IV.6. The Relevance of the Vertov Legacy to the Digital
Revolution:
The Vertov legacy in documentary has
been extensive, and is still growing today.
For example, Vertov was the direct
progenitor of the cinema verite movement
in the 1960s that used new light-weight cameras and equipment to show the world
in ways it had never been shown before, and the name cinema verite itself is a direct translation of Kino Pravda. The influential French New Wave director Jean-Luc Godard was also a
great admirer of Vertov for his ability to fuse political statement with
artistic creativity, and started La
Groupe Dziga Vertov in 1968 with several collegaues to make political films
following the example set by Vertov with Kino
Pravda almost half a century earlier.[1]
His appeal is not limited to the French
nouvelle vague and practitioners of cinema verite. Anyone seriously
interested in the potential of cinema and cinematic language found useful ideas
and observations in Vertov’s works and writings.
His Futurist faith in technology also resonates
today.
In addition to dynamic change, the Futurists
adored modern technology, and Vertov worshipped the film camera and explored
its potential in ways few have ever done. He took his Lumiere camera on trains,
boats, cars and trains, and even underneath trains. He showed intimate moments
of daily life in public places with hidden cameras, experimented with
pixilation and reverse motion, and frequently had reflexive shots of his camera
operator in action. [2]
His documentary feature, “The Man With The Movie Camera” is still
admired as a creative masterpiece, and, most recently, was voted 8th
best film of all time in the 2012 Sight and Sound poll.[3]
This poll included all film genres –
fiction, as well as documentary. In the 21st century, with an
increased interest in documentary due to the rapid proliferation of digital
technology, cinema historians are once again rediscovering the works and
writings of Vertov; after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early
1990’s many of his films have become available
to see on YouTube and elsewhere in the Western world, and English translations
of his writings are also now available to the general public.
Now, fortunately, people can judge his
relevance for themselves, rather than relying on the interpretations of experts
like Ivor Montagu and John Grierson.[4]
IV.7. Towards an Operational Definition of Documentary:
Perhaps it is now time, with the sudden
dominance of digital equipment, to once again resurrect the legacy of Dziga
Vertov and the Cine-Eye aesthetic and see if it can provide criteria for creating
an operational definition for documentary.
The reasoning behind this stems from
necessity, since defining documentary according to content, as many have done,
is simply intellectually and logically impossible; as we have already seen,
such a definition is based on completely subjective variables.
Likewise, any definition of documentary
based on an assumption of the documentarians’ alleged or implicit intentions runs the risk of becoming mired
in even more hopelessly subjective speculation. Indeed, the contemporary debate between documentary
theorists in the Anglophone academic world questioning the very rationale for documentary
has created an intellectual cul-de-sac.
For example, British post-modern documentary theorist Stella
Bruzzi caps an incoherent intellectual broadside against fellow documentary
theorists Linda Williams , Erik Barnouw, Michael Renov and Brian Winston with
the following assertion:”all
documentaries are inherently doomed
to failure…Too often in the past documentary was seen to have failed (or to be
in imminent danger of failing) because it could not be decontaminated of its
representational quality.”[5]
There are fundamental flaws in Bruzzi’s
argument. First of all, she is unable to
quote any documentarian saying that it is his or her creative goal to objectively represent reality, and
therefore can present no empirical support for her thesis. The reason for this is simple:
there are no documentarians of note who have ever said such a thing.
Secondly, Bruzzi also asserts in this
context that it is impossible for a documentarian to record a subject without
the subject being unaware of the process. This statement is demonstrably
untrue, and is even contradicted by the writings and work of Vertov, who
frequently employed hidden camera techniques to catch his subjects “off guard. ”
In his Cine Eyes Field Manual, Vertov writes, ”Filming unawares – an old military rule; gauging, speed, attack”… Vertov
then goes on to list 8 different ways in which the subject can be filmed
unawares.[6]
A more contemporary example of a
documentarian using a hidden camera can be also found in Danish Mads Brugger’s
lively documentary The Ambassador (2012),[7] in
which the director manages to purchase a position as an ambassador from Liberia
to the Central African Republic to see if he can buy conflict diamonds. Much of
the action involves interaction between the fake ambassador and local
dignitaries – all recorded with hidden camera.
In other words, Bruzzi has based her argument
on a demonstrably false premise.
As has been shown, the issue of
documentary’s representation of reality has been an intellectual challenge to a
generation of academic documentary theorists, who, in the words of historical
documentary researcher Dirk Eitzen, have,” tended
to devote their energies to showing how documentaries are constructed or
artificial or ‘fictive’.” [8]
While not wishing to dispute the
philosophical merits of this argument, Eitzen echoes the views of Patricia
Aufderheide when he suggests that these documentary theorists might be better
served if they considered the social impact on audiences of widely seen and
well made historical documentaries such as Claude Lanzmann’s Shoah (1985)[9] and Ken Burns’ Civil War (1990).[10]
Eitzen writes: “Philosophically speaking, reality and our representations of it are
truly ‘incommensurate’. Practically speaking, however, documentarians do have
the power to really put us in touch with our reality – just as “really”, that
is, as our senses put us in touch with reality. We can never know reality, it
is true, but we can very definitely know certain things about it. Evolution has
guaranteed this.”[11]
With the rapid growth of digital technology in documentary,
notions of what is and what is not acceptable representation are changing as
well. Therefore, it would perhaps be more practical to avoid altogether such
highly charged issues such as what constitutes representation and what is the nature of reality when seeking a workable definition of documentary.
