There’s something mysterious about the word documentary. Often, when people hear it, a little lever is pulled in their brain – the big red one that goes from “on” to “off”. Even an ostensible film fanatic will often start to droop his eyelids at the mention of Errol Morris or Nick Broomfield. The only one to elicit any response is Michael Moore but the man is so hugely divisive that one can’t help but have an opinion, though, hey, at least he re-popularised the form.
This, I have decided, with a Charlie-Brooker-esque gruffness, is an outrage. From whence did this stereotype emerge? Who, what or when is responsible for defaming this intricate, subtle, and varied art? Perhaps it’s television’s fault. We so associate documentary as a televisual form (read: the news) that perhaps it’s no surprise the mode in which we consume television is the same position assumed when people begin discussing documentary: neck loose, torso slouched, seas of flab rolling over a taut belt, legs thrust out at curious angles and a hand creeping subliminally towards the no-no bits.
Viewing someone in this position can only induce upon the observer a kind of vague disgust, and rightly so. By and large we like see fiction as an escape, somewhere we can go and be transported far from the benign movements of our little lives. And yet, how often do people trundle out the mouldy adage: Truth is stranger than fiction! My day-to-day existence has nothing to do with the monogamy of penguins in the Antarctic, or people hurling themselves off the
To be honest, I have just been working on a documentary, so perhaps I feel a little biased. Say the word documentary to a cinema and, mostly, they react like you just libeled their mothers in The Evening Standard. And punters, well, we’ve covered them. It’s time for a change. Groups like the Channel Four British Documentary Foundation (BritDoc) have already begun the revolution. I suppose I could start by making a documentary about it, couldn’t I?
