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A short film by Max Sherman, starring Ben York Jones and Tim Baltz.

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10 minutes by Ahmed Imamovic. 1994. Sarajevo, Bosnia and Rome, Italy. How many different things can happen for only 10 Minutes. The film won the award for the best European short film in 2002.

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"Life's a Bitch" / "Toutes des connes" Comedy. french with english subtitles. Love grief. Shock. Denial. Bubble bath. Mucus. Masturbation. Pop tart. Pigeons. Toothpaste. Hospital. Fuck. Bye. Hair. Chicken. Bootie. Kids. Rejection. Squirrels. Cries. Awkward. 95 scenes. 5 minutes. Life's a bitch.

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use of the steadicam

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Uploaded by My Favourite Films on 2014-04-05.

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shot for Gimme Shelter

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Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Charlie Watts, Mick Taylor and Jim Dickinson are listening to a recording of their Song Wild Horses. Taken from the documentary 'Gimme Shelter' from Charlotte Zwerin, Albert und David Maysles about the Rolling Stones and the Altamont Free Concert in 1969.

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Richard Leacock and Robert Drew

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Richard Leacock and Robert Drew discuss the origins and philosophy of 'Direct Cinema'.

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Look at #8 Tarkovsky - use of the wide shot

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This weekend, " The Raid 2" opens, in all its chop-socky glory, in limited release and will expand in the weeks to come. Continuing on from the original " The Raid," though by all accounts ( ours included) creating fight scenes even more fluid and flabbergasting than its predecessor (which was pretty much all one fight scene), it employs many takes of above-average length to give an extra edge of realism and dynamism to the old ultra-violence. This approach characterized Gareth Evans' shooting style last time out too and still feels like a refreshing counterpoint to the hyper-kinetic Michael Bay school of editing, which often feels like it's hiding as much as it's showing.

But if the use of long takes in action sequences is still a relatively novel phenomenon, the cinematic history of the extended take in general is much longer and we thought we'd take this opportunity to choose our favorites. This turned out to be a timely endeavor, because as you may know, recently a debate has kicked off in the (God forgive me) blogosphere about whether or not critics and film commentators should talk and write more about the form and craftsmanship aspects of filmmaking than they (we) currently do.

Sparked off by a well-written, interesting and articulate Films... are made by filmmakers. Write about the filmmaking" we'd have to counter with "yes, but films are made post by Matt Zoller Seitz over on RogerEbert.com with which we disagree so violently we may have dislocated something, the debate actually has some bearing on this feature: it is, after all, about a group of films that are sharing column space based on formal rather than thematic or narrative similarity. And yet, for us, that's exactly the paradox that hovers round the fringe of this list: contrary to the kind of analysis after which Seitz seems to hanker (echoing Andrew Sarris, among others), our own impulses are always toward the description of the effect of a particular technique on one's understanding of the story or mood, rather than on the technique itself. So where Seitz states " for viewers. Write for the viewer." How much do any of us, as viewers, want to know how the sausage is made, and how much do we just want to know, in the most literate and insightful way possible, that it's going to taste delicious?

Yes, we digress, but this was all on our minds when we assembled our list of long takes, because as much as we dislike the fetishization of form over content, in that debate, the long take may well be ground zero, as it's one instance of formal experimentation that is often so ostentatious that even the casual viewer, or the most determinedly story-oriented critic, can and does pick up on it. Those cases may make for impressive moments, but ultimately, they can also break a film's spell and so, while we've of necessity included a few, mostly we're heavily weighing our picks toward extended takes that have a definite narrative purpose outside of "look at me! I haven't used a cut in minutes!" Why? Because even here, in a feature about a formal convention, we'd rather talk about story than style. We're incorrigible.

20. " Panic Room" ( Fincher, 2002) DP: Darius Khondji, Conrad Hall
So let's start by totally breaking the augment-the-storytelling rule with this almost insultingly show-offy, CG establishing shot floats impossibly through banisters, coffee pot handles, into and out of keyholes and then through the ceiling. The technical virtuosity here is inarguable, and warranted it a spot on this list alone, but we'd argue it's also an example of putting form before content to a detrimental degree. The house feels porous, the geography malleable, when it should be confining and contained, and the claustrophobia of the premise is undercut by the sense, established early, that there is someone else already in the house-the inquisitive, omnipotent camera.

19. " Werckmeister Harmonies" (2000) Director: Bela Tarr DP: Patrick de Ranter

There are some directors for whom long takes are not so much a tool in their arsenal as a way of life, and not-for-everyone Hungarian maestro Bela Tarr can definitely be counted among those. Indeed the 145-min Harmonies' is a series of just 39 languid shots (the average film has 5000-ish cuts), but this particular scene does stand out for its complex staging and for its creepy absence of dialogue as the invading thugs lay waste to a hospital with almost lobotomized violence. And then the weird reverie culminates in an oddly beautiful tableau as they come across an old man, naked as a martyr, and shame, one of the themes of the film, overcomes them.

Another instance of a long take that is rather self-conscious in its placement in the middle of film that otherwise doesn't employ this same style, this epic shot from "Atonement" may be atypical, but the complexity of its choreography alone, as well as its ambition (to capture the chaos and hope and tragedy of Dunkirk) can't be faulted. But there's also something artificial about it, almost theatrical (though the stage is vast) that gives it a heightened, hyperreal feeling-every moment is so packed with incident and detail that, like a couple of other instances on this list, it's a shot that could almost stand alone outside of the film which it ostensibly serves.

With "The Raid" movies and the films of Tony Jaa, among others, gaining recognition for their graceful, often long-take approach to action, we should remember that there was a time when the word "balletic" was reserved as a descriptor for action scenes from the original ballet master, John Woo. "Hard Boiled," his last Hong Kong film before decamping to Hollywood (to diminishing returns, we'd say), is one of his best not only gifting us that iconic image of Chow Yun-Fat with a baby in one arm and a shotgun in the other, but also this bravura 2m40s shootout (which includes a 20 sec elevator conversation during which the crew reset the entire set).

16. " The Earrings of Madame de..." (1953) Director: Max Ophüls DP: Christian Matras

An avowed influence on Kubrick and Paul Thomas Anderson, and pretty much any other filmmaker who's ever moved their camera, Ophüls' more famous, and longer, long take is the opening to " La Ronde," but this one just feels more special to us. Here, combining movement with mise-en-scene and framing, the shot serves the story absolutely by introducing a character and a milieu so succinctly. But then, this whole list could be dedicated to Ophuls, whose style even caused James Mason to write a poem:

A shot that does not call for tracks

Is agony for poor old Max,

Who, separated from his dolly,

Is wrapped in deepest melancholy.

Once, when they took away his crane,

I thought he'd never smile again.

This early example from Kubrick is not his longest shot nor his most complex, but it does brilliantly illustrate how longer takes can be used to bolster storytelling, rather than remove you from it. The camera glides effortlessly as the general, oozing condescension, delivers his "morale-boosting" words to grateful, doomed troops, until we butt-edit up against a close up of the shellshocked, silent man who is not reading from the same script, and the hypocrisy is abruptly laid bare. (Course, we could easily have included the opening from " A Clockwork Orange" or the shots following Danny on his tricycle in " The Shining" or any of several sedate takes in ' 2001' etc.)

Another prime example of a long take (it clocks in at 5 mins) that is totally justified on a story level, this is an absolutely bravura sequence from the terrifically entertaining 2009 Best Foreign Film Oscar winner. Established by a wide "helicopter" shot of a packed football stadium, we fly in to close up on our heroes in the stands, swim in and out of the crowd as they embark on their impossible search, before it morphs into an extended chase during which the subject is found, then lost, then found again, before ending up in a panting heap on the middle of the football pitch, mid-game. Completely breathless, exciting filmmaking that is so immersive you lose yourself within it.

Throw a dart at a de Palma movie and chances are you'll end up in the middle of a long take-the director's filmography is lousy with them, and the occasionally dubious quality of the surrounding films (naw, we love him really, here's our retrospective) means that sometimes not for the best of reasons, they do stand out. And there's none that exemplifies that paradox (interesting shot; subpar movie) more than this 12-minute sequence from terminally silly Nic Cage thriller " Snake Eyes," (which, yes, has concealed cuts hidden in whip pans and what not, but the effect is still pretty seamless). Except maybe the beginning of " Bonfire of the Vanities" but we drank to forget that film.

12. " The Protector" (aka " Warrior King" aka " Tom Yum Goong") (2005) Director: Prachya Pinkaew DP: Nattawut Kittikhun

"Where's my ELEPHANT?" may still be our favorite recurring line of dialogue from any martial arts movie ever, but no list of this sort could fail to take note of the amazing staircase fight from this Tony Jaa movie. Playing out like a brightly lit, more humorous version of the original " The Raid" in miniature, in just under four minutes Jaa works his way up multiple flights of stairs dispatching anyone he meets in unmistakably non-stunt-double form. The vast landings and prevalence of bamboo dividers through which people can be thrown is obviously stagy, but when the results are this much fun, who cares?

11. "" (2013) Director: Alfonso Cuarón DP: Emmanuel Lubezki

The most recent entry on our list is also one of the longest: the 17-minute long sequence that starts the multi-Oscar-winner in such unforgettable style. With directors often employing longer takes as beginning or end shots (the rhythm of the film being less disturbed that way) this may go down as one of the most brilliant "establishing shot"s ever: I mean, how does one evoke a sense of geography where there is no geography? Lulling us into a sense of weightless safety before terrifyingly shattering that comfort, this stunning shot's length has only one drawback: humans can't actually go 17 minutes without breathing. The last 3m20s of that sequence is below:

There's no list on earth that could do justice to Tarkovsky's shotmaking (look at the burning barn in " Mirror" or the dream sequence in " Stalker" or the hypnotic driving scene in " Solaris" or all of " Andrei Rublev" etc etc). So we're going to go with this scene from the Bergman-indebted (shot in Gotland by Bergman collaborator Nyqvist) "The Sacrifice," Tarkovsky's last film. This 6 min shot is actually his second longest (the first is at the beginning of this film), but famously required the rebuilding of the house after the camera stalled. We're still not sure we understand how he manages to imbue what could be ridiculous, Benny-Hill-esque long-shot running-about with such tragic, aching mood, but then we could spend our lives trying to decipher Tarkovsky's skill. And probably will.

As clearly pointed out in this video deconstructing PTA's steadicam use, there's no film of his within which we couldn't find an example of the long tracking shot. But we're plumping for "Magnolia," even over the two spectacular "Boogie Nights" examples because as terrific as they (and the lesser-known one from " Hard Eight") are, they feel quite indebted to their influences, Scorsese in particular, and it's really "Magnolia" that feels like it's doing completely its own thing. The fluidity of this inquisitive, restless shot establishes character and location yes, but mostly acts an encapsulation of a film that's all about labyrinthine relationships between people struggling to connect, but only ever passing by.

The literal ticking time bomb of Welles' opener to his Charlton Heston-starrer is as good a reason as anyone's ever discovered for an extended take, with added epic feel coming from the wild variance in scale from the close up of the bomb to the high angle crane shot that picks up Heston, then loses him then picks him up as his path interweaves with that of the doomed car. It's an insanely complex shot that of course Welles makes look as effortless as falling off a log, though a sight more graceful, before it culminates in a kiss that is also an explosion. It's an amazing, peerless symbiosis of form and content.

One of a series of perfectly self-contained moments that characterize Godard's experimental black comedy thingummajig (in fact we'd suggest that the film is more comprehensible, and certainly more watchable if viewed as a collection of vignettes rather than a coherent feature, which it ain't and don't want to be), the 7-minute long traffic jam is probably the director's most famous shot. Not especially complex in terms of camerawork (it is just one long sideways track) nonetheless as it follows the line of cars we get these terrific little voyeuristic glimpses of the lives of the occupants, sometimes comical, sometimes odd, and it's all very Tati-esque and charming. Until the bodies and the tire tracks through the blood.

And from one classic lateral track to a more modern version-Park's awesomely violent original "Oldboy" just oozes style all over, but this corridor fight really felt like something we'd never seen before. Again, complex in its choreography and set design (and amazing lighting technique to make things comprehensible but also chiaruscuro-beautiful, like a Caravaggio) rather than its simple side-to-side camera movement, it's 2m 40s-ish of sheer badassery that will forever remain simply one of the coolest things we'd ever seen in a cinema.

Without a doubt one of the most beautiful films ever shot, it's astounding that "I Am Cuba" was so long neglected, following the negative reaction to its initial release in the Soviet Union and Cuba. It took valiant efforts of film conservationists such as Martin Scorsese to get it restored to its former glory, which is characterized by several mesmerizing long takes, notably one that ends up underwater in a hotel pool. But we're choosing to showcase this shot, which one would have thought impossible with the technology of the time, in which a protest march turns into a funeral procession and we follow in and out of buildings, high above the streets.

