I would not consider myself to be one who watches a lot of documentary films. Mostly just those that documents my interests such as music or sports. Hence, my knowledge of documentary films are limited to those that are about music. Documentary films such as Montage of Heck 2015, directed by Brett Morgen, Foo Fighters: Back and Forth, 2011, directed by James Moll and Amy, 2015, directed by Asif Kapadia, are just examples of the documentary films that I’ve been exposed to. The film screened this week, Grizzly Man, 2005, directed by Werner Herzog, was definitely an eye opener and left a very strong and lasting impression of the way documentary films on me. My view and interpretation of documentary films have changed after watching that particular film.

Grizzly Man uncovers the story of a man going to live in the Alaskan green forest in the summer to protect and study the bears who roam wild and free. It is almost like a documentary about e documentary, as there were 2 levels of plots in the film, or at least that’s how I look at it. We have the story of Timothy Treadwell, the man who goes out to live with the bears, and we have another story about the bears and how they live in the forest of Alaska. And in many ways, both plots are intertwined together, but in other ways, they are very much individual to their own stories, and Werner Herzog did a very good job in linking both ends together. Another story that might be slightly more subtle than the 2 in the fore would be the relationship and comparison between Herzog himself and Treadwell as well. In the film, both men endeavour to make documentary on a particular subject matter, for Treadwell’s case, it’s about the bears and protecting the wildlife, for Herzog, the death of Treadwell and the life he led. Both of them had certain things in common in terms of making a documentary and as a filmmaker, but of course, both man had their own set of thinking and ideology.

There are so many ways to tell a story, and documentary would be the most straight forward and explicit way, as oppose to maybe a reenactment or a remake of a particular event or biography of a person. The latter may be a little more entertaining, due to the extra headroom for exposing a little more creativity in telling a story. In a documentary however, there should be a certain form as discussed in the reading by Boredwell and Thompson. From my understand, documentaries can be made in 2 forms, the Categorical Form and the Rhetorical Form. Both must have a certain form of factual information of the world. They are assumed to hold some credibility and trustworthy in presenting facts about the particular subject matter. At times, the public or critics may question the truth of facts that are mentioned in a particular documentary film, but that’s for the public and critic to debate with the filmmaker, which in turn may lead to boycott or lower rating to the film.

In general, the concept of documentaries have changed over the years from just a platform where information is transmitted over the big screen to something more dramatized and well constructed in order to maintain and engage the audience’s attention. Gone are the days of documentaries on TV or film where it just shows the subject matter carrying out an activity with a voice over commenting and narrating over the pictures. There is more than meets the eye in terms of thoughts and decision making when it comes to making a documentary film just as much as when it comes to making an action film. And all these decisions are to ensure the greatest experience the filmmakers might promise to the audience in engaging them.

Editing has been always a keen interest of mine since I started studying about media and film production. It is at the filmmaker’s disposal to arrange the shots and when to cut, fade, dissolve or wipe. The possibilities on how to edit a film is endless and it is based on an individual and how he visions the sequence of the film should be. Like what Boredwell and Thompson mentioned in the reading, it can shape the response of the viewer and the decisions can build film form.

The cut is the most common tool when it comes to joining 2 shots to form a sequence. As mentioned by one of the students from class, editing with the cut is almost like the blinking of an eye. It provides some change from a particular shot to another. Sometimes, a scene might have gone on for some time and it might seem a little too unnatural as there are no cuts in between. We as human have to blink our eyes every now and then, and the cut sort of simulates that in editing to keep the audience interested as well as anchored to the film. The cut also creates emphasis on a particular scene.

In the film that was screened this week, Enemy of the State, where it is a typical Hollywood action packed movie, exhibits many a wide variety of editing. We see, as in many action movies, many fast cutting scenes during the chase sequence between the federal agents and the IT man who happened to have gain possession of a video that shows the assassination of the Congressman Hammersley. Obviously during a foot chase, there is a lot of things going on and it all captures at different angles, locations, with different point of view from both the protagonist and antagonist, not to mention medium to close ups shot of the characters running. Therefore, it is only natural to have fast cutting scenes in order to fit all these into one sequence, with the occasional panoramic view of the setting where the foot chase is taking place.

The film also exhibits crosscutting, where it creates 2 different scenes that may or may not be happening concurrently. In this case, during that same foot chase scene, we see our main character, Robert Clayton Dean, (Will Smith) in a lingerie shop buying a gift for his wife. And eventually the 2 scenes meet when the young IT man meets Robert and plants the tape containing the video of the assassination into one of Robert’s shopping bag. This introduces some spatial discontinuity at the beginning, but resolves when both characters meet each other at the lingerie store. This also pre–empts the viewers of the upcoming death of the IT man shortly after he hands over the tape to Robert, and also resolves the foot chase scene with that character dying in a collision with a truck, as he no longer holds any significance to the main narrative of the film. It also, more importantly, puts Robert in the main spotlight and focus to the federal agents and also to the viewers, since he is now in possession of the tape, unknowingly.

Like most mainstream Hollywood action movies, the editor, Chris Lebenzon, for the movie, employs the continuity editing technique to deliver narrative information in a smooth and clear sequence of shots. It gives a moment-by-moment flow of that reveals more and more information to the viewers to unveil the story. It also keeps the viewers engaged and wanting to find out more to see what happens at the end. Will Robert get his life back to how it was? Will Thomas Brian Reynolds (Jon Voight) get away with the murder? All these questions and more, would have been raised while in the midst of watching the film as an audience member.

We also see the use of the 180 degree system throughout the film. The 180 degree system is where the filmmaker creates a space around an “axis of action”. The axis is an imaginary line that connects between 2 subjects. Almost throughout the duration of the movie, when there is a conversation between 2 or more characters, we observe the 180 degree system. It is to prevent the audience from being confused on the position and arrangement of the characters and mise-en-scene. Personally, as technical as it sounds, I thought this system was the logical and self-explanatory. It is to give the viewers a sense of actually being present in the room or venue and watching the subjects engage in a conversation. If a camera were to cross the axis, it would seem as though the we, the viewers, would have suddenly jumped or teleported to the other side of the room and suddenly both our characters have swapped positions. Like with most post-production tools, we want to have it