Documentaries

I think documentaries can be incredibly fascinating or make you suicidal from boredom. That's my experience. They're such a specific kind of filmmaking and sometimes the best stories are told through this technique. This will be an interesting section, since I am in the documentary class with Dr. Clark. I've had to make a series of short docs under two minutes, and it's pretty enjoyable editing it together. You get to pick out the highlights and create a concise story. At least you try to.

One of my all time favorite movies is "Waiting for Guffman." It's a mockumentary from the creators of Spinal Tap, and one of the funniest films I've ever seen. I just watched "Thin Blue Line" yesterday, and that was featured today in class. I usually like Morgan Spulock's work as well. I think he has pushed docs into being entertaining and still educational. He is really honing in his storytelling techniques.

Docs are also great because you can learn something without reading an entire book. Personally I think they can sometimes be even more educational than some non-fiction books.


Here's a short documentary I did for a show called alt.news at my old school. It's a magazine style show that lets you know about off-the-wall stories you wouldn't normally get on the news. I produced, edited  etc, all of it. The original interview was about 18 minutes long. I had nothing to do with the bookmark segments with the puppet. This aired on PBS to three states and about 1 million people.