Featuring Welles's " Touch of Evil" lower on this list than the Altman-directed long take that literally references it may seem a bit sacrilegious, but hey, we're iconoclasts. And also, this shot is just an absolute blast, a witty inside-baseball look at the workings of a film studio in a film about filmmaking in which everyone works in the film industry and everyone only talks about films. It's a little like Playlist Towers in that regard, only everyone's better looking and it's sunny. While the meta, look at me! nature of extremely long takes is sometimes an issue, this one is in service of an extremely meta film, so it gets a joyous pass.

Many of these shots contain a "how did they do that?" element, which is often part of the problem, as regards something that distracts you from the story. But we'll suggest that that distraction is part of the reason the penultimate shot of Antonioni's enigmatic identity-swap drama works as well as it does. As the camera first follows Jack Nicholson around the hotel room, then ventures out through the bars to the courtyard outside, the discomfort of the "impossible" move is part of what is puzzling about the sequence and it sets up an uncanny sense of "things happening beyond our ken" which is perfect reflection of watching the business of the courtyard while an offscreen death is occurring. Still amazing, still unknowable.

2. "Goodfellas" (1990) Director: Martin Scorsese DP: Michael Ballhaus

Well. We could write a novel about this shot, and about all it represents and everything it has influenced since, but really it's simply an example of as close to perfect a long-take shot as has ever existed in film. It tells us so much about the characters, and their relationship, it establishes so much of a world and a mood, and it does all that so stylishly and with such fluidity and dynamism that it should surely feel a million times rehearsed. And yet the real genius of this shot (and why it rides so high on this list, when " Raging Bull" has terrific examples too, as has late entry "T he Wolf of Wall Street") is that it feels natural-the complexity of the shot never, ever, detracts from its vitality. Compared to other, impressive but more stately long takes (some of which we've shouted out here), this is a peerless example of virtuoso filmmaking whose technical virtuosity feels like the last thing on its mind.

And here we are, breaking our one-entry-per-director guideline, not for Tarkovsky or Kubrick or PTA or Scorsese, but for Best Director Oscar winner Alfonso Cuarón. But there's no getting away from the flat-out amazingness of this scene, which famously required days to shoot, whole new rigs to be built and which at one point Cuarón was convinced they hadn't got because of blood splatter on the camera lens. But as much as the technical heights it scales cannot be underestimated (" Gravity" after all, was hugely complex but somehow more controllable than this shot with all its variables of vehicles, characters, performance, timing etc), most impressive to us is the fact that this scene is one which, the first or second time out, we didn't even register as a one-take wonder. So wrapped up were we in the story that the craft only ever worked on us in a completely subconscious manner (as opposed, for example, to the other fantastic, emotional long shot of Clive Owen walking through the ruined hospital with the baby, whose length and grace we actively noticed). This long take, that breaks so many long take "rules" (like how the truly shocking moment happens not at the end but in the middle) is for us simply the supreme example of masterful, accomplished filmmaking being put in service of sky-high dramatic stakes.

Notable by their absence are a few no-brainer films that we excluded because they almost feel like they have a different agenda. So " Russian Ark" which is of course all one take, Hitchcock's " Rope," which is stitched together to give the impression of takes even longer than they actually were, Mike Figgis' " Timecode," with its real-time split-screen long takes and Michael Snow's " Wavelength " which is an experiment in long takes, do not appear but are all instructive for devotees of this sort of thing.

And there are some that just missed the cut: the introduction of the ship and its inhabitants in Joss Whedon's " Serenity" is a terrific example of establishing geography and character with wit and economy; Tarantino's voyage around the teahouse in " Kill Bill Vol 1" is a fun ride; Gus Van Sant's " Elephant" and " Last Days" both contain several very long takes (some might say tryingly so); as does Robert Siodmak's " The Killers." Hitchcock examples from " Frenzy" and " Young and Innocent," the first-person intro of Kathryn Bigelow's " Strange Days" and the initial, journey-through-the-galaxy intro to " Contact" were all also considered, while long takes that are more static, such as those that characterize the work of Michael Haneke or Steve McQueen's along with very long takes that are more about dialogue or monologues than action or camera hi jinks, such as in Linklater's " Before" trilogy or one-man-shows like " Bronson " we're also saving for another day.

But let us know the favorite one of yours that we missed, or how you feel about striking the balance between form and content in film criticism, below.

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Ranking The 20 Greatest, Most Celebrated Long Takes

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This weekend, " The Raid 2" opens, in all its chop-socky glory, in limited release and will expand in the weeks to come. Continuing on from the original " The Raid," though by all accounts ( ours included) creating fight scenes even more fluid and flabbergasting than its predecessor (which was pretty much all one fight scene), it employs many takes of above-average length to give an extra edge of realism and dynamism to the old ultra-violence.

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Inside /Outside the Frame

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Framing and the One Take

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An article that explains the evolution of this term

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What Mise-en-scène Is and Why It Matters

1. What Is Mise-en-scène?
Any student of the cinema quickly encounters the term mise-en-scène, and often comes away the worse
for the wear. The word-or is it words?-is long and funny-looking (to those who
don't speak French). Making matters worse, the term isn't always spelled the
same way: sometimes there's an accent, sometimes there aren't any hyphens, and sometimes
it's written in roman type, not italics.

The term's meaning is similarly complex, having shifted many
times over the years since its creation; it has also gotten bound up in several
different arguments, many of which we no longer inhabit directly. In this
article, I aim to survey that evolution, paying special attention to how it has
become associated with only particular types of filmmaking-the cinema of the
long take. Finally, I'll argue against that tendency, and attempt to
demonstrate the relevance of mise-en-scène
to the short take.

First things first. Mise-en-scène
was applied to film in the 1950s by the French critics writing at Cahiers du Cinéma ( Notebooks on Cinema). They borrowed it from French theater, where
it essentially referred to everything that appears on the stage (it literally
means "putting in the scene"). The thinking was that a film's mise-en-scène consisted of everything
that the camera sees: the setting, the lighting, the actors, their performances
(including blocking), costumes, makeup, props. It also referred to how those
elements were arranged within the frame-in other words, it was synonymous with
the shot's composition.

A few problems sprang up immediately. The first was that the
Cahiers critics never defined their
term all that precisely. Alexandre Astruc famously called mise-en-scène "a song, a rhythm, a dance" (267); in a 1998 interview,
Astruc's Cahiers colleague Jacques
Rivette claimed, "Here's a good definition of mise en scène-it's what's lacking in the films of Joseph L.
Mankiewicz" (Bonnaud). I thought at the time that Rivette was simply being
cheeky, but there's a way in which he's also deadly serious: he means that All About Eve, despite literally having
lighting and staging and props and settings, etc., nonetheless somehow lacks a
certain special quality, which is mise-en-scène.
Delving into the Cahiers writing of
the 1950s makes it apparent that there was, right from the start, a tendency to
define the concept loosely, poetically-which is what led critic Brian Henderson
to later call the term "undefined" (315).

The second problem occurs when you consider how people who
make films see different things than those who view films. When you watch a
play, the stage is in front of you, and it's clear what's on it and what isn't.
But films differ from theater in two key aspects. One, the camera frames the
image. Two, cinema includes cuts (edits).

Let's say you're making a film, shooting a scene on a busy
street. The camera sees only so much of that street, but you, being there, can
see the whole thing (and the actors can see the whole thing, which presumably
influences their performances). Where does the mise-en-scène begin and where does it end? What's more, a lot of
what you shoot won't end up in the film-parts of takes, and perhaps even whole
takes (what we today call "deleted scenes"), will end up on the cutting room
floor, or in some separate portion of a hard drive. What happens to the mise-en-scène of those images?

This is why mise-en-scène
isn't really a production term- as Astruc had already noted by 1959, it's not
something that filmmakers talk about when they're shooting (267). Instead, it's
a critic's term, referring to the content of shots that appear in the finished
film. And since it refers to the content of the shot, then it also must refer
to camera movements, since panning and tracking changes the shot's content.
(The famous long take in Goodfellas
that follows Henry Hill and his date as they enter the Copacabana via the
kitchen features more than one setting, as well as numerous actors, props,
costumes, and so on.)

So mise-en-scène
refers to the entirety of any given shot: the stuff that was filmed, as well as
how it is framed (and how that changes). And in many places, the term has more
or less survived into the present day in this form. For instance, here's how Ed
Sikov's Film Studies: An Introduction
(2010) defines it:

"Everything-literally everything-in the
filmed image is described by the term mise-en-scene:
it's the expressive totality of what you see in a single film image.
Mise-en-scene consists of all the
elements placed in front of the camera to be photographed: settings, props,
lighting, costumes, makeup, and figure behavior (meaning actors, their
gestures, and their facial expressions). In addition, mise-en-scene includes the camera's actions and angles and the
cinematography, which simply means photography for motion pictures. Since everything in the filmed image comes
under the heading of mise-en-scene, the term's definition is a mouthful, so a
shorter definition is this: Mise-en-scene
is the totality of expressive content within the image." (5-6, italics in
the original)

But when one stops to think about this concept, one sees how
even this is problematic. For one thing, how is mise-en-scène any different from the term "shot"? Or "composition"?
Obviously, we're not dealing with the actual things in the shot-the actual
setting, the actual props-but a two-dimensional record of them, frozen in a
particular arrangements. What's more, if every shot is essentially its mise-en-scène, and a film is made up entirely
of shots, then isn't mise-en-scène in
fact synonymous with the entire film? Which is to say, isn't mise-en-scène synonymous with cinema
itself?
2. Mise-en-scène and the Long Take
Some critics noted straight away that the one thing that mise-en-scène didn't refer to was editing. As such, they started using mise-en-scène and editing as antonyms.
Here it will help to know that, for the Cahiers
critics, editing was a hotly contested topic. Simply put, certain film theorists
who had gone before them-namely Lev Kuleshov and Sergei Eisenstein-had
emphasized the importance of editing, or montage. To them, the artistry of
cinema lay very much in how a film was assembled from disparate shots. This was
due to their noticing early on how editing could be used to create wholly
artificial relationships between shots. For instance, you could shoot a person
looking up at something on one side of town, then go to the other side of town
and shoot an image of a sign. When you edited them together, the resulting film
gave the impression that the person was looking at the sign, even though that look
was impossible in real life. Similarly, you could film a person walking into a
building in one locale, then film a different interior. And so on.

There proved to be no end to the artificial relationships
that you could create between shots. We partly understand this phenomenon today
as the Kuleshov Effect. If you take a picture of a man's face, and follow it
with a shot of a bowl of soup, it creates the impression that he's hungry. But
if you follow it with a shot of a woman reclining on a divan, it makes it look
like he's ogling her. (See this entire
clip for a humorous description by Alfred Hitchcock of how editing changes
the way viewers interpret shots.)

To put things very crudely, the critics at Cahiers du Cinéma began questioning the
importance of montage. They were led here by André Bazin, whose background was
in documentaries and Italian Neorealism. As such, he was less interested in how
cinema could artificially warp reality, and more interested in how it could be
used realistically. Accordingly, he devised an argument of cinematic realism in
which he proposed that the history of cinema was one of an increasing capacity
for realism. The way he saw it, improvements in film technology allowed
filmmakers to more faithfully capture reality. Improved film stocks (including
the development of color) allowed for higher resolution images. Sound cinema replaced
silent cinema. Widescreen formats allowed for larger compositions. Cameras got
smaller, enabling filmmakers to leave studios and shoot on real locations. Lenses
improved, allowing for deeper focus shots. And takes could also get longer and
longer, being less limited by the capacities of earlier reels.

Given this, Bazin and his protégés deemphasized the artistic
importance of the cut. They argued it had less to do with the "expressive
content" of cinema than the content or composition of the shot itself. So it's
no wonder that they invented and emphasized the concept of mise-en-scène. And it's because of this period in film criticism that
the term came to mean something opposed to editing. People began speaking of
two different approaches to filmmaking: editing (or montage) vs. mise-en-scène (which got tied up with other
devices that Bazin favored-long takes and deep focus). According to this line of
thinking, a director necessarily favored one approach over the other. The art
of cinema was either one of cutting or of long takes.

Critics, too, often fell into one camp or the other. Those
who supported montage noted how editing allowed for the manipulation of reality,
and the creation of effects that were impossible in real life. Such arguments,
of course, became the very grounds for dismissal from the long takes / mise-en-scène camp. To them, filmic
artistry depended not on artifice, but on the faithful imitation of reality. According
to this line of thinking, since we experience time and space continuously, a
superior cinema-a primarily realist cinema-should by definition avoid cutting. Returning
to our earlier example from Goodfellas: when we follow Henry Hill
from his car through the kitchen and to a table in front of the stage at the
Copacabana, we see how all those spaces are connected; we aren't just cutting
from an exterior shot to an interior shot on a back lot or on a soundstage.

If these arguments sound quaint, then I hasten to stress
that I am indeed oversimplifying them here in order to highlight a very
particular historical debate. It's also worth mentioning that Bazin died quite
young, at the age of 40 in 1958, and as such had no control over the ways in
which his arguments were later transformed by some into clichés. There are of
course complexities and subtleties to this long history of criticism that a general
survey necessarily omits. It's is also indisputable that modern film studies is
largely based on the work of Bazin and the Cahiers
critics. Without their contributions, we critics of today would be
significantly impoverished. (We might not even be here!)

