This course offers an overview of the major modes of documentary filmmaking and the fundamental theoretical questions that they both raise and attempt to respond to. Films are drawn from a range of periods and countries, and have been selected to illustrate the central theme or question of each lecture. Although the syllabus follows a roughly chronological framework (with the main film often juxtaposed with excerpts from more recent ones), our goal in this course will not be so much to comprehensively survey the history of the documentary, but rather to explore the way the category of “documentary” itself is constructed, and the historical and cultural factors that determine the way in which documentaries purport to give us access to the “real world.”
- Teacher: Michael Cramer