A documentary is a type of genre which fits into the

categories TV or Film. Using pictures, interviews and

archives with people involved in real events helps to

persuade an audience of the argument the film maker is

trying to make. Produced to inform the audience on an

area their audience may not know about creates another

purpose of its creation; to educate. As well as educate, a

documentary has to entertain. This will ensure a growth in

views and will also maintain an audiences attention and

interest.

John Grierson was the first to use the word

"documentary" in relation to a film. Grierson

returned to Britain at the end of the 1920s with

a deeply held conviction that film-making

could be a force for good in society. In 1930

he persuaded the EMB to form a film unit,

headed by himself, to produce

"documentaries".

Codes and Conventions of Documentary's

InterviewsArchival Footage

Technicality of realism

Use of texts/titles

Visual Coding

Voiceover

Exposition

Theorists Vladimir Propp

Russian Critic

Interested in narrative of folk tales

He believes that characters provide a structure for a

specific text

8 different types; Hero, Villian, Father, Princess,

Dispatcher, Donor, Sidekick and false hero.

Todorov

He believed that all films followed the same narrative pattern

There are five stages the narrative can progress through:

1. A state of equilibrium

2. A disruption of that order by an event.

3. A recognition that the disorder has occurred.

4. An attempt to repair the damage of the disruption.

5. A restoration of a new equilibrium

Roland Barthes

French Literacy Theorist

Describes text as a ‘galaxy of signifiers, not a

structure of signifieds’

Said that texts may be ‘opened’ or ‘closed’

Broken down into 5 codes which are woven into any

narrative ; Action code, Enigma code, Semic code,

Symbolic code and Cultural code.