Words can't express the shock

Fox News gives a positive review to Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11. Not only that they call it a "tribute to patriotism". I'm surprised and even more curious to see this movie now.
8:19:07 PM    comment []  trackback []

The future of docs from a past perspective

I found this article that wonders about the future of documentary circa 2000 last night and it made me really wonder about the perceptions that came from the advent of DV cameras to the reality that we face today. It is no coincidence that cheap, easy-to-use, cameras using a format that you can edit on a years-old Macintosh comes out and then a few years later we see a wave of documentaries and essentially see the "hottest" time for documentaries that we've ever seen. Is it the reason why documentaries are so popular? Yes and no. Is it why there are so many of them? Absolutely yes. This year's breakout success of "Super Size Me" was shot entirely on Mini-DV. Hundreds, possibly even thousands of other docs and doc shorts were shot using the format (including all of mine). Looking back to the article- let's seeing what questions we can answer. "Would [Digital] cameras really democratize (sic) film and encourage a new production ethos or simply mean more of the same - but cheaper ?" I think this is the easiest to answer - no and yes. They looked too deep into it, I feel. Did the cameras/format "democratize" film? No. Absolutely not. And I don't think that it ever intended to.

Instead it made it more of a one mind - one vision - one film ideal. We all have a bit of Orson Welles in us. To democratize would mean that we wouldn't see the independent spirit in film - we'd see things that are afraid to go beyond the norm, we'd see things that don't innovate, and we wouldn't see the Michael Moore documentary or the Errol Morris documentary. We wouldn't see the P.T. Anderson film or the Terry Gilliam film. No, democracy gets us muddled visions and compromise - it gets us our government and movies that star "American Idol" singers as actors. The second question in the article deals with distribution. Two consistently unanswered questions drive the independent film business regardless of genre - funding and distribution. The big issue was the web - how do I get distribution on the web, how do I get my movie shown on the web, who can I pay to put my movie on the web, etc. These, too, are incredibly wrong questions. Does the web work for distribution - yes, it does, thousands of people on the web trade copies of movies, ranging from classics to movies that aren't even in theaters yet. This is the web distribution model that works. Low cost, long wait, reward. On the viewer side this is a great deal, on the filmmaker side - questionable (some like it - exposure - some don't like it - infringement issues - and most just don't care.) Even this model of distribution suffers from the same problems as the theatre model - a well funded, high profile movie will attract more attention than an independent film. Not that an indie won't reach it's audience this way - film addicts and art film lovers know the pinch that filmgoing can bring and will find a way to see a film for less as well.

This model, of course, will be rejected. Rejected by the trade organizations, rejected by the copyright holders, rejected by the unions, rejected by the actors, rejected by everyone. That's fair. Nobody gets rich in this model (something that the rejecters fail to see). So we look to the legitimate web distribution model - a postage stamp QuickTime movie that people have to be willing to seek out, find it, suffer through a download, and be forced to watch it at their computer screen. For this to be a completely successful model, there has to be a "pay" step involved. Add this to the mix and this appeals to nobody. Basically put paid web distribution won't work. Steve Jobs put it the best - he was asked, I believe by MacWorld, on convergence technology - the hype about bringing your television and your computer together. He said that Apple wasn't looking into it - that the computer and the television won't have a successful mix because of the way they're used - you get close to your computer screen and interact with it, but you stay far away from your television and only give simple input to it. That while they may be cousins who have their mother's CRT and their fathers built-in speakers, they'll stay apart because personality wise they're completely different. That's a paraphrase of Jobs that I put a lot of commentary into, I wouldn't hold him to any of those phrases. But the idea is the same. I can take a DVD and watch it on my computer or my TV - every time I will choose my TV. I don't think there are many people who won't.

So where is documentary headed - particularly digital documentary? As a whole, they're going up. Documentary is currently having the greatest boom that it's ever had. Docs are popular now; they're controversial. Digital media is partly responsible, in that it's enabling individual visions. That's what's driving the documentary movement; digital cameras are just making them go incredibly fast.
8:16:38 PM    comment []  trackback []