That having been said, there is a historical tendency to
oppose mise-en-scène to montage-an
entrenchment that lives on today in various forms. It's hardly unusual to hear film
buffs claim that long takes are somehow inherently superior to shorter ones.
For instance, cinephiles often celebrate movies like Goodfellas and Russian Ark
and Children of Men and Gravity simply because they feature
long, complicated shots; meanwhile, people dismiss Michael Bay's Transformers films, or movies like Quantum of Solace, because they feature way
too much cutting. These arguments are heir to the debate between Bazinian mise-en-scène and Eisensteinian montage.
Meanwhile, plenty of critics continue to equate mise-en-scène with long takes-see, for example, the opening line of
Ben Sachs's recent Chicago Reader review
of Gareth Edwards'sGodzilla, as
well as this
AV Club article by Mike D'Angelo, which directly engages the debate between
editing and long takes (and does so by opposing mise-en-scène to montage). And the Wikipedia article
onmise-en-scène, while garbled
as a whole (and of course always prone to sudden revision), contains some
language equating mise-en-scène with
long takes.

(Actually, the Wikipedia article is even more restrictive in
its usage, equating mise-en-scène only
with something called "oners," or scenes that are filmed in single takes, and
that also feature mobile camerawork. This is so selective an association that
it renders the term practically useless. It's also fairly nonsensical. This
particular line was added
by a now defunct Wikipedia contributor, "StephanDuVal," who popped into the
conversation for twenty minutes two years ago, then disappeared. Since then,
various users have randomly appended sources that themselves don't employ the
term, resulting in the kind of hodgepodge so typical of the Wikipedia. Instead
of defining the term objectively, the article stakes out a peculiarly small
tradition. A term that was once seemingly synonymous with all of cinema is
there reduced to the point where it refers only to a miniscule number of shots
in a miniscule number of films! Not even the most fervent devotees of Bazin
ever restricted the usage of mise-en-scène
to scenes that were executed in single, mobile takes.)

3. Mise-en-scène and Its DiscontentsKeeping this convoluted history in mind, I want to examine
now at what is overlooked by the historical tendency to associate mise-en-scène with the long take, and to
oppose it to editing. Because I believe that these traditional oppositions and associations
limit our understanding of the richness and artistry of the cinema.

For starters, let's look more closely at Bazin's argument
that the long take is better than the short one for representing reality. A
commonly heard argument here (one still hears it today) is that whenever a filmmaker
cuts, he or she is guiding the viewer's attention, and forcing them to look at
particular things in particular ways. By way of contrast, Bazin argued that
long takes allowed viewers more freedom-they could look where they wanted. This
contributed to the idea that long takes are somehow more respectful of film viewers,
and as such require more sophisticated viewers. Over time, this created the
kneejerk association that long takes are somehow smarter than shorter ones (an
idea that lives on in the attacks on Michael Bay).

But is this argument necessarily true? There are many
reasons to doubt it. For one thing, all shots, long and short, are equally
artificial. It simply isn't the case that as a shot gets longer, it somehow gets
truer. To think that way overlooks the artifice of the long take.

For instance, Bazin's arguments about how long takes were more
respectful or less manipulative than shorter ones don't always hold up to
scrutiny. As it turns out, there is nothing stopping long takes from being just
as composed and manipulative as shorter ones. Directors have many tools at
their disposal to direct the viewer's attention through the long take, just
like they do in shorter ones. Composition can be, and often is, a means for directing
attention. So, too, are performances and camera movements. In other words, there's
no reason to assume that mise-en-scène
is any less "manipulative" than editing.

This point is well made by David Bordwell in his article "Widescreen
Aesthetics and Mise-en-Scène Criticism" (1985, available
here as a PDF). In particular, Bordwell observes how Otto Preminger's use
of widescreen was celebrated by certain critics operating in the Bazinian
tradition. He relates how two critics writing in the Bazinian tradition, V.F.
Perkins and Charles Barr, praised a scene in (1954) in which Marilyn Monroe's character, Kay, drops her
valise while boarding a raft. As the scene continues, we see the valise drifting
away in the background of other shots. The argument here is that Preminger has
left it up to the viewer to see this detail, even as the action continues in
the foreground. Both Perkins and Barr celebrated Preminger's employment of long
takes and deep focus, arguing that they gave his films a kind of naturalism,
transparency, and subtlety.

But Bordwell argues that this isn't the case at all. In his
analysis, he notes how the film actually employs several devices that function
to draw attention to the disappearing valise:

"When Kay drops the valise she glances
frantically toward it and cries out, 'My things!' Harry shouts, 'Let it go!' At
the same moment, the camera pans sharply to the right to reframe the valise,
and a chord sounds on the musical track. Our attention to the drifting bundle
is just as motivated. For one thing, the bundle is initially centered when Matt
and Henry pass. Furthermore, Preminger has anticipated this camera position a
few shots earlier, when matt ran to the edge of the bank. It is common for a
classical film to establish a locale in a neutral way and then return to this
already-seen camera setup when we are to notice a fresh element in the space.
We thus identify the new information as significant against a background of
familiarity. As a fresh element in a locale we have already seen from a
comparable vantage point, the bundle becomes noteworthy. In sum, Preminger's
staging of the scene stands out because it avoids editing, but it uses other
means to draw our attention to the bundle-centering, the return to a familiar
setup, and the repetition of cues for the bundle's loss." (22-3).

So much, then for Preminger's supposed naturalism and transparency.
His long takes and use of deep focus-hallmarks of Bazinian realism, and supposedly
free of manipulation-turn out to be saturated with artifice, and highly
manipulative. (Preminger is hardly the only example one can find of this- Citizen Kane, for instance, also uses
composition and sound cues to focus its viewers' attention, in addition to its celebrated
usage of long takes and deep focus.)

Another problem with the critical tendency to oppose long
takes and editing is that it ignores the many ways that those two techniques commonly
work together. This point is well made by Brian Henderson in his 1976 essay "The
Long Take," which seeks to deconstruct the false binary between Bazin's long
take and Eisenstein's montage. For one thing, Henderson points out that long
takes still have duration, beginnings and endings, and as such still employ
editing-they're edited together. What's more, even a director like Max Ophuls-truly
a master of the long take if there ever was one-rarely assembled his films out
of nothing but long takes. Thus, a film with many long takes may also feature
shorter ones, and those shorter takes may in fact come between long takes:

"The present article takes its chief
emphasis from the fact that the long take rarely appears in its pure state (as
a sequence filmed in one shot), but almost always in combination with some form
of editing. [...] Most analyses of long take directors and styles concentrate on
the long take itself and ignore the mode of cutting unique to it-what we call
below the intra-sequence cut. But such cuts or cutting patterns (one could even
speak of cutting styles) are as essential to the long take sequence as the long
take itself." (316)

Throughout the essay, Henderson patiently draws attention to
these problems in order to ultimately argue that a film criticism that simply opposes
long takes and editing is bound to overlook the crucial role that editing plays
in defining the long take, and sequences of long takes. His goal is to point
out an area of filmmaking that has largely gone unstudied. Sadly, the tendency
to diametrically oppose mise-en-scène
with cutting prevails nearly forty years later, leaving a fascinating realm of
cinema still largely unstudied. At the present moment in popular film
criticism, the championing of long takes has once again risen to something of a
fetish. It receives a disparate amount of attention despite the fact that the long
take is but one element of filmmaking, no better or worse than any other.

A related problem is the tendency to measure the length of a
film's takes by calculating the Average Shot Length, or ASL. This value is
calculated by dividing a film's running time by the number of shots it
contains. And ASL is a very useful value in many respects. For one thing, when
one surveys many different films, ASL can give a general sense of how rapidly
films are cut in a given place or time. Thus, one can say that the average rate
of cutting in Hollywood cinema has increased throughout the sound era. Or, one
can attempt to catalog which contemporary Hollywood films feature the longest
ASL's- as
I did here, in an earlier article for PressPlay.

But ASL also leaves out a lot of information, especially
when one is analyzing specific films. Alfonso Cuarón's ,
for instance, has an ASL of roughly 35, since it features 156 shots in 90
minutes. (I'm speaking approximately here; I'm going off reported numbers, and
haven't performed this analysis myself. Also, I don't know the actual runtime
of the film, sans credits. The exact ASL, however, is beside the point.) Having
in hand an ASL of 35 doesn't mean that every shot in Gravity is 35 seconds long-or indeed that any shot in Gravity is 35 seconds long. The opening
shot, for instance, is at least twelve minutes long-meaning that, on average,
the remaining 155 shots have an ASL of 30 seconds. And for every shot longer
than that, there means there are also shots shorter than that. What of them?
Are they any good? What is their relationship to the longer shots in the film?
Or is Gravity only good during its
long shots? (And if that's the case, then why?)

The fetishizing of long takes is part of a larger,
long-running problem in film criticism, which as a whole is arguably less
critical than it pretends to be. As David Bordwell has expressed it:

"Instead of asking how films work or
how spectators understand films, many scholars prefer to offer interpretive
commentary on films. Even what's called film theory is largely a mixture of
received doctrines, highly selective evidence, and more or less free
association. Which is to say that many humanists treat doing film theory as a
sort of abstract version of doing film criticism. They don't embrace the
practices of rational inquiry, which includes assessing a wide body of
evidence, seeking out counterexamples, and showing how a line of argument is
more adequate than its rivals." (" Articles ")

Put another way, the fascination with the long take risks
becoming entirely symptomatic, and uncritical. What makes a movie good? Long
takes! How do you know which movies are the best? Why, just check which ones
feature the longest takes! This is a totally dumbed-down type of film
criticism, where all we need do is calculate ASL's in order to rank all the
movies ever made.

I don't want to imply that long takes aren't important, or
don't feature a special relationship with mise-en-scène.
Certainly we should be sensitive to the unique challenges and properties posed
by the long take, and how it presents its content to the viewer. No film better
illustrates this than Aleksandr Sokurov's featureRussian Ark
(2002), whose 96 minutes of footage consist of a single take. I myself watched
the film twice in a row in the theater, something I've rarely done-but Russian Ark is truly an atypical film.

However, is Russian
Ark somehow more realistic than films that feature editing? Hardly. It's worth
remembering, a la Henderson, that the 96-minute-long shot, and the film itself,
still has a beginning and an end. When compared with a person's life-or even a
single day-it is still but a miniscule slice of time, unable to compete with actual
lived experience.

What's more, we would do well to remember Bordwell's
analysis of Preminger. The film as a whole, rather than being some transparent
documentation of reality, is entirely contrived. The single take carries us
from room to room, and from scene to scene. We go where Sokurov takes us. And
the man isn't just wandering the Winter Palace of the Russian State Hermitage
Museum with a camcorder, capturing whatever reality he finds there. Instead,
he's organized everything that we see. His camera movements and framing glide
along very differently than we people do, being balanced by a Steadicam. And
they continuously direct our attention, focusing it to particular aspects of
the spectacle. Meanwhile, everything that appears on screen is the product of meticulous
design and rehearsal. And we aren't even seeing the first take, but the fourth!
( Goodfellas's Steadicam passage
through the Copacabana is similarly no more real or less artificial than any
other shot in any other film ever.)

Along these lines, associating mise-en-scène exclusively with long takes perpetuates the bias
toward long takes, since they then seem to have a special quality ( mise-en-scène!) that's lacking in
shorter ones. Because, I mean, if cutting eliminates mise-en-scène, then aren't they inherently worse? But short takes
do have mise-en-scène, and
understanding the connection between the mise-en-scène
and the montage is extremely important. To put it another way, if montage is
the study of the interrelation of shots, and all shots possess a mise-en-scène, then montage is also the
study of the interrelation of mise-en-scènes.
This is a topic just as worthy of serious critical attention as the study of
individual long takes. What is needed, overall, is a critical approach to cinema
that seeks to relate the various parts to the whole (as we find in the works of
critics like Bordwell and Henderson).
4. Mise-en-scène and the Short Take
In order to demonstrate the importance of mise-en-scène in short-take cinema, I'd
like to devote the remainder of this article to analyzing a scene fromScott Pilgrim vs. the World
(2010), looking at how mise-en-scène and
editing work in concert to produce several complicated larger effects. A few
notes first. I chose this scene because the editing in it is very fast. (The
editing in Wright's films tends to be very fast in general.) Here, we have 24
shots in 57 seconds, yielding an ASL of only 2.1. That of course doesn't tell
us how long each shot is, but it's worth noting that this ASL is lower than in
most contemporary Hollywood films, which tend to hover in the 3-6 second range.
And yet, despite the brisk pace, a great amount of information is communicated in
this minute of film. Let's see how that is done.

