“This week has really centred on locating your own interest and documentary desire. What drives you to do this studio, how do you want to use documentary, what different approaches you might make and what are some potential topics, participants and organisations.” Documentary as Action
An exciting first week of university and more importantly a crucial week to make clear the ambitions and intentions of what we want to achieve in this second semester. I have always had interest in films and motion picture documentaries when I was a kid didn’t seem too entertaining, when I was in VCE studying media for our final project we were allowed to have a strong creative freedom on what our final media assignment would be. Many of my counterparts were choosing short films, magazines, photography projects but I wanted to be different, stand out and do a project that would truly challenge me therefore I was the first student in six years at my school to attempt to make a documentary. A lot of students make films in VCE Media but not many students make documentary. The unique part of making a documentary for the first time was my school despite being very supportive didn’t really know how to help me make a documentary like teaching the exact structures needed in class. Therefore through watching some of my favourite documentaries and ones I hadn’t seen before I tried to get an idea of how to successfully create an emotive documentary whilst also learning plenty of the skills required to make a documentary on the way.
I made a documentary in 2015 and it won the best art piece at our schools annual Art Show which gave me a lot of confidence going forwards with my documentary craft. My Dad volunteers at the Shrine of Remembrance and in 2015 it was the 100th anniversary of the landing at Gallipoli, a huge memorial for the ANZAC past and current servicemen and womens calendar and significant for Australia and New Zealand. Therefore the timing was perfect to create a short 10-minute documentary about 100th anniversary of the spirit of ANZAC. Through people my Dad knew at the Shrine of Remembrance and through my cousin who currently serves for the Australian Army, I managed to gain exclusive access to the opinions and inspirational stories of past and current servicemen and women. The highlight was with Frank Stabback a 93 year old digger who was captured by the Japanese in the Fall of Singapore in 1942 and survived the horrendous conditions building the Thai-Burma Railway. Frank gave an incredible insight into his life, invited me into his home, wept as he told me how thankful he was that someone young wanted to hear his stories as he gave some heartfelt opinions on war and the ANZAC spirit and survival.
The documentary grew me as a person, doing something completely different like this inspired me to take up new challenges try new things but there was something I really loved about documentary. It also helped me at that time in my decision choosing what course I would do at university out of Media and Journalism.
I remember when I was trying to decide in Year 12 whether I would go into journalism or media someone told me the difference between a documentary maker and a reporter. “The reporter is the first person on the grounds after a terrible disaster lets say for instance a flood, they will report back to the world how severe it was and once foreign aid was in the country, the journalists move onto the next big story.” This person prompted me to ask myself what I would do in a situation like this, brought into a flood effected area, hundreds of homes destroyed, loved ones missing, every thing you own…gone, you’re the journalist and you need to interview people in the effected area.
I remember seeing a journalist reporting from tsunami effected area once on the news, this man was on the ground, had lost everything, the journalist had the cheek after he had found out this man had lost his love ones and his possessions he asked the man… how do you feel? It made me cringe I don’t think the man even answered the question, the heartbroken expression on his face painted a thousand words. If I was in the position of the journalist seeing this devastation I wouldn’t want to ask all the hard and sometimes obvious questions, however I would feel compelled to help to do something for these people, get my hands dirty to help these poor effected people. That was moment I knew I couldn’t be a hard news journalist. The person also told me that “when the journalists leave they rarely ever come back to the devastation but documentary makers on the other hand, track the progress made, they will stay there helping, tracing the stories, seeing things change over time and aiming to put something out there that won’t only help their subjects in the short term but also in the long term. Documentary makers will have a vested interest in the place to return and to finish the story months, years, decades down the line.” That really resonated with me.
That sounded like something I would want to pursue, follow a story, truly get to know the subjects, get to know the subject matter well, get to know the places, the cultures, all of the stories, traditions, everything, when you get connected to a story that’s when the true magic begins, although I have some interest in making fiction films I believe if it doesn’t have a powerful message the point of making the film in my opinion is redundant. Clearly I won’t be making Stephan Seagal films anytime soon.
Michael Serpell
