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September 3, 2005
Penguins Against Bears
Stephen Holden's New York Times article, "A Reprieve for Reality," reviews the continued popularity of documentary films. Holden notes that March of the Penguins, which I still haven't seen, has now surpassed Bowling for Columbine as the second-highest grossing documentary of all-time. Holden then compares March's somewhat "Disneyfied" portrayal of the penguins' annual against-the-elements trek to Werner Herzog's Grizzly Man, which portrays suburban surfer-hippie Timothy Treadwell's somewhat misguided attempts to protect grizzlies from the humans he believes wish to destroy the bears.
Holden's main point is to note that the continued popularity of the documentary might reflect a larger cultural wariness regarding the triviality of celebrity culture, a desire for "reality" in the face of reality television's silly twisting of the meaning of that term:
These movies challenge audiences to examine reality at a moment when the very term has been warped beyond recognition by reality television. This has been the summer in which mass culture, in its search for new commercial distractions, reached a dangerous tipping point. There is a sense of exhaustion in the air, as though the accumulation of cultural debris, celebrity worship and meaningless competitions had reached a critical mass.Holden asks some interesting questions here. I don't think that the popularity of today's documentaries, including the explicitly politcal ones, can be attributed to a single factor. The "Orwellian political environment," which I take to include not only the Bush administration itself but also the deregulated news media, is certainly a factor, but I think the sense of "exhaustion" he describes is probably far more important, especially now that we are beginning to grasp the real human catastrophe taking place in Louisiana and Mississippi, something I'm still not sure I know how to write about, in part because the event exceeds my ability to understand and represent it.How much longer can we continue to live inside a bubble where Jennifer Aniston's broken heart and Tom Cruise's public meltdown compete with the war in Iraq, famine in Sudan and the catastrophe in New Orleans as headline news stories?
Are the fame-seeking narcissists who swarm through reality television shows an accurate mirror of who we have become as a people? Or are they an illusion marketed by hucksters who cleverly play on a creeping self-disgust, then devise fresh new camouflage to mask that deepening sense of revulsion?
The relationship of reality television to the rise of the documentary is another question to ponder. Did reality television prepare the way for the new popularity of the documentary? Or is the increasing popularity of documentaries a response to the Orwellian political climate.
It's probably worth adding that documentaries can be made very cheaply, and with Final Cut Pro and similar technologies, barriers of technological mastery are somewhat lower than in the past. The lower production costs allow filmmakers to take some chances with the material.
Posted by chuck at September 3, 2005 1:34 PM
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Comments
I might also add a couple of other industrial factors that might account for a renewed popular interest in documentaries. There are more screens around the country, and it's less risky for a megaplex to squeeze in a doc than it would be for a theater with fewer screens. Also, now that most films get the bulk of their revenue from DVD sales, it seems like niche films like "independents" and foreign films have a theatrical run simply to get notices in the New York Times and other prestige outlets. If a niche film like MOTP does do well at the box office, it can step up to broader exhibition. These aren't new factors, but it seems like they contribute to high-grossing documentaries.
All that aside, here's another perspective on MOTP.
Posted by: McChris at September 3, 2005 5:07 PM
You're right about the number of screens--I think that's a major factor, and the documentary "niche" is very marketable right now. But there's something else that I've been thining about in terms of documentary: You comment that "niche films like 'independents' and foreign films have a theatrical run simply to get notices in the New York Times and other prestige outlets." I think that's certainly true. Gunner Palace and Tarnation, among others, received a huge boost from articles by Frank Rich and A. O. Scott.
But what I find interetsing is the fact that these films have the potential to re-set the discussion of certain political issues, most notably the politics of images. Even if people aren't seeing the films themselves, I think they can be drawn into the dialogue they engender.
I loved "Michael Bay's" editorial. Really fantastic.
Posted by: Chuck ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://chutry.wordherders.net/nav-commenters.gif)
at September 3, 2005 6:17 PM
Grizzly Man: great movie!
Posted by: W.C. Varones at September 4, 2005 12:08 AM