Mehak Hussain

History of Genre
Documentaries are constantly produced for the pleasure of its audiences, what
they want, expect or need; that is the priority of the director/producer. There are
many reasons behind why a documentary is made; however this would all come
down to the type of documentary that it is as well the topic. For example, some
are produced mainly to inform viewers so that they are able to make society
aware of a particular issue, expecting this to have an affect on the audience,
they would some sort of change to be made to society. These can sometimes be
used to change the perception of viewers. On the other hand, there are
documentaries that are simply created to entice the viewer through its sources
of information. These types of documentaries allow viewers to make their own
judgements through the information they are provided with.
Well where did they all start?
The first films that had been ever invented, were produced by two brothers, who
are famously known as the Lumiere brothers, they called their documentaries
Actualites, these were made in 1895. The documentaries didnt last very long
since they had created their own camera system which had only allowed them to
hold a little amount of 50ft of film stock. The clips where unedited and only
displayed a small snap-shot of what was around them, for example, their most
famous film captured a train pulling into a train station, made in 1895, they
called it Un Train Arrivee. The film had audiences excited because for the first
time they had seen how a string of images created a moving image through a
camera.
Then, a man named Robert Flaherty created the very first documentary in 1922,
he called it Nanook of the North. Nanook had been the very factual as well as
the first feature length film, however many of his scenes had been staged in
order to make the documentary more intense for audiences . John Grierson had
referred to this as the creative interpretation of reality since not all scenes had
been authentic, he was also the very first to describe Flahertys film as a
documentary.
Grierson extended his research into poetic-realistic documentaries and
eventually made a documentary of his own in 1936, which provided information
about the mail train from London to Edinburgh, he called it Nightmail. However,
the theme of his documentary was not praised the way he had probably hoped
as his critics argued his theme disregards human beings and instead focuses on
the modernisation of society as he celebrates machinery.
Afterward in the 1950s and 1960s there had been a major development for
documentaries; Direct Cinema. This had begun in the US, and was designed to
provide information directly to audiences in an unmediated way. This allowed
audiences to believe that what they were seeing was happening at the same
time as it way being filmed. This was done because smaller and lighter cameras
had been produced that allowed cameramen to hold the camera on their
shoulder. These were a lot more convenient than the 16mm and 35mm reels that
were previously being used to produce documentaries.
A smaller movement on the other hand was taking place in France where the
style of film making used made the audience believe that whatever was captured

Mehak Hussain

History of Genre
through the camera was not genuine and had not been modified or staged. This
was called Cinema Verite. The techniques used to create this atmosphere was
maintaining natural light, real location settings, diegetic sounds and finally the
use of hand-held camera. These techniques had later been manipulated and
used for films, these films were then referred to as mockumentaries. These had
caused some people in audiences to question why they put so much faith in the
realism of documentation when the codes and conventions can easily be
recreated by anyone.
http://www.slideshare.net/jontowlson/a-short-history-of-documentary