The scene in question occurs roughly 26 minutes into the
film. Scott Pilgrim has just had his first date with Ramona Flowers. Later that
day, his band (Sex Bob-omb) is due to play in a battle of the bands at a club
called the Rockit:

Ramona arrives, surprising Scott; she then meets some of
Scott's family and friends. She also meets Scott's current girlfriend, Knives
Chao, who kisses Scott, causing the young man to stammer and flee. Along the
way, we also get the beginnings of a subplot in which Wallace will seduce Jimmy
away from Stacey. In order to understand how Edgar Wright accomplished all of
this (and more!), we need to examine his sophisticated deployment of mise-en-scène.

For one thing, even though the Rockit isn't the primary
focus of the scene, the setting is still important. The first two shots (of the
club's sign and the interior, including the stage) function as establishing
shots, after which we catch glimpses of people milling about, and crew members
preparing for the upcoming battle of the bands. The next ten minutes of the
film will take place at the Rockit, and these establishing and background
elements help set the stage (literally) for the coming action. The setting also
figures into the film's larger plot: its dive-bar atmosphere ("this place is a
toilet") helps establish the upward progress that Scott and his band mates are
striving to make, which will be entwined with Scott's struggle to win Ramona's
heart. As both Sex Bob-omb and Scott advance, the clubs grow progressively
nicer until they wind up at the final battle, at Gideon Graves's
state-of-the-art Chaos Theater.

Other background elements are also doing important work.
Edgar Wright sets up a quick joke by using the first few shots not only to
reveal information, but to conceal some as well. Ramona arrives and greets
Scott, and we get some conversation between them done as shot-reverse-shot.
Wright then cuts to reveal that Wallace, Stacey, and Jimmy are also present,
and have been standing there the whole time. The reveal is humorous, and helps
further Scott's obliviousness (he has eyes only for Ramona). (The maneuver
recalls the joke in the opening scene of Shaun
of the Dead, where Wright gradually adds in characters.)

Another important function of the mise-en-scène of each shot is how it helps focus our
attention-which is in fact vitally important, given how short these shots are.
Lighting and costuming are used to offset the characters from the background,
drawing our attention to their faces. And it's worth noting here that, even in
short takes, there's still room for mobile camerawork. (In other words, changes
in composition and changes in shots through editing are hardly opposed to one
another, but can work in concert.) As Stacey introduces Wallace and Jimmy, the
camera whip-pans to show us each character. Wright then builds another joke out
of this, hand-in-hand with the cutting, as Wallace sets his sights on Jimmy.

As the scene progresses, our attention is gradually shifted
away from the background elements of the setting, and more toward the
characters themselves. Again, numerous elements are working together here to
accomplish this (including tighter framing and a shallower depth of field). The
focus grows increasingly shallow throughout the scene, as our perspective
shrinks to that of Scott Pilgrim and his discomfort. The payoff comes in the
final shot of the scene, where Wright opens the space up once again, returning us
to a larger sense of the club. The pounding of Scott's heart turns out to be a
drum being used in the sound check. Meanwhile, Scott, unable to handle the
conflict at hand (his basic problem as a protagonist), takes advantage of the deeper
focus of the shot to run off into the distance, and out of sight. (We have here
an illustration of how cinematography often anticipates how the actors are
going to move in the course of a shot.)

Yet other elements of the mise-en-scène work to develop the ongoing conflicts and jokes. When
Knives Chau shows up, her performance calls attention to her new hairstyle,
which is part of her character's arc: her adoration for Scott is causing her to
become an indie rock fan. In a later scene, she'll dye her hair blue, in
imitation of Ramona-and already the film is drawing comparisons between their
respective looks, and setting that love triangle in motion.

It's also worth noting that the scene, despite being rapidly
edited, is hardly incoherent, either temporally, spatially, or narratively.
Indeed, a great deal is being communicated here in all three of those aspects
of the film. Several of the jokes depend on a consistent sense of space. And,
narratively, the scene introduces many characters to one another, delivering
some exposition to them and to the audience, as well as establishing two
separate love triangles (Scott / Ramona / Knives and Stacey / Wallace / Jimmy).

And this analysis only scratches the surface-we haven't
considered much how sound functions in the scene, or color, or any of the CGI
elements. But I think we can see how the scene functions due to its complex
interaction of lighting, costuming, setting, character positioning (blocking),
camera movement-and editing (and camerawork). Rather than opposing one another,
all of the elements of the film-including the mise-en-scène and the editing-are working in concert to progress a
wealth of character and plot detail. Indeed, it's only because those elements
are so carefully arranged in consideration of one another that Wright can
accomplish so much so economically. That complex interplay is the very heart of
the film's sophistication, and artistry.

A.D Jameson is the author
of three books: Amazing Adult Fantasy (Mutable Sound, 2011), Giant Slugs (Lawrence and Gibson, 2011), and 99 Things to Do When You Have the Time (Compendium Inc., 2013). Other writing has appeared
at and HTMLGIANT, as well as in dozens of literary journals. Since August 2011 he's been a PhD student at the University of Illinois at
Chicago. Follow him on Twitter at@adjameson.

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What Mise-en-scène Is and Why It Matters

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What Mise-en-scène Is and Why It Matters 1. What Is Mise-en-scène? Any student of the cinema quickly encounters the term mise-en-scène, and often comes away the worse for the wear. The word-or is it words?-is long and funny-looking (to those who don't speak French).

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20 facts about the film

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The following correction was printed in the Guardian's Corrections and clarifications column, Saturday November 25

Sacha Baron Cohen's altar ego, mentioned in the article below, is actually an alter ego.

It began with outrage in Kazakhstan, followed by the strangulated sound of forced laughter from the nation's diplomats, who realised they should pretend to get the joke. It may end in a procession of costly trips to court. While Kazakhs have meekly come to an accommodation with the blockbusting power of Borat Sagdiyev, it appears that Sacha Baron Cohen's alter ego did not learn one important lesson during his travels across the United States: when they are offended, Americans sue.

The ker-ching of box office cash registers for Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan has been matched by the wails of the offended and the murmur of American lawyers who believe that they, too, can make benefit from the movie. After the film was released, Baron Cohen confirmed, as every cinema-goer had already realised, that of course the joke was not actually on Kazakhstan, but on those whom he had set up during the course of the film. Borat, he said, was a tool for exposing racism and anti-semitism.

Indeed, the homophobic rodeo organiser and the boorishly drunk college kids whom Borat took advantage of may not elicit much sympathy in any bid to receive compensation. But that is not necessarily true of all his victims, and the putative lawsuits that have emerged so far have thrown new light on the extraordinary methods used by Baron Cohen's production company to fool members of the public (while, the company hoped, evading costly legal claims). In the case of the Romanian village persuaded to take the place of Borat's Kazakh home in the film, the small sums of money allegedly paid - when compared to the amount of humiliation undergone - have led to accusations of exploitation.

Baron Cohen's sting was similar for most of his US targets. The subject would be cold-called by representatives of a front company, usually called One America Productions. Linda Stein, for example, an artist and feminist baited by Borat in the film, had a pre-interview with a woman with the false name of Chelsea Barnard. Because the Kazakhstan angle would be familiar to those watching Ali G and Borat's adventures on US cable channel HBO, Baron Cohen's people usually claimed to be working with a Belarus TV station.

Stein searched for One America on the internet and found nothing. Fearing it could be a cover for an extreme right group, she interrogated Barnard, who told her funding for the "documentary" came from Belarus Television. Baron Cohen was shielded from Stein, and others, until the last minute, presumably to give people less time to see through his act.

The unwitting stars of Borat were offered modest sums, from $150 to $400 (£80-£210) for their time. And, just as the crew were setting up the shoot, the victims would be handed consent or release forms, in complex legalese. Media lawyers who have looked at the forms say they are unusually long, with some unique clauses. But the victims invariably signed them without even looking at them properly.

In one such form, published by Slate magazine, the project is described as "a documentary-style film" that the producer "hopes to reach a young adult audience using entertaining content and formats". Clause four states that the participant waives the right to bring any claims against the producer. At first, its subclauses include standard terms such as "damages caused by 'acts of God'". Then they go further, demanding that the subject agrees not to bring any claims over "false light (such as any allegedly false or misleading portrayal of the Participant)" and "fraud (such as any alleged deception or surprise about the Film or this consent agreement)". Stein admits she barely read the form but she questions its validity given that hers was signed by Chelsea Barnard - a made-up name. And, as she wrote in Manhattan's Downtown Express, "While I'm no legal expert, I can't believe that you can agree to be defrauded."

Do these clauses protect Baron Cohen and his producers from legal action? According to Phil Sherrell, a media lawyer at international law firm Eversheds, the clause waiving the right to seek redress against the producers would be struck out under English law. "If this was playing out in England, the subjects would have a good claim that the nature of the project had been fraudulently misrepresented, and that the agreement was therefore void," he says. "If you look at clause four, there are constant references to the subjects being falsely or misleadingly portrayed. The producers might think that it flags up their intentions and makes it clear that emotional distress may be caused, but none of that would matter if the producers did completely mislead the victims about what they were letting themselves in for."

At least one US entertainment lawyer believes the forms are watertight, however. "Generally, these releases will hold up in court unless the person suing can prove that he signed the agreement under false pretences or while incapacitated," says Aaron Moss, an entertainment lawyer for LA-based Greenberg Glusker. "Even if a participant was lied to, a court may find that the person should have read the contract and that if he didn't, it's essentially his own fault."

Nevertheless, etiquette coach Cindy Streit has asked California's attorney general to investigate the film. She claims the company that approached her, "Springland Films", put it in writing that the second of her two sessions with Borat would be "filmed as part of a documentary for Belarus Television and for those purposes only". Twentieth Century Fox, the studio behind Borat, has dismissed this claim as "nonsense".

Baron Cohen is far from the first prankster to fool the public on film. Nine years ago in Britain, Chris Morris's Channel 4 show Brass Eye devised similarly elaborate ruses to induce its subjects to believe satirical guff such as the existence of the deadly drug Cake, or the "fact" that paedophiles and crabs share the same genes. The Tory MP David Amess was fooled into asking a question in parliament - it was answered, too - about the perils of Cake. Amess took his case to the Independent Television Commission, which ruled in his favour. "If there are individuals who have been duped as I was about a serious subject, my advice to them is not to let it drop," he says. "It is out of control. If these ordinary people in America feel their rights have been violated [and go to court], I say good luck to them."

Amess points out that while Morris's oblivious stooges were MPs and celebrities, many victims of Borat complain that they are ordinary folk and not public figures at all. (The only "victim" of Baron Cohen's who was a well-known public figure was Pamela Anderson, and she claims she knew about his antics in advance.)

Baron Cohen is a brave man to take on probably the most litigious people in the world. But he might not have expected the Romanians to get in on the act. On Monday a $30m (£15m) lawsuit was filed in Manhattan's federal court on behalf of Nicolae Todorache and Spiridom Ciorebea, two residents of Glod, the Romanian hamlet where scenes in Borat's "home town" were filmed. The men claimed they were told the film was a documentary about extreme poverty in Romania that would accurately depict their lives. "Nothing could have been further from the truth," the lawsuit says. "The project was intended to portray the plaintiffs ... and other villagers as rapists, abortionists, prostitutes, thieves, racists, bigots, simpletons and/or boors."

Nicolae Staicu, leader of the Roma in the area, accused the producers of paying locals just $3.30-$5.50 (£1.72-£2.87). But Gregg Brilliant, a spokesman for Twentieth Century Fox, said that locals were paid twice the going rate for extras, while the production team and Baron Cohen each donated $5,000 (£2,600) to the village, paid a location fee and bought it computers and school supplies. He said the movie "was never presented to anyone in Romania as a documentary".

In turn, lawyers for the villagers argue that the producers deliberately exposed the victims to ridicule without allowing them a proper chance to give their consent. "This case is not about money but about dignity," says lawyer Ed Fagan, who helped win victims of the Holocaust an out-of-court settlement of $1.25bn (£653m) after filing lawsuits against Swiss banks that had allegedly failed to repay money belonging to the victims. The Romanians' legal team argues that, unlike participants in the US, they were not asked to sign any agreement or consent forms.

Baron Cohen's use of the people of Glod is more about morality and media ethics than law. Sherrell believes this negative publicity could increase the chances of Baron Cohen's backers pragmatically settling out of court: "If the stories are true, it appears that the villagers are impoverished and were treated very poorly. That casts the producers in a bad light. Picking on Romanian peasants for laughs isn't great PR. But legally the issues are the same: did the villagers give consent and, if they did, was it meaningful and based on a proper understanding of the project?"

Can there be a happy ending for those who feel ridiculed or exploited? Mocked for being fooled over the fake drug Cake, Amess was pleased to win the ITC ruling. Now though, he says, all people remember is the joke - no one recalls his victory. "It's amazing that young people still mention the thing about Cake," he says. "They've never, ever forgotten it".
'People's lives have been ruined by his comedy'
From Roma villagers to etiquette coaches - the victims bite back

Linda Stein Artist and feminist

In the film Borat goads her into storming off by telling her that women must walk behind men in his country and asking how he can contact Pamela Anderson. Stein boots Borat out.

She now says "He was very, very clever in the way he warmed up to his outrageous behaviour. At no point did I feel that there was an actor in the room."

