, both on TV and the theatre, sport now fills this schedules, with numerous game talk shows, interviews, tributes, feature programs and many more all this even before the action begins. One could but obviously expect that it was natural for sport to fall in the eye of cinema, though it faced resistance for many years. All said and done, sport is indeed an ocean of dramatic action, apart from protagonists, and action scenes. There is always drama, there is always action, and there is always a story.

Case Study On Three Famous Documentaries

When We Were Kings (1996)


This documentary, arguably one of the best documentaries ever, is about the return of Mohammad Ali, the greatest boxer of all time, to Africa to regain his heavyweight title of the world from George Forman. As the filmmaker introduces the fight to the audience, we not only see the build up of the championship fight but also the state of Africa. Using actual footage and constructed interviews, the director Leon Gast has structured this film to build up on the championship fight. The documentary begins with real footage of ABC sports writer Howard Cosell saying: The time may have come to say goodbye to Mohammad Ali, because quiet frankly, I dont think he has a chance. Followed by a counter from Ali, saying: Howard Cosell, you told everybody that I dont have a chance, I dont have a prayer. Well chump, if my prayer goes to the right man, not only will Foreman fall, but so will mountains. Followed by a few rebuttals and comments from both the parties. The director has wisely chosen to introduce Alis ambition to become the world number one by showing cut scenes of this argument. The film maker, to induce interest also introduces a certain doubt in the minds of the minds of the viewers of Alis ability to succeed, developing controversy and interest for further viewing. At regular intervals, the filmmaker uses interviews of prominent people, including Alis coaching staff, opponents etc. By using actual footage of sports writers, comments from sports people, the filmmaker tries to portray Alis huge ego. This gives the effect of narration as the documentary continues. The associates personal opinion encourages the viewer to adopt the interviewees viewpoint without the intervention of the narrator. These encounters makes the documentary more plausible, showing insight into the reality into the reality of the festival, showing a few tussles in the management, while still portraying Ali as a great boxer.

Throughout the documentary, the filmmaker uses various camera angles, to capture the actual footage that was taken in 1974. Many low angle shots are used, to show Ali as a dominant character. Many Close up shots are also used to show Ali pointing down at the camera, to reveal his expressions and emotions. Pan shots that show the African scenery and the people of Africa chanting Ali kill him are used to show Alis popularity and an insight on Ali representing a Muslim community. In selecting the original footage filmed during the build up to, and the fight itself, the viewers can admire Ali. By using such variations in camera techniques, Ali is shown as a great man, at the same time capturing all the emotions and demonstrating his expressions to become the world champions. In the interviews between Ali and Foreman, towards the end, a combination is formed between Ali and Foreman. Gast uses an interview of Ali and Foreman before the final fight to create tension. At the end of the documentary, as the fight is underway, Norman Mailler, a great sports commentator is shown as the commentator for the entire match. During the commentary he describes Alis techniques to overcome Foremans strong punches. As Norman explains Alis moves, a repetition of footage is used to show how exactly how the fight progresses. By listening to Normans commentary on Alis technique and watching Ali beat Forman using his wits and mind game, viewers can finally sum up their opinion about Mohammad Ali, as they watch one of the most memorable moments of sporting history and a great man at work. Leon Gast has put together a clever documentary, combining a variety of footage and not using too much of narration. Making the documentary look dramatic and interesting. The amazing background score, the diversity of cultures shown, the anticipation through the build up and the dramatic ending, all make it a perfect documentary. I think this documentary has achieved in portraying Ali not only as a great boxer, but also as a legend, earning his place in sporting history!

Hoop Dreams:
It comes very often while conversing with other documentary filmmakers. Though it was rejected by the Oscar committee, it is the most successful and critically acclaimed documentary, Hoop dreams is about two black kids from a the neighborhoods of Chicago, whose dream is to play for the NBA. The film shows their different paths through school, their personal and professional difficulties, problems, fatherhood, crime and drugs. The documentary begins a few moments before its climax: a high-school state championship game. This way the filmmaker gives the audience a hint that something big is going to happen. Use of effective dialogues adds to the already very interesting documentary. At this early stage theres a great line from one of the characters: When I get in the NBA a unique way to begin a character driven plot. The documentary puts the story in motion. The documentary flashes back to pre-high school, where the actual story begins. We are introduced to Arthur Agee, who gets into the same suburban high school as Isaiah Thomas before he became a professional. The documentary changes between the two main characters, adopting a fusion of cinema and interview-driven storytelling. Theres a little narration, provided by director Steve James, to guide us the story. This story is supported by an incredible element: conflict. It also narrates the gap between the reality and the success boys from suburbs aim to achieve. Their struggles in their childhood: their coach fails to see their potential. Injuries threaten their professional career. Tuition costs force one of the boys to drop out of school briefly. One of the boys fathers leaves the family. The biggest conflict coming, comes from inside with both boys performing poorly in academics. Act one introduces the heros and their journey to achieve their dreams, facing a series of tests that prove they are up to the challenge. Act two shows them either overcoming or failing to overcome a series of increasingly difficult tests, which sets one of them up for the final

