This is the first entry of my listening diary, one of a few that I will be working on this term. With each entry, I explore Nichols’ different modes of documentary, and evaluate them in terms of how successful I believe they are within their respective modes, and how I believe they have been successful or unsuccessful in entertaining and gripping the audience. I hope that through this process I can draw from these evaluations to guide me in my own practice as a documentarian. This week I listened to Ghetto Life 101, an interesting perspective from a couple of boys, LeAlan Jones and Lloyd Newman, who reside in Brooklyn, and go around the streets interviewing people on their various family situations and consequences of living in a city dogged with crime and poverty. I also listened to Remorse, and both are situated in the observatory documentary mode. According to Nichols (2001) within this mode, the documentarians are able to document life in a less intrusive manner, leaving the social actors free to act and the documentarians free to record without interacting with each other.
The success of Ghetto Life 101 as a documentary is down to the boys’ approach. He is not afraid to ask questions that can stir emotions. Asking questions such as ‘do you think you’ve been a good father’, allows for extremely engaging conversations and emotional responses. When one of them asked about their father, the answer was ‘he’s probably dead’ which is emotionally moving. Also, images are created and depicted very well, especially when they walks into homes, knocks on doors, searching for interviews, and making this part of the documentary process. It allows the audience to feel that they are with the boys. There is also a very good variation of voices, such as the background tracks, and the singing at the end. This variation allows the audience to stay interested.
In listening to Remorse, I also took note of the great images that this documentary creates for the audience. For instance, there is footage of knocking on doors, which wouldn’t normally be accepted as good audio material. Also, footage including the difficulty of finding interview sources also displays the image of frustration and lack of sympathy for the story of Eric Morse. Again like Ghetto 101, the variation of sounds is used very cleverly, and the background song sets an apt mood.
After reading ‘Poetry on the Margins’ by Reese Elrich, it is clear that he believes that although it is important to cover the stories such as the ones told on Ghetto Life 101, it is wrong to suggest that these lives are general to the whole area of Brooklyn- it stereotypes Brooklyn as a poverty stricken, crime ridden place, where in fact there may be families living there that are happy and safe. “Ultimately, it will be argued that while the radio documentaries are limited in the degree to which they counter stereotypes and demand accountability and justice, they help promote social solidarity and empathy while serving as a model for journalism as a whole,” (Erlich, 2001). He suggests that this is just another case of telling the sad story of a few lives and generalising it to a stereotypically portrayed poor city. “News issues ‘are more likely to be pursued in depth if they portray flaws in the public” (Elrich, 2001). So again, whilst this is an informative story, a wider range of sources and viewpoints would make this a far more accountable story to tell on Brooklyn as a city. “The question is whether an independent journalist who works in a different medium is better able to produce ‘multiracial coverage’ that ‘promotes social understanding and alleviates unwarranted fears based on prejudices’ while paving the way for social change” (Elrich, 2001).
However, as mentioned above, this is a fantastically vivid portrayal of the way life is in Brooklyn for some people. I believe the ‘observational mode’ approach was useful for both documentaries in allowing a less intrusive and more open account of a variety of sources. Next week, I will be commenting on the documentaries of the Soweto Uprisings.
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