helena t ř eštíková’s documentary film presentation of the project: helena t ř...

Helena Třeštíková’s Documentary Film

Presentation of the project:Helena Třeštíková’s Documentary Film –

Beginning and development of long – term observational documentary in Czech

documentary cinematography

Dissertation seminar December 2009

Masaryk University, Faculty of Arts

Department of Film Studies and Audiovisual Culture

Tutor: PhDr. Jaromír Blažejovský, Ph.D.

Student: Maša Hilčišin


Aim of the Project:

Research and analyse Helena Třeštíková 's long-term method in observational documentary filmmaking including author's involvement in documentaries dealing with social issues, which is characterised by Třeštíková 's use of specific approaches and elements through relation to the social subject, time collecting, presentation of social subjects and social issues in documentary films, as well as the influence of this method on the specific articulation of various social issues.



Reasons for choosing the subject:

Helena Třeštíková’s specific documentaristic approaches

Social involvement and activism dealing with various social issues

Examinations and researches on women characters

Influences on other cinematographersEthical considerations of long-term observational

mode


Some of the questions that project is dealing with:

To what extent author can develop relation with social subject and how do we protect the film from possible glorification of crime or violence?

To what extent author can be involved in observational documentary filmmaking (includes questions during filming, author appearance in the film during shooting, author’s involvement in helping her social subjects)?

How does the author treats people in the film? How do we recognize if someone in the film have been

exploited during filming or how do we recognize that author is capturing real social subject and they are not acting just because camera or author is there?


State of theoretical researches:

Paul Rotha Documentary is a form which is 'beyond the simple

descriptive terms of the teaching film, more imaginative and expressive than the specific publicity picture, deeper in meaning and more skillful in style than the news-reel, wider in observation than the travel picture or lecture film, more profound in implication and reference than the plain 'inerest' picture‘

Documentaries developed according to the following different traditions: naturalist, realist, news-reel, and propagandist tradition



Richard Meran BarsamDocumentary film a 'creative treatment of

actuality’Classification of nonfiction films into the

following groups: travel films, educational, training, or classroom films, and news-reels



Bill Nichols Documentary is a representation of the world we

already occupy. It stands for a particular view of the world, one we may never have encountered before, even if the aspects of the world that is represented are familiar to us

Identification of six modes of representation that function something like sub-genres of the documentary film genre itself: poetic, expository, participatory, observational, reflexive, and performative


Historical background of observational mode of representation:

Developed in Canada, Europe, and the United States, in the period after WWII, reached its culmination during the 1960s with the documentaries 'Primary' (Robert Drew, 1960), and 'Chronicle of Summer' (Jean Rouch, 1962)

Adoption of portable, synchronous sound 16 mm motion picture equipment, complemented by faster film stocks for indoor and night-time shooting produced new labels ‘cinema direct’ and ‘cinéma-vérité

Direct cinema suggesting observational methods, and cinéma-vérité a more confrontational approach, filmmaker operating as participant observer, most characteristic of French cinéma-vérité


Specifics and methodology of the project

The research and analysis will deal with several areas:

methodology of workdocumentary voiceactivist-social involvementethical issues


Specifics and methodology of the project

The methodology will include: Content analysis of different discourses and

contextsComparative analysis of different theoretical

studies, works, and documentary works An interview with Helena TřeštíkováAnalysis of the corpus of Helena Třeštíková’s

documentaries


Specifics and methodology of the project:

• To analyse and define characteristics of long- term observational documentaries (absence of a real ending of the film, the selection and following of characters, further development of the documentary story, uncertainty, and other characteristics of this documentary mode)

• To research ambiguity and methods of work on documentary film: finding persons/subjects, observation and monitoring of people's lives, involvement of psycho-social context, introducing of new term 'collecting of memory', specifics of chosen social topics, activist-social involvement

• To define specifics of directors voice and social observational documentary

• To define specifics and dynamics of changes in narration and social discourse of documentary films filmed within different periods and places

• To analyse central ethical issues on long – term social observational documentaries.

Bibliography

• Aitken, Ian. Encyclopedia Of The Documentary Film – Volumes I-III. London: Routledge, 2005• Barnouw, Erik. Documentary: A History of the Non-Fiction Film. New York: Oxford University

Press, 1974• Barsam, Richard Meran. Nonfiction Film: A Critical History. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd.,

1974• Bruzzi, Stella. Contemporary Documentary: A Critical Introduction. London: Routledge, 2000• Ellis, Jack C, McLane, Betsy A. A New History of Documentary Film. New York: Continuum, 2006• Gillian, Rose. Visual Methodologies: An Introduction to the Interpretation of Visual Materials,

London: Sage Publications, 2001• Hicks, Jeremy. Dziga Vertov: Defining Documentary Film. London: I.B. Tauris&Company,

Limited, 2007• Hovorka, Marek. Slováková, Andrea. Časosběr vzbuzoval pocit ohrožení a neklidu: Rozhovor s

Helenou Třeštíkovou, http://www.literarky.cz, 2008• Nichols, Bill. Representing Reality. Indiana University Press, 1991• Nichols, Bill. Introduction to Documentary. Indiana University Press, 2001• Rotha, Paul. Documentary Film. London: Faber and Faber, Ltd., 1951• Saunders, Dave. Direct Cinema: Observational Documentary and the Politics of the Sixties.

London: Wallflower Press, 2007• Smith, Geoffrey Nowell. The Oxford History of World Cinema. Oxford University Press, 1996• Škapová, Zdena. Technical University of Liberec. Jaký byl a jaký je hrdina českého dokumentu :

manželské etudy: zásadní projekt Heleny Třeštíkové, Technical University of Liberec, 2006• Třeštíková, Helena. Časosběrná metoda v dokumentárním filmu• Turner, Graeme. Film As Social Practice, London: Routledge, 1999• Waldman, Diane. Walker, Janet. Feminism and Documentary. University of Minnesota Press,

1999

Presentation of the project:

Helena Třeštíková’s Documentary Film – Beginning and development of long – term observational documentary in Czech documentary cinematography

Dissertation seminar December 11, 2009

Thank you for your time!

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