showdown in act three. After the climactic final game, the film wraps up quickly. We learn what happened to the two major characters in college in epilogue text prior to the credit roll. The cinematography techniques were impressive considering the fact that Hoop Dreams made it look simple and easy (even in clutch situations during playoff games where they had only once shot at getting it right). They are helped by shooting wide angle, suing shoulder-carried cameras. Other shots onclude tracking shots from windows of the car to show the neighborhood, and the kids walking to school (with camera traveling a little faster than the person walking as if they are falling behind perhaps). A pan down from the sky to the outdoor basketball court is how we first get into the narrative, from the early set up of playoff game. The interviews were a mix of interviews, and off-the-cuff interviews. They have also included live camera shots of the arthroscopic surgery that added drama to the entire scene. There have been two places in the film where big games are introduced with a shot from very high in the stands with the camera moving through a narrow doorway into the arena. This is a visual metaphor for getting through a tight spot and adds great dramatic effect to introduction of game, even though these are very brief shots. The cuts that move us seamlessly from practice games into real games are very impressive. It publishes the essence for the practice. The frequent mixing of close up, medium and wide shots used throughout the film is very much in sync and is very pleasing to watch. The use of music in the film to introduce dramatic moments and give us a hint that something important is happening. A lot of the dramatic effect background music is repetitive, interestingly. But there are a lot of great cuts in there too by performers like Snoop Dog.

Riding Tides:
Cinematographer Peter Pilafian along with Director Stacy worked to develop a shooting style that would capture the quick, swooping movements of the sport. Pilafian and Peralta developed a unique visual approach to capture the footage and document it. The documentary uses both new and archival material. Footage of legendary surfers riding the waves comes are used from various archives. It also includes interviews, which are shot especially for Riding Giants. There are many spell bounding shots in this documentary. Pilafan says that in all his shots he has visualized his scenes carefully. He adds, "The camera should feel like it's closely tied to the character. I like to think of it as jazz improvisation," he says. "The camera and the person being interviewed are two instruments in a jazz combo; they play together with the same rhythm and the same feeling. For viewers, that style heightens the interest and involvement with the person who's talking." This is why the camera was always handheld for the interviews. Says Pilafian, "Handheld shooting allows for minor intuitive variations of angle, frame size and composition, which were driven as much as possible by the emotional content of the stories." The shooting and editing work are quick and flashy which is well suited to the diminished attention spans of todays generation. "The way Stacy directs and Paul Crowder edits, they use only the very intense meat of the story in the final film. Knowing that, I was able to constantly

move the camera," says Pilafian. The documentary was shot on a Super 16-a while a handful were shot on 35mm.

The interview subjects were divided into four categories. The first category was about the gods of modern-day surfing, Laird Hamilton and Dave Kalama. The second category focused on the story of big wave surfers. The third category was composed of journalists and writers who covered the surfing scene. The fourth and final category followed surfers from the 1950s and '60s, the pioneers who dared to ride the outer breaks that no one else would touch.

Impact of Sports Documentaries:

Producers of social-issue documentaries have always tried to change the world, trying to alter the political situation or the understanding of many major issues. Over the last decade,more open strategies have been the main aspect of documentary projects, churned by a generation of documentary producers and the interests and requirements of major foundations. George Stoney, a popular filmmaker, argues that "50 percent of the documentary filmmaker's job is making the movie, and 50 percent is figuring out what its impact can be and how it can move audiences to action." The concept of creating awareness is common among todays documentaries, and many independent documentaries have developed elaborate strategies to enhance the impact of this work. Activist at all levels, from local to international, are popularly

