Documentary Film

DOCUMENTARY FILM: EXPANDED EDITION includes the complete texts of Documentary Film: A Primer and Documentary Film: Contexts and Criticism while also augmenting certain sections: Readings, Model Reviews, Student Reviews, and Topics for Discussion. In a new third part, Backgrounds and Settings, discussions of biography and history will help students of film evaluate works such as Triumph of the Will, Olympia, documentaries on the former Yugoslavia, and on mockumentaries such as Best in Show and exposs such as Pedigree Dogs Exposed. The expanded edition includes a succinct introduction to the nature of the documentary, drawing on examples from the work of Robert Flaherty, Dziga Vertov, Leni Riefenstahl, Woody Allen, Warren Beatty, Spalding Gray, Cindy Sherman, Susan Sontag, Jill Craigie and others. The documentaries discussed cover a range of subjects including the Russian Revolution, the Holocaust, the wars in the former Yugoslavia, and the worlds of fashion and sports. This dialogic text captures some of the actual give-and-take of the classroom and the range of opinion that even the best critics cannot convey. What should emerge from the reading of this book are the different voice (mindsets) through which the films are viewed.