Action "I'm keeping my options open," she says. "Sacha Baron Cohen should buy one of my sculptures. He owes me one."

Nicolae Todorache and Spiridom Ciorebea Villagers, Glod, Romania

In the film Todorache, who has lost an arm in an accident, was filmed with a rubber sex toy attached to the stump. Ciorebea played the "village mechanic and abortionist".

Todorache now says "Our region is very poor, and everyone is trying hard to get out of this misery. It is outrageous to exploit people's misfortune like this - to laugh at them."

Action A $30m (£15.5m) lawsuit has been filed in Manhattan's federal court.

College students Known only as John Doe One and John Doe Two

In the film On a road trip, the frat boys from South Carolina University give Borat a lift. Shown drinking together, they are contemptuous of women and tell Borat that America is ruled by minorities. They also show him the sex video Pamela Anderson made with Tommy Lee.

They now say The film caused them "mental anguish, humiliation, physical and emotional distress and loss of reputation".

Action They are suing for fraud, breach of contract, invasion of privacy and distress. A spokesman for Twentieth Century Fox has said the legal action "has no merit".

Dharma Arthur TV producer

In the film Borat appears on the lunchtime news show on the WAPT network in Jackson, Mississippi. Anchorman Brad McMullan gamely struggles to rein in Borat, who then interrupts a live weather forecast, causing the weatherman to laugh hysterically. Arthur was the producer.

She now says "Because of him, my boss lost faith in my abilities and second-guessed everything I did thereafter," she wrote in Newsweek. "I spiralled into depression, and before I could recover, I was released from my contract early. It took me three months to find another job ... How upsetting that a man who leaves so much harm in his path is lauded as a comedic genius."

Action None so far.

Bobby Rowe Rodeo manager, Tennessee

In the film Rowe is filmed venting prejudice against homosexuals and Muslims. Borat addresses the rodeo crowd, offering support for George Bush's "War of Terror". His calls for Iraq to be bombed "so only the lizards survive" are cheered; his rendition of the Kazakh national anthem to the tune of the Star-Spangled Banner is booed.

He now says "I got out there [when Borat sang the anthem]," Rowe told Newsweek, "and I say, 'Get the hell outta this dadgum building! Half the sumbucks in there are probably packin' heat, and they'll put you in front of the firing squad.' Boy, they got in their trucks and hauled boogie."

Action None.

Patrick Haggerty Public speaking and humour coach

In the film In a tutorial on American humour, Borat talks about his "retard" brother and tells a few popular Kazakh jokes, such as the one about having sex with your mother-in-law.

He now says "I think he's a comic genius. About 15 or 20 minutes into the filming I really started to smell a rat. I went up to the director and I said 'Why don't you let me in on the gag? I know there's a gag'. He said 'No, no, no, no, you misunderstand. You're doing fine. This guy needs your help'."

Action As a humour coach, Haggerty probably cannot afford to have a sense of humour failure over his appearance in Borat.

Joe Behar Bed and breakfast owner

In the film Borat is shown throwing money at computer-generated cockroaches in the bedroom, saying they are the Jewish couple who have changed shapes and become insects.

He now says "The director said I was a good actor. If they want to be equitable about it, though, I think they should compensate everyone involved in a more decent way."

Action None.

Sally Speaker Guest at Magnolia Springs Manor in Helena, Alabama

In the film Borat asks Presbyterian minister Cary Speaker whether another guest is his wife. Mr Speaker replies: "No, that is my wife", pointing at Sally. Borat says: "In my country they would go crazy for these two," pointing at the hostess Cindy Streit and Sarah Moseley. Pointing at Mrs Speaker, he says, "You ... not so much."

She now says "Lives have been ruined by his comedy. I realise some people will watch the movie and find it funny, but for the people who were duped into appearing, what happened was anything but humorous."

Action No plans to sue.

Cindy Streit Etiquette coach and host of Magnolia Springs Manor dinner party

In the film Borat gives her a bag of excrement after a visit to the bathroom. She shows him how to flush it down the toilet. He is asked to leave when he invites a black prostitute - played by an actress - to the dinner.

She now says She claims that her business, Etiquette Training Services, has been ruined.

Action Has asked California's attorney general to investigate possible violations of the Unfair Trade Practices Act.

Patrick Barkham
Topics

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Patrick Barkham on the backlash against Sacha Baron Cohen

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The following correction was printed in the Guardian's Corrections and clarifications column, Saturday November 25 Sacha Baron Cohen's altar ego, mentioned in the article below, is actually an alter ego. It began with outrage in Kazakhstan, followed by the strangulated sound of forced laughter from the nation's diplomats, who realised they should pretend to get the joke.

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Fictional short film about rape. A male filmmaker casually films a conversation with his female friend, and she soon mentions her recent assault

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The 15 Best Movies Inspired By True Events

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Check out our list of The 15 Best Movies Inspired By True Events.

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Is truth indeed stranger than fiction? Maybe so in the case of the new movie True Story, based on the real case of Christian Longo, accused murderer of his wife and three children, and Michael Finkel, the disgraced journalist whose identity Longo briefly assumed. The film, directed by Rupert Goold and starring James Franco as Longo and Jonah Hill as Finkel, is based on Finkel's book (full title: True Story: Memoir, Mea Culpa) recounting the case and his personal involvement with his impersonator. Though Finkel writes at the outset that he feels the need to emphasize the truthfulness of what he reports, truth can of course be a slippery concept. Better to stick with the facts.

First of all, Finkel wasn't always so respectful of accuracy in reporting. Though he had moved into a coveted writing position with the New York Times Magazine by his early 30s, the journalist got himself in a fix with a 2001 story about child laborers in Mali. Investigating reports of slavery on cocoa plantations in the West African nation, Finkel found the reality to be far more complex. His editor at the Times Magazine proposed he focus on one boy's journey from poverty-stricken village to squalid plantation. The problem was, there was no single source from Finkel's reporting that could tell this story. So he invented one from interviews he had done with a number of laborers, giving the story's subject the real name of a boy he had talked to. The story was published, inconsistencies were spotted, and Finkel was exposed, publicly excoriated, and fired.

A door closes, and a window opens. Licking his wounds at his Montana home in early 2002, Finkel got a phone call from another journalist asking about a case thus far unfamiliar to him. Just before Christmas 2001, the bodies of two children had been discovered in a coastal Oregon pond; their ankles had been tethered to pillowcases weighted with rocks. They were identified as 27-year-old Christian Longo's two oldest children-Zachery, 4, and Sadie, 3. Several days later, his wife MaryJane Longo and two-year-old daughter Madison were found in the nearby bay. Each had been strangled, packed in a suitcase, and thrown in the water. Christian Longo was traced by the FBI to Cancun, Mexico, where he had introduced himself as Michael Finkel, writer for the New York Times. Finkel was intrigued enough to contact the now-incarcerated man.

Longo, it turned out, had read and was a fan of Finkel's writing in the Times, National Geographic Adventure, and Sports Illustrated, and that was why he chose the journalist's identity as his own. He agreed (against the advice of his lawyers) to allow Finkel to interview him, and the two men began a communication that encompassed weekly phone calls, voluminous letter writing, and a few prison meetings. They were each at a personal low point, although obviously Finkel hadn't killed anyone. But he does admit in True Story that "I'd lied many times: to bolster my credentials, to elicit sympathy, to make myself appear less ordinary."

Longo's gift for duplicity, however, put Finkel's to shame. Though he had no documented history of violence prior to the killings, Longo's young life had been marked by repeated instances of bad judgment, risk-taking, fraud, and larceny. Married at 19 to fellow Jehovah's Witness MaryJane, Longo struggled to support his rapidly growing family. After working various sales jobs, he started a Michigan business cleaning up new construction sites, but had trouble collecting on invoices. When his car broke down, he created a fake driver's license, drove to an Ohio car dealer, took a minivan for a test drive and never returned. When he couldn't meet payroll, he faked some checks from one of his delinquent clients to the tune of $17,000, and later forged credit cards in his father's name. He was arrested, lost his company and his house, and was "disfellowshipped" by his church. He took his family on a probation-violating cross-country trek that ended in Oregon, and finally, it seemed, he killed them.

Longo didn't confess, and didn't even initially plead not guilty - he stood "mute" to the indictment. And though he was telling his life story in great detail to Finkel, he did not account for his actions surrounding the murders. Then he pled guilty to the murders of his wife and youngest child, and not guilty in the deaths of the two other children. On the stand during his 2003 trial, he contended that MaryJane, after discovering the extent of her husband's lies and criminality, had killed Zachery and Sadie, disposed of their bodies, and had also attempted to kill Madison. When Longo found two of his children gone and the third gravely injured, the story continued, he strangled MaryJane and made the agonizing decision to also end his youngest child's life. The jury wasn't buying: it found Longo guilty, and sentenced him to death.

The story didn't end there, of course. Finkel's book was published in 2005. In 2009, Longo contacted the author from Oregon's Death Row and said he was ready to come clean. When he could no longer keep up the facade of stellar husband and fatherhood, Longo confessed, he had indeed killed his entire family - strangling MaryJane during lovemaking, and throwing all of his children into the water while they were still breathing. He said that he was now ready to be executed and wanted to donate his body parts.

Unfortunately, Finkel discovered, the lethal injections that would kill Longo would also render most of his organs useless. So Longo started an organization called GAVE (Gifts of Anatomical Value from the Executed) with the purpose of changing execution methods to enable harvesting of organs. He even wrote an op-ed piece for the New York Times about his quest. And now, like Michael Finkel, Christian Longo can truthfully say that he has written for the New York Times.

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Is truth indeed stranger than fiction? Maybe so in the case of the new movie True Story, based on the real case of Christian Longo, accused murderer of his wife and three children, and Michael Finkel, the disgraced journalist whose identity Longo briefly assumed.

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Take the movie everyone seemed to be talking about this fall. Is "The Social Network" accurate? Is it true? Do its polished surface and carefully engineered visual and sonic effects count as realism at all? Every commercial biopic invites this kind of scrutiny, and whenever a new one is released, someone publishes an article lining up the discrepancies between the historical record and the Hollywood version. Even before "The Social Network" was released, The New Yorker broke the news that Mark Zuckerberg (the real one, not the one played by Jesse Eisenberg) has had a steady girlfriend for most of the period covered in the film, a detail omitted from the movie, which makes much of its protagonist's inability to sustain relationships, or even conversations, with women.

But the public surely knows - don't we? do we? - that movies take liberties, and that the words "based on a true story" or "inspired by true events" appearing before the opening titles offer at best a loose and flimsy tether to reality. We are either sophisticated enough not to trust that what we see corresponds to what was, or jaded enough not to care. There may be an extra dose of cognitive dissonance when the biopic subject is, like Zuckerberg, still alive, not yet 30 and very much in the public eye. But surely we are used to that kind of feedback loop as well.

Other movies trod muddier ground, turning the question "Is it real?" into a kind of double dare. To ask the question is to risk seeming naïvely literal-minded; not to ask could make you a sucker. That, at least, was the trick attempted by Casey Affleck's "I'm Still Here," a multimedia publicity stunt wrapped around a transparently fake documentary. The subject of this carefully staged celebrity train wreck, Joaquin Phoenix, provoked much puzzlement with his infamously hairy and unhinged appearance on "The Late Show With David Letterman." By the time he and Affleck revealed that the actor's bizarre public behavior - rambling incoherently, growing a beard, announcing that he was forsaking acting for a career in hip-hop - was a put-on, and the movie a prank, pretty much everyone already knew and pretty much nobody cared. The attempt to make a point about the fungibility of identity in an age of shallow celebrity foundered because it was too obvious, too elementary. Pretending to be someone else, or a different version of yourself, in front of the cameras is no great feat or revelation. It's a fairly normal mode of being, for the famous and the obscure.

And besides, the simple binary choice that Affleck and Phoenix offered viewers - earnest or ironic? hoax or not? - was much too unsophisticated. They were the ones who looked naïve for supposing that anyone would fall for their stunt. But "Catfish" and "Exit Through the Gift Shop," two documentaries that premiered at Sundance in January, were more slippery. The credited director and, at least at first, the ostensible subject of "Exit" is Banksy, the artist whose conceptual graffiti are as recognizable as his face is unknown. But what begins as a tour of the world of international street art quickly becomes something else. A documentary about Banksy and his colleagues, directed by an amiable Los Angeles-based Frenchman named Thierry Guetta, turns into its opposite, as the would-be (and apparently incompetent) documentarian remakes himself into an art-world pseudo-celebrity known as Mr. Brainwash, whose rise to fame is dutifully recorded by Banksy himself.

Is Mr. Brainwash the perpetrator of a fraud, the subject of a prank or just an ordinary guy caught in the viewfinder of a crafty filmmaker? Similarly vertiginous questions surround the Michigan woman who turns out to be the title character in "Catfish." The film's directors, Ariel Shulman and Henry Joost, set out on the road with Ariel's younger brother, Nev, to find an 8-year-old artistic prodigy and her seductive older half-sister, both of whom were Nev's friends on Facebook. What they found was a case of mistaken - or rather deliberately manufactured - identity far more audacious and strange than anything Mr. Brainwash or Joaquin Phoenix could have imagined. The two girls were not exactly whole-cloth inventions, but in the form Nev had come to know them online, they were the alter egos of their mother, Angela Wesselman-Pierce, a fabulist of considerable talent and nerve.

