Documentary - A Human View

Documentaries are often led by the individual's personal view on the matters they are making a documentary about. Most film-makers try to be objective, meaning they are only showing the facts as they are and not mediating it influenced by feelings or opinions about the facts. Historical documentaties are very good at this as they try to be impartial. However, as most documentaries are about matters which cause emotional attatchment, many makers are subjective and influenced by their views on the issues.

Sometimes documentarians manipulate the representation of characters to make the audience dislike or like an individual. This can make the viewers side with the film-maker and agree with the point of view. For example, in this scene of Bowling for Columbine the clip is edited to show the shots of Michael Moore getting a weapon when he has filled out the form showing it as a fast and easy process with not a lot of checks when really the footage will have been cut down to emphasise these key points.

There are many ethical concerns for documentaries from whether the material is 'fake' or misleading, to whether it is morally right to represent a subject as seemingly unilliterate or as a bad person and did they have informed consent  for the footage to be used in that way. 


For example, Jade Goody was represented as a racist contestant on Big Brother but this escalated and she was shown as a monster. However, after it was revealed she had cancer, she was shown in a positive way by using clips of her battle with it and all the events she managed.