recognizing documentaries as vehicles for social change. The production and distribution of social-issue documentaries has a wide impact on community organizations, educational institutions, citizens, and policy makers. Capturing the many and varied avenues through which documentaries "work" in the world requires a shift in strategy. The key innovation is to change the starting point for assessing impact from the documentary itself to the issue examined in the documentary. From this perspective, a documentary production company can be understood as being immersed in a larger policy process, and a social-issue documentary can be conceptualized as an intervention into a complex and on-going network of activists and policy makers concerned about the issue raised in the documentary. Throughout production and distribution, the production company navigates the policy process, interacting along the way with individuals within the relevant issue network: the set of activists and policy makers, at all levels of government, concerned about the issue. From this more holistic perspective, a more elaborate portrait of political impact emerges. Potential impact on individual viewers exposed to mainstream distribution (more knowledge, change in attitude, more interest, shifting in personal agendas) is still important but becomes more peripheral. Rather than focusing solely on change occurring inside the minds of individual citizens, an issue-centered model also explores broader changes in activist organizations and changes in public policy. Producers and activists seeking to increase the political impact, and scholars try to understand political impact, benefit from conceptualizing the production and distribution of a social-issue documentary as an intervention into a policy process. Impact occurs primarily through the linkages between the production company and the components of the relevant issue network. A documentary "works" within an issue network by being linked to activists and policy makers at all levels. The deeper and broader these linkages are, the greater the opportunity for political impact. Individuals are still important, but individual activists and individual policy makers are of more interest than individual citizens. Political impact is most likely to occur when at least one element of the issue network puts the documentary to work within the network, using the documentary to approach other elites, to mobilize their own and other groups, to mobilize individual citizens, and ultimately to change public policy. John Pilger on the Impact of Documentaries and Other Films and John Pilger film festival The great John Pilger, Truth shall set us free

From hearing rooms on Capitol Hill to religious fairs in remote villages on the border between Thailand and Burma, Ellen Bruno's Sacrifice has been a prominent component of campaigns for social justice and human rights. The documentary examines "the social, cultural, and economic forces at work in the trafficking of Burmese girls into prostitution in Thailand," linking trafficking to human rights abuses, political and economic repression, and the absence of employment opportunities in Burma. Sacrifice had extensive circulation with the issue network focused on trafficking in women in Southeast Asia and provides an excellent example of how varied the impact of a documentary can be. Tracing out the full issue network relevant to trafficking in women would require summarizing the political actors involved in policy-making activity not only on the international level but also on the national and local levels within the United States and within many other nations. At all of these levels we could identify relevant political actors from within legislative bodies, executive agencies, activist organizations, and the media. The website created for Sacrifice (www.brunofilms.com/sacrifice.html) reflects the high level of awareness of the context of the issue that guided Bruno during the production process. The site provides a quite detailed account of important organizations within the issue network, including a list of over sixty organizations in separate sections on "Organizations Working on Trafficking Issues" and "Organizations Working on Human Rights in Burma." These lists also reveal clearly another aspect of the issue network important for understanding the impact of Bruno's documentary, the network of organizations working directly on the issue in areas of Thailand near the Burma border. The documentary itself struck some within the network as an unlikely vehicle for social activism. Except for some text at the very beginning about government oppression of minorities in Burma, Sacrifice does not provide much in the way of context for the issues it raises. Nor does it contain anything in the way of preferred "solutions."

There is a hunger among the public for documentaries because only documentaries, at their best, are fearless and show the unpalatable and make sense of the news. The extraordinary films of Alan Francovich achieved this. Francovitch, who died in 1997 , made The Maltese Double Cross Lockerbie. THIS destroyed the official truth that Libya was responsible for the sabotage of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie in 1988. Instead, an unwitting mule, with links to the CIA, was alleged to have carried the bomb on board the aircraft. (Paul Foots parallel investigation for Private Eye came to a similar conclusion). The Maltese Double Cross Lockerbie has never been publicly screened in the United States. In this country, the threat of legal action from a US Government official prevented showings at the 1994 London Film Festival and the Institute of Contemporary Arts. In 1995, defying threats, Tam Dalyell showed it in the House of Commons, and Channel 4 broadcast it in May 1995.

Bibliography:
http://www.videography.com/article/77988 http://www.studiodaily.com/filmandvideo/technique/craft/f/shooting/ExtremeDocumentaries_4556.html

http://www.docshare.com/doc/117727/In-the-documentary-When-We-Were-Kings-howdoe http://revisionistslc.com/2011/01/06/sports-documentary-on-social-change/

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