But the queasiness of "Catfish" - the suspicion that it is not entirely on the level - comes less from Wesselman-Pierce's imposture than from the filmmakers' response to it, which feels at the very least disingenuous. Wesselman-Pierce does not seem to be their creation, any more than Mr. Brainwash is Banksy's brainchild, but the way the directors pivot from credulity to shock at her deceit does not entirely ring true. Surely, young adepts of the Internet like these New Yorkers would know better than to take Facebook self-representations at face value. By insisting otherwise, Joost and the Shulmans manage the trick of looking like patsies rather than cynical con men. For most of the movie, they sustain the idea that they (or at least Nev) are innocent dupes, even as their film is built on, and ends by affirming, the assumption that they are smarter and more sophisticated than Wesselman-Pierce.

It is hardly news that documentaries manipulate reality with effects that can be morally toxic. This danger is the subject of "A Film Unfinished," Yael Hersonski's remarkable exploration of the blurred line between propaganda and reportage. Uncovering footage that the Nazis took, and staged, in the Warsaw ghetto, Hersonski shows that what later generations have taken to be firsthand, raw images had instead passed through the machinery of ideological illusion making. They were real, but not exactly in the way they appeared to be.

In that case, it is troubling to contemplate how easily we can be deceived. But more often, audiences consent to being fooled just for the fun of it. Horror movies, for decades ruled by the technical conservatism of the shock cut and the point-of-view shot, have rediscovered, almost a decade after "The Blair Witch Project," the scary pleasures of the hoax. The first "Paranormal Activity," purporting to be an amateur video recording of demonic possession, may not be surpassed for sheer, dumb formal ingenuity, but its influence has spread beyond its own sequel to the half-clever "Monsters" and the almost-clever "Last Exorcism," both cheap sensations that crept in and out of theaters this year.

The most radical reality effects today may come from young filmmakers who adopt an almost willfully guileless attitude toward the artifices of filmmaking, recording themselves and their friends playing people like themselves and their friends in situations barely distinguishable from ordinary existence. Mumblecore, as this tendency is unhappily called, has already moved beyond its D.I.Y. origins, infiltrating the comic mainstream most notably, this year, in "Cyrus," a scruffy, icky domestic comedy that married the anti-technique of mumblecoreans Jay and Mark Duplass, who directed, with the awkward star power of Jonah Hill and John C. Reilly, who played variations on their usual roles as half-grown men looking for love and reassurance.

The undisciplined shooting and haphazard framing of "Cyrus" don't look conventionally movielike, which makes the film puzzling, irritating and also, in its way, exemplary. The presence of professional movie stars in a film that looks so systematically amateurish in its disregard for (or plain ignorance of) the norms of cinematic craft may well be a sign of things to come, since the Duplasses' antistyle represents an emerging aesthetic. This is perhaps easier to identify than to name, but you can see it working in small-scale projects like Lena Dunham 's "Tiny Furniture," Benny and Josh Safdie's "Daddy Longlegs" and Kentucker Audley's "Open Five."

What makes these movies interesting and difficult to assimilate is less the fact that they blur the line between real life and representation than the way they accomplish the blurring. "Open Five" may be notable mainly for shifting the landscape of aimless, youthful contemplation from the city to the countryside, but its record of the ambivalent desires and drifting ambitions of a group of friends is artful enough to be touching as well as vague. "Tiny Furniture" and "Daddy Longlegs," autobiographical films about Manhattan children and their bohemian parents, present a similar - but at the same time, in each case, highly idiosyncratic - blend of coyness and sincerity. The scenes feel improvised; the stories emerge almost haphazardly out of long takes and meandering shots. Your expectation of seeing life framed, organized, made somehow more coherent, is teased, frustrated and sometimes thwarted outright. This is not entirely a pleasant or comfortable experience, and you may find yourself asking, Where is the art? Or even, What is the point? Can you just aim the camera at something that's happening and call the result a movie? What else would you call it?

ONE OF THE best-known stories about the birth of movies - which has always seemed to me at least partly apocryphal, the way most such tales are - takes place in 1895 in a Paris cafe, where Auguste and Louis Lumière screened a film, scarcely a minute long, of a train arriving in Ciotat Station. Legend has it that the assembled public fled in panic, seized by the momentary belief that, in spite of the absence of either a railroad track or a soundtrack, an actual locomotive was bearing down on them.

This anecdote can be used to remind us of the now-unimaginable novelty of cinema, a strange and wonderful late-19th-century invention that must have seemed, at the time, to refute the very laws of physics. Or we can wonder (and laugh) at the naïveté of the audience, who supposedly failed to grasp the distinction between reality and representation that is so obvious to us now. We know better than to believe what we see.

But we also, sometimes willfully, let go of that knowledge, and it is possible to discern in the frenzied reaction of that ancient Parisian crowd the first recorded eruption of a distinctively modern form of pleasure. We may not be fooled by images, but maybe sometimes we would like to be. The Lumière brothers called their spectacles (the first of which showed workers filing out of the family's factory) "actuality films," and they have gone down in history as early instances of both the documentary and realist tendencies in cinema. As such, they stand in contrast with the roughly contemporary work of Georges Méliès, cinema's first great fantasist, who famously used the nascent medium to conjure the imaginary and the impossible - voyages to the moon! extraordinary illusions! - rather than to capture what actually existed.

Now, more than 100 years later, the Mélièsian universe grows ever more crowded and elaborate. The refinement of digital special effects, displacing the camera with the computer, has only extended its domain. But at the same time, the Lumièresque urge to record, to use the camera to see rather than to dream, has itself been strengthened by new technologies, notably the ever-wider availability of cheap, portable, easy-to-use cameras. Everyone with a flip-cam or a cellphone can be a documentary filmmaker, or at least an Internet auteur. You want trains pulling into stations? YouTube has plenty of those, and an endless supply of babies doing cute, messy things with food, including the one in Lumière film No. 88, a 44-second tour de force called "Baby's Lunch."

The appetite for actuality has hardly waned, but it remains an unstable, contradictory hunger, compounded of doubt and credulity, the will to believe and the wish to be tricked. This observation can easily be applied to the realm of politics and media at large - where every supposed debunking seems to produce its own kind bunk, and where the idea of reality television flips from oxymoron to tautology in the space of a commercial break - but let's stay with the movies for now. What did you see this year? And more to the point: What did you believe?

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Take the movie everyone seemed to be talking about this fall. Is "The Social Network" accurate? Is it true? Do its polished surface and carefully engineered visual and sonic effects count as realism at all?

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Manohla Dargis and A. O. Scott identify and discuss an international assortment of rising young filmmakers.

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the short documentary

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After the writer and theologian John Hull became completely blind in 1983, he kept an audio diary of his experience. This film is a dramatization using those recordings.

For the story behind 'Notes on Blindness,' click here: nytimes.com/notesonblindness

Click here to follow us: vimeo.com/newyorktimes
Watch more videos at: nytimes.com/video
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An article

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The Story Behind 'Notes on Blindness'

In May 2011, we received a parcel containing a dusty box of eight C90 cassettes. Amid the analog crackle of the first tape, we heard a now-familiar voice: "Cassette one. Side one. Notes on Blindness." It was the first time the recording had been played for almost 25 years.

We had met John and Marilyn Hull six months earlier while filming a short documentary about the blind experience of snowfall. Among the many first-person testimonies we had encountered during our research was John's book, "Touching the Rock." We were immediately struck by the depth of his observation and the power of his account. Naturally, we were eager to discover whether the diary tapes upon which the book was based were still in existence, and were honored when John was generous enough to share them with us.

John developed cataracts at the age of 13, which left him blind for months at a time. The restoration of his sight was followed by a series of retinal detachments. After a number of operations, in 1980, at age 45, John's vision was so poor that he was registered blind. He and Marilyn were newly married and she had just given birth to a son, Thomas. John was working as a lecturer at the University of Birmingham, England, and he recalls that this initial period was dominated by the practical challenges of adaptation, which left little time for reflection.

It wasn't until 1983, when John had lost the final traces of light sensation, that he began to confront the enormousness of this loss. "I knew that if I didn't understand it," he now recalls, "blindness would destroy me." In June of that year John made his first diary recording.

"The world into which I am being dragged with my loved ones will engulf us. There will be no return. Blindness is permanent and irreversible... My life is in crisis."

Over the next three years John recorded over 16 hours of audio diaries, excavating the interior world of blindness. They document a purging period of grief, but eventually of renewal, in what John describes as the discovery of a "world beyond sight."

Throughout this time, the diaries are characterized by a restless, searching gaze. And here our phrasing becomes problematic - insight, gaze, observation. One of the great tensions of the work is that it is constantly working at the limits of expression, straining language dominated by visual referents and imagery. Yet it is at these moments that the account is at its most poetic: The Los Angeles Times, in its review of John's book "Touching the Rock," described his "talent for - in the words of the blind poet John Milton - making the 'darkness visible.'" As filmmakers, too, we found that approaching this material in a visual medium was a partly paradoxical enterprise.

Translating John's Hull's Audio Diaries to the Screen

John's original audio recordings form the narrative backbone of the film. We also hear Marilyn's voice, taken from a BBC interview from the early 1990s. These documentary sources are supported by cinematic interpretations using actors, visual metaphor and textured sound design. The audio recordings are employed in several ways: as straightforward narration; as dialogue; and in certain instances as verbatim speech, lip-synced by our cast.

In combining documentary and dramatic elements, we hope to follow a recent trend in creative approaches to the documentary form, such as Sarah Polley's "Stories We Tell" and Joshua Oppenheimer's "The Act of Killing"; films that interrogate the distinctions between "real" and "performed" within the documentary framework.

"Notes on Blindness" was conceived as three distinct chapters, each exploring a central theme of the diaries. The first of these focuses on the role of the visual in memory and the construction of the self. The second explores John's struggle with acceptance and the question of whether he'll ever be able to truly find peace with blindness. The final chapter is a celebration of sensation - Johnʼs first glimpse of the "riches" of blindness and the nuances of nonvisual perception.

John description of blindness as "the borderland between dream and memory" informed our aesthetic approach, and much of the key imagery of the film is rooted in his testimony. Throughout the diaries John recounts vivid "technicolor" dreams, his "last state of visual consciousness," which he compares to watching films. In particular, the water imagery that recurs in the film - visions of surging waves; of being dragged into the depths of the ocean - is derived from John's account.

While John and Marilyn's voices form a central part of the soundtrack, we avoided direct use of visual archive material on screen. In a passage where John describes "trying to remember memories of photographs" in order to recall the faces of his children, we carefully recreated images from the Hull family photo albums using our actors.

Drawing both from the diaries and from research interviews carried out with John and Marilyn, the second chapter of the film condenses a number of distressing instances of panic-induced asthma attacks. John had suffered severe breathing problems since childhood, and these became particularly intense during the first few years of total blindness, an acutely physical manifestation of his sense of isolation. Perhaps not coincidentally, elsewhere in the diaries John compares the mind of the recently blinded, longing for optic stimulation, to lungs starved of oxygen, gasping for air.

The final scene of "Notes on Blindness" hints at the larger narrative of the tapes, across which John registers a sea change in his outlook. By the close of the diaries, John finds that increasingly he has to remind himself of the existence of the visual world. Indeed, in an entry from 1986 he even defines blindness as "a dark, paradoxical gift," around which he will come to redefine his life.

Now in his late 70s and still working as an honorary professor at the Queen's Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Education, Birmingham, John in 2012 was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award for Services to Literature on Blindness by the Royal National Institute of Blind People (R.N.I.B.).

John's responses to the diary extracts used in "Notes on Blindness," listening from a distance of 30 years, accompany the film in text and audio form. It has clearly been painful for him to revisit this time. Just last week, John mentioned to us that while drafting these responses he had to telephone Marilyn from his office to ask, "Why am I doing this?" She replied, "For other people."

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In May 2011, we received a parcel containing a dusty box of eight C90 cassettes. Amid the analog crackle of the first tape, we heard a now-familiar voice: "Cassette one. Side one. Notes on Blindness." It was the first time the recording had been played for almost 25 years.

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Script Writing Software for Storytellers

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Celtx is a scriptwriting and pre-production management software for film, TV, ads, short-format video, commercial video, documentaries, games, VR, and more.

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Watch the Best Short Films | Short of the Week

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Watch the most innovative stories—Documentary, Comedy, Sci-fi, Horror, Experimental, Animation, Inspiration, Student films, Award winners & more short films

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adapted from Bill Nichols

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In 2010's "Introduction to Documentary," film educator and documentary consultant Bill Nichols distilled the types of documentaries down to six styles.

In this article, we will discuss the six styles or modes Nichols wrote able. However, lets first define what a documentary actually is before we get into the types of documentaries.

What is a documentary?

