Factual Programming Essay

What is a Documentary? 
A documentary to me is a factual peice of media which is shown to the viewer in diffrent forms, they are all mostly interpreted souly based on reality and factr but can all recreate stories and events by various amounts of  narative, a documentary is a peice of media which intenionally leaves the viewer to feel informed and show them the filmmakers interpretation of many relative things such as everyday life.

Expository Documentary
A expository documentary is a basic retelling of events, subjects or lives. Which is told by the use of voice over, archive footage, Interviews and images. It is strictly informative and descriptive to do the best telling of the story they set out to document. My own example of an expository documentary is 'Amy' a telling of the life of Amy Winehouse, it simply tells a chronological story from start to finish detailing of Amy's rise the in the music industry to her abrupt death in 2011. The story of 'Amy' is told by images, archive footage, live performances and interviews coming from fellow celebrity friends (Pete Doherty, ETC) Family members, producers and friends.


Observational Documentary
An observational documentary is a documentary which attempts to show the viewer a direct representation of how a certain group, person or Business etc operates on a day to day basis, presenting a somewhat 'Slice of life' to the viewer. the format being used mostly involves a focus on just the lives of the people who are being filmed. The filmmaker is not involved what is happening directly in the frame at any time. The documentary that I had picked for this format was Inside London's Hedonistic, Poly-amorous Unicorn Movement,a documentary published by VICE. This strange but factual documentary shows the day to day lives of a group/Party located in London, called the Hedonistic, Poly-amorous Unicorn Movement, this is mostly told from the main perspective of the leader of the Party 'Shaft' The filmmaker is not ever shown in the documentary keeping the focus within the various amounts of people who are being presented, the documentary shows the daily lives of the 'Unicorns' involved in the party depicting the lives of these people. We are shown their lives at home, their social lives, their occupations, relationships  and the way their daily struggles. It mainly focuses on 'shaft' and how his transformation from an alcoholic music video director to a life loving 'unicorn' and how his and his unicorn friends lifestyle lives and breaths..

Interactive Documentary
an interactive documentary is a documentary which the film maker is their to react with the audience he is presenting the documentary by interacting with people or events for example he can be put into an out the ordinary situation, visits a dangerous place or even spends a day with a well known criminal or celebrity. This format of documentary main features are; the filmmaker shows himself in front of the camera the majority of the time, he is usually interviewing various amounts of people and interacting with what is around him and how he reacts is usually how the audience reacts he the eyes of the audience when they are brought into these worlds. The documentary i had chosen for an example of the interactive format was Vice and Noisey production called, Bompton with Kendrick Lamar. The Documentary is about a vice journalist who shows himself getting involved with the various living 'infamous' residents of the bloods side of Compton. The 'bloods' are a gang who are also known as 'The Pirus' their enemies are 'Crips', Bompton is the side of Compton where 'Bloods' are mainly stationed. The documentary features also rapper  Kendrick Lamar who was a resident of Bompton the filmmaker is shown interviewing him and his 'crew' of bloods, what makes this documentary special is that it gives to sides of the gangster lifestyle of Compton, it shows the
 filmmaker interacting with these various amounts of people who all have different stories, lives and ambitions of what this life they have been given growing up in such a place, the filmmaker mainly interacts with the best friend of Kendrick Lamar 'Lil L' the filmmaker shows how like Kendrick,   
Lil L wants to get out of the ghetto and go into a different direction rather than the 'gangster lifestyle' the filmaker is there to react whilist he is presenting this inormation to the audience.

Reflexive Documentry
a reflexive documentary is a documentary which informs the viewer by using a alternative way to how most typical documentaries are made, uses of diffrent camera angles and variations of narrative, sometimes the narrative can vairy from no narration whats so ever or to the filmmaker giving a scripted prologue esc narration. For my example of thus format was human planet, Human Planet is a BBC documentary series based on how human life adapt ts to its surroundings from all over the globe, it is narrated by john hurt. It links to this format because of the narrative of the programme because each episode can focus on a different place, story and narrative each one explains the trials and tribulations of the human race on a different side of the planet varying from Africa to The Antarctic. it is different to other documentarys because of the varitian of scenery and narrative, one moment we will be watching over a young boy struggling to grow crops in Peru to watching African tribes hunt.

Performative Documentary

A performative documentary is a documentary which shows events and situations recreated or shown in their own interpretation of how they felt they had occurred, in these type of documentaries the filmmaker mostly influences how they feel these events occurred because of the way they have interpreted an event, anotehr main feature of this format of documentary is mostly when events are retold in forms like this it creates a 'bigger picture' revealing the ideas he has put onto screen it is not always necessarily fact a lot of the events retold are usually 'subjective' and are retold in a fashion that makes you question what is the truth, but in the end the filmmaker usually reveals what he feels is the best representation of the events of the events taken place. For an example of this format is a documentary called, Cobain: Montage Of Heck; it is based upon the singer Kurt Cobain of the band 'Nirvana' it explores his life and the secrets of his life not revealed until this documentary was released.this documentary is called montage of heck because secret tapes created by Cobain named 'Montage of Heck' this documentary is mainly a telling of the beginning and tragic end to Kurt Cobain's life but it explores parts of his Ofelia that no one had knew because of these tapes and notes shown on the documentary. This links to this format because of the recreation of events through the tapes by animation, there are full on retelling of events in Cobain's life done visually with audio of the 'Montage of Heck' tapes completely told in animation creating the events in the filmmakers own visual interpretation.





Performative Documentary: Montage Of Heck (2015)

The Interactive Documentary: Bompton with Kendrick Lamar (2016)

The Observational Documentary:  Inside London's Hedonistic, Poly-amorous Unicorn Movement. (2015)

Expository Documentary: Amy (2015)

Reflexive Documentary: Human Planet (2011)