Documentaries 101

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Documentaries 101

Documentaries 101 -- What is a documentary film?

A documentary is a "reality-based" movie.

Documentary film is a broad term to describe a non-fiction movie that, in some way, tries to capture, recreate or "document" reality.

Definition: documentary

adj.

1. Consisting of, concerning, or based on documents.

2. Presenting facts objectively without editorializing or inserting fictional matter, as in a book or film.

n., pl. -ries.

A work, such as a film or television program, presenting political, social, or historical subject matter in a factual and informative manner and often consisting of actual news films or interviews accompanied by narration.

- The American Heritage® Dictionary

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Documentaries are often used to reveal an unusual, interesting or unknown angle.

It is a genre of movie making that uses video & film scenes, photographs and/or sound of real people and real events which when edited together creates a particular story, viewpoint, message or experience.

Documentaries can be funny, poignant, disturbing, ironic, absurd, inspirational, amusing, shocking or any combination.

Traditionally, documentaries are 30-minutes to 2 hours in length (to fit within a television schedule or for theatrical release). However, documentaries are often shorter in length, especially in recent years with the advent of the Internet and web video.

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Why is it film if it’s video?

Documentaries 101

When I first began making documentaries, I wondered why a documentary was sometimes referred to as a film or movie even though documentaries are often shot on video. I asked this of a friend of mine who’s a professor of film at NYU and she explained that a "film" or "movie" is a general term to describe the art form of a "moving picture". Aha! In any case, making a "film" sounds much cooler than making a "video", right?

Check out this wonderful little movie below ("Mankind Is No Island") that was shot entirely on a cell phone.