Webster defines documentary as "a movie or television program that tells the facts about actual people and events." The conventional thinking about documentaries is that they document reality. Also, conventional thinking suggests they represent the objective truth and do not include fictional elements.

Certainly, these are some of the qualities we expect from journalistically driven current affairs docs made for TV where the editorial impetus is to strive for factual and balanced presentations.

But the documentary form has been shifting its shape ever since the earliest days of cinema. The Scottish documentary trailblazer John Grierson first coined the term documentary in 1926. He defined it as "A creative treatment of actuality." Commenting on Robert Flaherty's early anthropological films (Nanook of the North 1922; Moana 1926), which were more docufiction than documentation, Grierson anticipated that documentary is as much about making art as it is about presenting facts.

If you're an emerging doc maker, you should be watching as many documentaries as you can. Study documentaries of all styles and genres to inspire your own work as non-fiction storyteller. Also, read up on what film scholars and movie critics have to say about how these films are constructed.

The six primary types of documentaries

The Expository Mode

The expository mode is the most familiar of the six types of documentaries. Expository docs are heavily researched and are sometimes referred to as essay films because they aim to educate and explain things - events, issues, ways of life, worlds and exotic settings we know little about. Typical production elements include interviews, illustrative visuals, some actuality, perhaps some graphics and photos and a 'voice of God' narration track. Scripted narration connects the story elements and often unpacks a thesis or an argument.

Expository docs are heavily researched and are sometimes referred to as essay films because they aim to educate and explain things - events, issues, ways of life, worlds and exotic settings we know little about.

The "Why We Fight" (1942-43) series of propaganda films were commissioned by the government. Their purpose were to explain U.S. involvement in World War II. They were made in classic expository style. Other examples include current affairs docs made for "60 Minutes," History Channel programs, and nature films such as "The Blue Planet." The sweeping historical documentaries of Ken Burns ("Mark Twain," 2001; "The Dust Bowl," 2012) fall into the expository category.

The "Why We Fight" (1942-43) propaganda series of the World War II era follows the expository mode of documentary, most notably in its voice of God narration.

Suggested Viewing

"The Plow That Broke the Plains" Pare Lorentz 1936; "City of Gold" NFB 1949; "The Civil War" Ken Burns 1990;

The Observational Mode

Observational documentary is probably the most analyzed mode of all the types of documentaries. The form is also referred to as cinema verité, direct cinema or fly-on-the-wall documentary.

Observational docs strive for cinematic realism. The gritty realism produced by actuality filmmakers of the 1960s and 70s was achieved through technological advances made ten years earlier. Faster lenses for shooting in low light conditions and smaller cameras that could now be handheld. So, they were no longer tethered to a sound recorder with an audio sync cable. An unobtrusive crew of two could shoot almost anywhere with available light and follow actuality as it unfolded. Up until then, bulky film production gear required finicky technical setups and careful staging of the action.

Frederick Wiseman: the master of observational cinema

Boston director Frederick Wiseman, considered to be the master of observational cinema, is known for his groundbreaking studies of institutions and big social issues ("High School," 1968; "Public Housing," 1997). Wiseman resists categorization of his work: "Cinema verité is just a pompous French word."

In Frederick Wiseman's 1968 documentary "High School," fly-on-the-wall observational style filmmaking offers a candid peek inside a Philadelphia public high school.

In Wiseman's films, carefully edited and arranged actuality scenes speak for themselves. There is no intervention by the filmmaker, no interview questions, no commentary to camera, no narration. Also, on location, Wiseman records the sound and handles the microphone. Freed from looking through the viewfinder, the director is able to pay better attention to what's going on around him and anticipate the action. Wiseman communicates with his cameraperson through pre-arranged hand signals and directs by pointing his microphone at what he wants filmed.

"Fly-on-the-wall is the most demeaning [term]," Wiseman tells POV magazine. "None of the flies I know are conscious." Although not fond of fancy film terms, the curmudgeonly octogenarian is considered to be the most authentic maker of observational documentaries.

Suggested Viewing

"Primary Drew Associates" 1960; "Don't Look Back" D.A. Pennebaker, 1967; "Salesmen" Albert and David Maysles, 1969

The Participatory Mode

In "Introduction to Documentary," Bill Nichols describes participatory documentary as "[when] the encounter between filmmaker and subject is recorded and the filmmaker actively engages with the situation they are documenting."

The participatory mode aims for immediacy. Also, it often presents the filmmaker's point of view.

Michael Moore's documentaries are primarily vehicles for his social commentary. A dynamic shooting style that captures 'man in the street' interviews as well as ambush grillings of the powerful, staged sequences featuring the director and mostly one-sided narration are trademarks of Moore's point of view docs, including "Sicko" - slamming the health care system - and "Bowling for Columbine" - lobbying for gun control.

In "Tales of the Grim Sleeper," Broomfield again becomes part of the story as he investigates the LA serial killer.

Also, the investigative work of filmmaker Nick Bloomfield also falls into the participatory mode ("Kurt and Courtney," 1998; "Tales of the Grim Sleeper," 2014). Bloomfield shoots with a skeletal crew handling audio mixer and boom mic himself. He often rolls camera on the way to the next location and gives anticipatory commentary to camera when he's not conducting gun and run interviews.

Initially taking an investigative approach to the controversy surrounding Kurt Cobain's death, "Kurt & Courtney" falls into the participatory mode as the filmmaker, Nick Broomfield, becomes more involved in the story.

Suggested Viewing

"Chronicle of a Summer" Jean Rouche 1960; "Sherman's March" Ross McElwee 1986; "Supersize Me" Morgan Spurlock 2004; "Approaching the Elephant" Amanda Wilder 2014

The Reflexive Mode

Documentaries made in reflexive mode provoke audiences to "question the authenticity of documentary in general," writes Bill Nichols. Reflexive docs challenge assumptions and expectations about the form itself.

Dziga Vertov, the Russian film pioneer makes it clear in "The Man With A Movie Camera" that what the audience is watching is not reality but rather a construction of reality. The film is silent and contains no interstitial titles. Ostensibly a 'city documentary' that chronicles a day in the life of a metropolis, the 1929 avant-garde classic includes scenes of the film's cameraman and how he went about getting his shots. Also intercut with scenes of factories, trains and crowded streets are short sequences of a diligent film editor working with individual frames from the film. By clever juxtaposition of scenes and images, Vertov gives us a sense that the film we are watching is being assembled right before our eyes.

Rob Reiner's "This is Spinal Tap," a 'mockumentary' about a fictional heavy metal band in decline. That mockumentary also falls into the reflexive mode. Fake interviews, fake concert clips, improvised dialogue and a 'shaky cam' shooting style are Reiner's devices for taking satirical pokes both at heavy metal culture and at rock documentary conventions. Additionally, in Reiner's well-observed 1985 cult classic, audiences recognize the trademarks of the 'rockumentary' genre - intra-band conflict, decline in popularity, the band clawing their way back to the top and the final concert.

The mocumentary "This is Spinal Tap" is an example of the reflexive mode of documentary filmmaking, calling attention to the tropes and motifs common to the rockumentary genre.

Suggested Viewing

"Exit Through the Gift Shop" Banksy 2010; "The Spaghetti Story" BBC 1957

The Poetic Mode

Webster defines poetry as "literary work in which special intensity is given to the expression of feelings and ideas by the use of distinctive style and rhythm."

You can apply this definition almost perfectly to many documentaries created in the poetic mode. The aim is to create an impression or a mood rather than argue a point. The poetic form also referred to as abstract or avant-garde can be traced back to the popular City Symphony film movement of the 1920s. Such classics as Walter Ruttmann's "Berlin: Symphony of a Metropolis" (1927) came from that period.

Also, filmmakers operating in the poetic mode typically emphasize cinematic values over content to create visual poetry. Shot design, composition and rhythm achieved in editing are hallmarks of the genre. The narrative, if there is one, is expressed visually rather than rhetorically. Additionally, Dutch filmmaker Joris Iven's City Symphony classic "Rain" (1929) is a shining example of the poetic style. It shows how a rainstorm transforms the Dutch metropolis Amsterdam.

Suggested Viewing

"Play of Light: Black, White, Grey" Laslo Moholy-Nagy 1930; "N.Y.,N.Y." Francis Thomson 1957; "Sans Soleil" (Sunless) Chris Marker 1983; "Koyaanisqatsi" Godfrey Reggio 1982

The Performative Mode

The performative mode of documentary is the direct opposite of the observational mode. In Observational documentaries, unobtrusive observation of the subject is the director's aim. A Performative documentary emphasizes the filmmaker's own involvement with the subject.

Furthermore, the filmmaker shows a larger political or historical reality through the window of her own experience. Rather than rely on the expository approach, the performative filmmaker becomes a personal guide. The guide shows it and tells it like it is with raw emotion.

In performative mode the filmmaker gives a "what's it like to be there" perspective on a world, a culture or an event in history. Without that perspective, it's likely the audience would otherwise never know those topics. In "Tongues Untied" (1989) the late African-American filmmaker Marlon Riggs combines actuality, re-enactments and his personal account to shine a light on black gay American identity.

Also in the performative category are the works of so-called 'found footage' filmmakers like Hungarian Péter Forgács ("Danube Exodus," 1999). His films are created from home movies. They're recovered personal records to tell the story of ordinary people's lives that are about to be overtaken by catastrophic, historic events.

Suggested Viewing

"Night And Fog" Alain Resnais 1955; "Paris Is Burning" Jenny Livingston 1991; "Forest of Bliss" Robert Gardner 1986

Framing all type of documentaries

All the types of documentaries have their own distinguishing characteristics. However, most docs are not made exclusively in any one mode. Rather, they combine more than one style. For example, it can be argued that Michael Moore's films straddle both participatory and performative modes. Additionally, masters of direct cinema Albert and David Maysles were clearly operating in participatory as well as in observational mode. They were not afraid to include in their films off topic interactions between crew and subject.

To enrich your understanding of the types of documentaries, look for the works of documentary masters online. Also, be on the lookout for documentary fests near you. Look for where screenings that include Q & As with filmmakers. Their insights will inform your own approach to crafting non-fiction stories for the screen.
Peter Biesterfeld is a seasoned script-to-screen television. He's also a video producer and trainer with a specialty in documentary, current affairs, reality television and educational production.

Peter Biesterfeld is a non-fiction storyteller specializing in documentary, current affairs, reality television and educational production.

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In 2010's "Introduction to Documentary," film educator and documentary consultant Bill Nichols distilled the types of documentaries down to six styles. In this article, we will discuss the six styles or modes Nichols wrote able. However, lets first define what a documentary actually is before we get into the types of documentaries.

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by Bill Nichols

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DOCUMENTARY TIP #7: Writing a Strong Treatment

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Documentary tip about getting an agent for your documentary ideas

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New Frontiers in American Documentary Film

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What is documentary film? The subject of what constitutes a documentary has been debated ever since John Grierson labeled the non-fiction film Nanook of the North as a "documentary" because it was an example of the "creative treatment of actuality." What is meant by "creative" varies widely among film makers.

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All under five minutes, the greatest short short films online from around the world, including Post-it Love by Si & Ad, Kiwi! by Dony Permedi, and The Sun Worshipper by Ed Wiles.

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10 Great Documentaries That Weren't Nominated For An Oscar

With " The Act Of Killing," " Cutie and the Boxer" and " The Square" among the nominees, this year's Best Documentary Feature category is one of the strongest we can remember. But that doesn't mean that the Academy got everything right. Many of the year's most notable non-fiction films were ignored, most notably Sarah Polley's " Stories We Tell," a movie which managed to top many critical lists and was widely acclaimed as not just one of the best documentaries of 2013, but as one of the best movies of any kind.

But Polley's in good company. Perhaps even more so than with the main Best Picture prize, the documentary branch have a long history of overlooking the towering classics of the form completely. Sure, some great docs have been recognized by the Academy-" The War Game," " Woodstock," " Hearts And Minds," " Harlan County USA," " When We Were Kings," " 4 Little Girls," " Man On Wire "-but it's far from uncommon for the truly classic contenders to be completely ignored in favor of movies that are about the right issues, or tug the heartstrings in the right way.

So with the Oscars now less than two weeks away, in commiseration with "Stories We Tell," and to celebrate IFC's Sundance Now Doc Club for the month, which features a number of non-nominated films hand-selected by non-fiction mover-and-shaker Thom Powers, we've picked out ten phenomenal documentary movies that failed to even get an Academy Award nomination, let alone win the prize. To narrow it down a little, we mostly excluded concert films and music documentaries, along with multi-part movies like " The Sorrow And The Pity" and the " Up " series, and other films that were ineligible. The ones left, below, all qualify as essential viewing.

