At the start of this assignment, I was struggling to think of a location that had undergone an evident physical change. However when I stopped thinking of change as something so black and white and something that can be a personal experience, my ideas began to broaden.

Cemeteries are something that as a child, I was extremely scared of. Whenever my sister and I would drive past one, we would hold our breaths and pray that our mum or dad would drive faster (living about 2 minutes away from a cemetery meant lots of breath holding). The Brighton Cemetery is at the end of my street and it’s become the easiest way to identify where I live to strangers. When co-workers or new friends ask where I live and I’m having trouble explaining, I simply say ‘you know the cemetery on North road? Right near there’, and they immediately understand. Houses surround the cemetery, along with the 64 tram line, and a strip of shops such as the neighbourhood chemist and a BP petrol station. A world of busy suburban life comes right up to the tall red brick fences of Brighton Cemetery. A world I feel completely comfortable in, so why had I been so scared to step through the gates and into the cemetery? For a place I see nearly every day, I couldn’t be more separated from it. However after recently actually going into the cemetery for the first time, my perception of this place that I had lived so close to for 17 years changed in a matter of minutes. Although this place has never physically changed, my experience of the environment did. But why had I been, like so many other people, scared of cemeteries? Of course the obvious answer is that they are full of dead people, which would scare most people. But realistically, they can’t do much to harm you. Is it superstition? Because maybe if you go near a cemetery your body will be taken over by an evil spirit? Or because Hollywood only ever shows cemeterys as these dark, foggy places where zombies awaken? Throughout this documentary I hope to explore this question of why cemeteries have such a bad reputation of being scary, when in reality they can be one of the most calm and peaceful environments.

To answer this question, a majority of the documentary will be focused around a particular member of staff who spends a lot of time at the cemetery and therefore clearly feels comfortable and safe there, unlike most people. Ideally this employee would be in a caretaker type position as I feel they would have the most experience being on the grounds and would be an interesting character to explore due to having such a unique job. As it is very family oriented neighbourhood, it would also be interesting to interview someone who lives directly across from the cemetery, both adults and children. However this could be more difficult to arrange.

Historically, I think the Brighton Cemetery would be an interesting location to explore as it was established in 1854 and has several notable interments such as Sir John Monash, Dame Marie Breen and Arthur Boyd. I feel with such an extensive history, this would definitely be a unique place to try and capture the emotion of.

I would use a hand held camera to walk around the grounds with my interviewee and just allow them to guide the cameraman wherever they want as I feel it would be more beneficial to let the interviewee talk about their experiences and where they happened on the grounds than to box them in one small location with a still camera. However I would use a still camera with a seated interviewee subject in parts of the documentary where I wanted to ask more general questions.

It would be interesting for this documentary to have somewhat comedic elements as the location is so serious and I think having the interviewer featuring on screens at times with the interviewee as well as narrating the documentary can often lead to a funnier style as I’ve seen with Louis Theroux and Chelsea Handler documentaries. However I think this would depend on the personality of the interviewee.