Reality T.V articles

The first reality television article was very interesting. The fact that the reality t.v shows were grouped into categories was good. I've never seen groups such as these before. I have always thought of reality television as one big large group, not as small groups sectioned off.

It makes sense to group them like this, for there are different types of reality television. One of the most common is the competitive reality television shows where they are playing for some kind of reward at the end. This could consist of love, money, or fame. One of the most common examples of this would be fear factor. They have to do very disgusting things in order to acquire money in the end. Another type of reality television category is transformation. In this either people, or other things are transformed by the end of the television show. An example of this is extreme makeover home edition, where they make over an entire house in a week. Or, the biggest loser. This is transformer peoples bodies so they can become healthier.

Sherman's March

Sherman's March was another very interesting documentary. At first you think it is going to be all about the historic Sherman's March, but in the end it turns out to be much of Ross McElwee's journey. He starts out searching for love and stumbles upon a woman named Pat. Now the beginning seems to be all about Pat, and McElwee seems to make most of the beginning about her endeavors. He uses the camera at very interesting angels when he is filming Pat, and often keeps it directly on her. Pat then gets an audition and leaves McElwee and he seems to be starting his original idea, and going back to the actual Sherman's March. This documentary has many masculine conquests the biggest being his romantic conquest. In the beginning his mother tries to set him up with people and that is where he ultimately meets Pat. It seems he feels as if he is incomplete without a woman in his life. Another small conquest could be his car. When Pat is not around to film, he often goes and works on his car, although he does not film this. This would be one of his smaller conquests, and only a side job for when Pat is not present.

London

London was made by Patrick Keiller in 1992. This documentary was very interesting to say the least, and it was very confusing. It had voice of God narration, and was observational but you do not see the people they were referring to. The images often did not match the narration. For at one point they were talking about Romanticism and had a very long shot on McDonald's. He was talking about where he can always go to get things done and before had been talking about Romanticism. When you think about Romanticism McDonald's is the very last thing that would come to mind. He also used medium shots, and stayed on the subject for a very long period of time. Often the subject would change before the actual picture would. The documentary did not focus on the traditional tour sites of London, but instead focused on parts the two characters had been and had experienced very normal things.

This documentary was actually really weird. I did not really like it, and did not fully understand what the purpose was. It seemed to put a negative light on London, which is not usually the case when someone is doing a documentary on a place.

Ric Burns

Ric Burns was a very interesting presentation. It was nice to see a man who makes documentaries so laid back, and so willing to talk to all of us and make jokes. It was really interesting to hear him talk about the whole process, and why he was starting his next documentary. I did not quite understand at first what would compel someone to write a documentary on whale hunting. After he talked about it, it really started to make sense and I saw that it is actually a very interesting topic. The part of the documentary he showed us was actually really interesting. He had a lot of interviews with many people which made all the stories seem so much more believable. I liked that he focused on the one boat that never returned, and after watching I would have loved to watch the rest. He left you in suspense and led up to what would actually happen with the boat in the end. It was nice that he first described the significance of whale hunting and what it was used for in the older days. What I was thinking during the documentary is where did he get the footage of all the boats at sea? Was this old footage or did he actually go on location and shoot this?

7-up

7 Up was a very interesting documentary. I liked it a lot. This type of documentary is known as a "journey documentary" for it followed the teens through their lives. The up documentaries are really interesting and after watching 7 Up I would have liked to watch the others to see what would have happened to these children. 7 Up seemed to focus on economic status for all the children. In the interviews that are done they are grouped by their school, and that ultimately means they are grouped by their status. As the children grow older they seem to have some of the same beliefs as when they were younger. It appears as if growing up in a certain community can alter a children beliefs and what they are going to achieve in life. With journey documentaries you can see where life takes people, and the different factors that can affect ones life.

San Soleil

San Soleil was a very interesting documentary. At first it was very hard to understand, but now that i think about it the main focus was on memory. It was a woman narrating travels, although it seemed as if she was very disoriented. The story went from Japan, to animals doing very dirty things. It was kind of hard to follow.

A lot of the time the images that were playing in the background did not match the voice over of the woman. It makes you think was this done on purpose, for a specific meaning. Was Marker trying to say that at times our memory of the words that were said do not fit the specific images we associate them with, or rather that we misconstrue memories to match the words we want them to?

Another interesting fact was that Marker used Japan as a main focus. Why would Japan need to be a focus of his documentary? Possibly it is because Japan's culture is so different than that of the Americans, or the French. Japan is not often studied openly and there is little information about the festivals like the ones shown in the documentary.

The narrator in San Soleil is a female. For many documentaries the narrator is a male, with a very strong voice. The female in this film also had a very strong voice, but it was also calming at the same time. It was as if he used this for a reason, to make you really listen and think about the things this woman was saying.

Salesman

Salesman was the first documentary of the direct cinema movement. It followed a group of Bible salesman while they went about their day selling the Bible. As the film went on it focused on one man more than the others, and that was Paul. Paul was the oldest seller, and the film slowed his slow decline as a salesman and his frustration with the process. At the end of the film it is left open what happens with Paul, but it can be inferred that he was going to be fired in the near future. Paul could not get many more sales when he used to be able to get a lot.

The film was interesting because it showed real life people, doing their job. It looked as if the camera rarely interfered with things, but then again how could it not. A man was coming into your house to sell a bible with a camera crew. It was very interesting to see the people in the town open their houses no matter what they were doing. Many of them were in their pajamas and did not look as if they would want to be on film.

The use of direct cinema allowed the Maysles brothers to capture the men as they really were. While they were in between selling bibles you often saw them smoking and drinking, which was odd since they were bible salesman. It opened up your eyes to the things people do when no one is aware of them.