"Hoop Dreams" (1994)
Probably the best-known of the Oscar-snubbed documentaries, and the second of the two 1994 films, along with " Crumb," that finally caused a change in the system (the film had been touted by some as a possible Best Picture nominee, so that it failed to be even nominated as a documentary caused a bona-fide outcry), " Hoop Dreams" still stands today as one of the finest films about sports ever made. Directed by Steve James (whose equally terrific " The Interrupters" also missed a nod more than fifteen years later, and whose new Roger Ebert tribute " Life Itself" is pretty great too), the film was originally intended to be a half-hour short for PBS, but grew and grew over time into a three-hour epic that took eight years to shoot. It follows William Gates and Arthur Agee, two hugely talented young basketball players recruited by a scout for a mostly white high school with a top basketball program. At one level, it's a tiny story, about two good kids who struggle with everyday pressures to get by and maybe build a better future. On the other (like several of these movies), it's a film about America, and the American dream, unsentimentally drawing a picture of the low-income households from which the kids come from, while never promising that their sporting prowess will actually prove to be their way out. It captures real life in a way that the form so often promises, but very rarely manages, which isn't to say that there's no artifice, but more that it's hidden masterfully by James (who really is a top-flight filmmaker). It was never lacking in acclaim-Ebert would later call it the best film of the 1990s, and it did even manage an Oscar nod for Best Editing, deservedly so. But that the documentary committee couldn't see its worth (reportedly, it was turned off after twenty minutes) simply begs belief, given that it's one of the crowning achievements of the documentary artform.

"Paris Is Burning" (1990)
To its credit, the documentary category has often been a way for the Academy to spotlight certain minorities or subcultures that might yet take decades to make an impact in the mainstream categories. But there was a limit to that, and that must have been one of the reasons that " Paris Is Burning" was ignored by the Academy, despite being probably the most acclaimed documentary film of its year. Directed by Jennie Livingston, it peeks behind the curtain of "ball culture," walk-offs between drag artists who belonged to a system of houses. Hitting just as Madonna's "Vogue" was helping to bring the world into the mainstream, it takes an expansive and in-depth look at the scene, deftly introducing wider audiences to a culture that must have been rather alien to many (including, presumably, those voting for the Documentary Oscar). The performance scenes are vivid and energetic, capturing the buzz and appeal of the balls, but just as memorable is the way it draws the politics of the scenes (the rivalry between the different houses), and the personality of its figures, permanent outsiders who've found a scene where they finally fit in. The film's undoubtedly dated a bit in the intervening years, and one almost wishes for a sequel, given the tragic fate of some of its protagonists (one prominent figure, Dorian Corey, died in 1993, at which point a mummified body, dead for over 15 years, was found in her apartment), but it's still a beautiful snapshot of a time, a place, and the people who lived there. Given that it was something of a hit at the time (one of the films that helped make the name of Miramax), and that it won prizes from Sundance, Berlin and the New York Film Critics Circle, it's very puzzling that it was so ignored by the Academy.

"Point Of Order" (1964)
That " Point Of Order" was rejected from the New York Film Festival for "not being a real movie" is symptomatic of the lack of imagination that the Academy's documentary branch can bring to their picks. As recently as " Grizzly Man," they've been (often incorrectly, as in the case of the Herzog film) disqualifying movies that are only made up of archive footage, and few of those films that slipped through the crack have been better than "Point Of Order." Directed by Emile de Antonio (the legendary groundbreaking political documentarian, who was nominated for the 1968 film " In The Year Of The Pig," about the origins of the Vietnam war), it creates a 90-minute collage reconstructing the 1954 Army-McCarthy hearings, in which the U.S. Army's accusations that Senator Joseph McCarthy had attempted to win influence for a former employee, Private G. David Schine, helped to ruin McCarthy's reputation, and end his reign of terror. It's an admittedly academic and dry approach, without cutting to later recollections, or ever even leaving the room of the hearings, but it's incredibly rigorous in its formal restrictions, and all the more fascinating for it. There's a hypnotic quality to its rhythms (not least in watching the repulsively charismatic McCarthy work his magic), and it's quietly, subtly constructed into a real courtroom thriller. By the time it reaches its emotional climax-as the dignified, powerful Joseph Welch tears McCarthy to shreds, telling him, famously, "At long last, have you left no sense of decency"-you realize the powerful craft of de Antonio's cutting. You can see for yourself now-the film is available in full on YouTube.

"Salesman" (1968)
Almost no filmmakers have had the kind of impact on the form of documentary cinema that Albert and David Maysles did-they're endlessly influential, and their films, including " Gimme Shelter" and " Grey Gardens," are still regarded as absolute classics of the genre. And yet, the pair's only Oscar nomination came for Documentary Short in 1974 for " Christo's Last Curtain," which means that not only were the aforementioned two features overlooked, but also the earlier, equally great " Salesman" (co-directed with editor Charlotte Zwerin) which might be their most fully realized and satisfying film. Having helped popularize the direct cinema style in the U.S., the brothers, inspired by Truman Capote's description of " In Cold Blood" as a "nonfiction novel," set out to make a nonfiction feature film with this picture, which tracks a quartet of bible salesmen, loosely en route to a meeting in Chicago. Echoing Arthur Miller (not least in its depiction of Paul Brennan, the film's most compelling and unforgettable character, whose becomes more and more depressed at his lot in life as the film progresses), it's an examination of the American dream, and the link between religion and capitalism, but more importantly of four people: the film's compassionate viewpoint on its central quartet never forgets their humanity (it's why we'd pick it over "Grey Gardens," which feels exploitative in a way that this never does). The film's less well known these days than some of its contemporaries, but one only has to look back at it to realize the extent of its influence-everything from " Glengarry Glen Ross" to the movies of Paul Greengrass to " The Office" and " The Simpsons " have been touched by "Salesmen." History has spoken up where the Academy hadn't.

"Shoah" (1985)
In defense of the documentary committee, " Shoah" is one of the most intimidating prospects in cinema history-an oral history of the Holocaust, told by its survivors, that runs at nearly ten hours long. But given that it delivers the definitive take on the 20th century's greatest atrocity, you'd think they could have tried a little harder. Made by French director Claude Lanzmann over the course of eleven years, and assembled from 350 hours of interviews, it eschews contemporary found footage and relies entirely on first-person testimony, both of Jewish survivors and occasionally their guards and captors (some of which was captured with hidden cameras; the discovery of one caused Lanzmann to be beaten and hospitalized for a month), centering on the death camps of Treblinka, Chelmno and Auschwitz-Birkenau, and of those in the Warsaw Ghetto. As you might expect, it's as wrenching and nausea-inducing a film as you'll ever sit through, but one, almost by definition, of deep humanity, even as it deals with the worst examples of inhumanity you can imagine. And it's about as vital a film as has ever been made: a last chance for those who were there to testify as to what they witnessed, and as a result, it's historical value is unquestionable. But it's also a beautifully made film, impeccably constructed by Lanzmann from the first minute to the 566th. For it to be overlooked by the Academy is inexcusable, but it always had a much greater, higher purpose, and one that it lives up to entirely.

"The Thin Blue Line" (1988)
One of the best known documentarians working, Errol Morris finally won an Oscar in 2004 for his " The Fog Of War," and while that's a very good film, it's hard not think that it was something of an apology to the filmmaker for overlooking his earlier work, and in particular his 1988 film " The Thin Blue Line," a legitimate crossover hit that, nonsensically, was considered "nonfiction" rather than documentary, and was thus disqualified by the Academy. About as gripping a true crime story as has ever been made, the film relates and recreates (those scenes being the ones that led to the film being disqualified, though it's now a more accepted practice) the miscarriage of justice that followed the death by shooting of Dallas police officer Robert Wood in 1976. There were two men in the stolen car that Wood had stopped before he was shot-16-year-old driver and car thief David Ray Harris, and 28-year-old Randall Adams, who'd accepted a lift from Harris, and on whom the murder was pinned. Adams, despite being totally innocent, was charged with capital murder, in part because Adams was a minor and wouldn't face the death penalty, and he spent twelve years in prison for the crime before Morris' film helped him to be released. Morris had worked as a private eye in the past, and he builds a solid case for reasonable doubt in Adams' conviction, but also admits and engages with the idea that the truth is essentially unknowable. Morris has a point-of-view, certainly, but it's far from the only one. It's also a fine example, as are most of the director's films, that a documentary doesn't just have to be a series of talking heads and archive footage. The beautifully shot re-enactments might have caused the film to miss out an Oscar nomination, but they also make the movie linger far longer in the memory.

Honorable Mentions: It's almost easier to name the great films that were Oscar-nominated in the documentary category than the ones that weren't. But to name but a few, there was also " Roger & Me," " The Interrupters," " Grizzly Man," " The Last Waltz," " Grey Gardens," " A Grin Without A Cat," " Lake Of Fire," " Hearts Of Darkness," " Sans Soleil," " American Movie," " Dogtown and Z-Boys," " The Celluloid Closet," " This Film Is Not Yet Rated" and remarkably, any Frederick Wiseman films (though we're not sure of their potential eligibility in a lot of cases). Any other notable ones we've missed out? Just let us know in the comments section.

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10 Great Documentaries That Weren't Nominated For An Oscar

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10 Great Documentaries That Weren't Nominated For An Oscar With " The Act Of Killing," " Cutie and the Boxer" and " The Square" among the nominees, this year's Best Documentary Feature category is one of the strongest we can remember. But that doesn't mean that the Academy got everything right.

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by Greg Mottola - film thesis

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Swingin in the Painter's Room -Short Film

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I got it from you tube I can't take all the credit for it

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Rosamond Purcell, now 74, in a scene from Molly Bernstein's documentary about her. Credit Credit Rosamond Purcell/BOND/360

"An Art That Nature Makes: The Work of Rosamond Purcell" is the portrait of an artist who is not interested in portraits. Early in her career as a photographer, Ms. Purcell remarks, she stopped taking pictures of people. In the years since - she's 74 now - she has established herself as a visual poet of the inanimate, a still-life painter with a camera.

Image

Ms. Purcell's studio. Credit Rosamond Purcell/BOND/360

Not that such descriptions do justice to the extraordinary images sampled in Molly Bernstein's illuminating documentary. As its title and subtitle promise, this film is not principally biographical, though there is some information about Ms. Purcell's childhood and her marriage. Mostly, though, Ms. Bernstein invites us to see the world through the lens of her subject, to explore the sources and methods that yield such striking and marvelous photographs.

Photography turns out to be just one aspect of a creative process that has its roots in the urge to collect and classify objects of all kinds. We accompany Ms. Purcell on several visits to a scrapyard in Owls Head, Me., a 13-acre warren of detritus that is really a work of environmental art in its own right. There she scavenges for wooden duck heads, old bottles and water-damaged books, purchasing them from the owner, William Buckminster, whose devotion to things establishes him as one of Ms. Purcell's kindred souls.

"Snowy Egret." Death and decay figure prominently in Ms. Purcell's photographs. Credit Rosamond Purcell/BOND/360

Others include the filmmaker Errol Morris, who is interviewed, and the Harvard paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould, who collaborated with Ms. Purcell on many books, articles and exhibitions. She is as drawn to systematically organized natural history collections as she is to the anarchy of Mr. Buckminster's junkyard, and especially fascinated by the anomalies and serendipitous patterns that can be found in large accumulations of stuff.

Death and decay figure prominently in her photographs. The phrase "still life" ("dead nature" in French) carries a connotation of mortality, and the objects she chooses exist in various states of preservation or decomposition. There are creatures fished out of formaldehyde, volumes flecked with rot, birds that have been hollowed out and stuffed, household tools battered beyond recognition. The effect of seeing all this is certainly haunting, but too beautiful to be morbid.

Ms. Purcell in her studio. Credit Dennis Purcell/BOND/360

Like film, still photography is a form haunted by its late arrival in history. There are artists who seek to overcome this limitation by simulating what, for example, the movies of the Victorian era might have looked like.

Ms. Purcell, whose work recalls a time when the visual arts were often closely linked to scientific inquiry and philosophical speculation, uses her camera to accomplish a more radical species of time travel. Before seeing Ms. Bernstein's documentary, I had seen and admired some of Ms. Purcell's art, but never taken the full measure of her accomplishment. Now it's clear to me that she is without question our greatest living 17th-century photographer.
"An Art That Nature Makes: The Work of Rosamond Purcell" is not rated. Running time: 1 hour 15 minutes.

Correction:

A picture caption on Wednesday with a film review of "An Art That Nature Makes: The Work of Rosamond Purcell" carried an erroneous credit. The photographs are by Rosamond Purcell/BOND/360, not by Rosamond Purcell/BOND & 360.

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Review: 'An Art That Nature Makes,' an Illuminating Look at Rosamond Purcell

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"An Art That Nature Makes: The Work of Rosamond Purcell" is the portrait of an artist who is not interested in portraits. Early in her career as a photographer, Ms. Purcell remarks, she stopped taking pictures of people.

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Propaganda as Vision: Triumph of the Will 

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Propaganda as Vision: Triumph of the Will 

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by Ken Kelman

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Lumiere Brothers - 1896

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Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat (1896) - LOUIS LUMIERE - L'Arrivee d'un Train a La Ciotat

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Lumiere Brothers - 1895

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Create a new document and edit with others at the same time -- from your computer, phone or tablet. Get stuff done with or without an internet connection. Use Docs to edit Word files. Free from Google.