If we are going to provide a clear and
concise definition of what is, and what is not, documentary, we need to focus
on how documentaries are made, rather
than what they might or might not depict.
In this context, in his seminal work on documentary
production, “ Directing the Documentary”,
Michael Rabiger observes that the
debate regarding the identity of documentary has largely faded away among
established filmmakers, adding that,” Except
for women’s and gay political issues, academics have largely taken over the
arguments. Little about the original debates has ever been settled, and the
documentary remains a minefield of temptations and possibilities, just as in
the early days... Documentary is a branch of the expressive arts, not a
science.”[12]
Jack C. Ellis and Betsy MacLane, authors of “ A New History of Documentary Film”, offer
a similar response to documentary theorists like Bruzzi : “ However useful they may be for viewers
seeking a deep understanding of the films, the writings of film theorists are
not very much a part of the world of documentary making and watching.”[13]
A simpler methodology for defining
documentary is offered by American media theorist James Monaco ; according to
Monaco, cinematic styles concentrating on what is in front of the camera can be
defined as realist; those cinematic
styles with a focus on what goes on behind the camera he defines as expressionist. For illustrative
purposes, he defines the Lumiere Brothers’s work as realist, and Melies’ work as
expressionist.[14]
There is also significant support for
such an approach in science. As Dr. Rudolf Carnap explains, Werner Heisenberg’s Uncertainty
Principle has forced us to accept
that we live in an indeterminate world, where there is never 100% certainty. For example, there are phenomena which we know
to exist, but which are too small or complex to measure accurately.[15] Scientific phenomena that cannot be defined by
their intrinsic essence, are
sometimes defined according to how
they are measured, in what are called correspondent
or operational definitions.[16]
The British documentary theorist Dai
Vaughan has summarized the essence of Vertov’s Theory as follows: “The cine-camera is endowed with all the
potentialities of human sight – and more. It can peep with unblinking gaze into
every corner of life, observing, selecting and capturing the myriad details of
appearance and transaction which
constitute the reality of our epoch. The camera should, therefore, be used to
record not the simulated emotions of paid actors in locales created by the
plasterer and the set-decorator, but the authentic and unrehearsed behavior of
real people in the streets and houses in which we live. All artifice should be
eliminated, except in the unavoidable process of editing.”[17]
Let us now consider a possible operational
definition of documentary based on what might be termed The Dziga Vertov
Documentary Canon:
1)
DOCUMENTARY
IS AN EXPRESSIVE CINEMATIC ART FORM WHICH CAN CONTAIN IMAGES OF ANYONE OR
ANYTHING, BUT WHICH LOOKS AT THE UNIVERSE WITH A CRITICAL AND CREATIVE EYE.
2)
DOCUMENTARY
CANNOT CONTAIN ANY STAGED OR DRAMATICALLY RE-CREATED VISUAL MATERIAL. IF THERE IS SUCH MATERIAL, AND IT MUST BE USED
OVERTLY. AUTHENTICITY CANNOT BE SUGGESTED WHEN THERE IS NONE.
In reality,
few documentarians are absolute purists on this second point. As documentarians
and all practitioners of cinematic craft know well, there are few absolutes in
cinema; rather, one creates creative goals and then strives to achieve them as
best one can. Fidelity alone to a given set of rules does not determine an
artistic products success or failure. Indeed, the so-called failure may be far
more interesting than the supposed success. Vertov himself admits he violated
his own “rules” on more then one occasion.
Acordingly,
this definition should be seen more as providing stylistic guidelines rather than laws etched in stone – along the
lines of the Danish Dogme-95 Manifesto, which
created an aesthetic without being doctrinaire.[18]
What makes Vertov particularly intriguing as a paradigm for the creation of an
operational definition of documentary is the dialectic between his theory and
his practice – the interplay between his writings and his extensive body of
work. His observations on documentary technique are very detailed, and appear
to be refreshingly honest.
For example, he
himself confesses to some staging and manipulation in his work for practical
production purposes , noting that the goal should be to keep such staging or
manipulation to an absolute minimum. However,
as a documentary producer, Vertov was well aware that, when one has a job to
do, one cannot always be an absolutist; unlike a critic, sometimes it is
necessary for a film producer to compromise to get the job done.
Theoretical
and ideological discussions aside, it is also worth remembering that Vertov’s silent masterpiece, “The Man With The Movie Camera” is
still recognized as being so far ahead of its time in terms of documentary and
cinematic techniques that some critics feel that it could could still serve as
a manual in visual documentary techniques and aesthetics for future
generations.[19]
[1]
Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/dziga.vertov)
[2]
Link to “Kino Pravda, Parts 1-5”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QBKBij5_0c
[3]
Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/dziga_vertov)
[4]
Link to “The Man With the Movie Camera”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Fd_T4l2qaQ
[5]
Stella Bruzzi ( New Documentary) Second
Edition. Routledge, 2006, p. 6
[6]
Hicks Iibid)p. 24
[7]
Link to trailer for “The Ambassador”:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=the+ambassador+trailer&sm=1
[8]
Dirk Eitzen (Against the Ivory Tower – An
Apologia for ‘Popular’ Historical Documentaries) in Rosenthal and Corner( ibid), p. 417
[9]
Link to Part 1 of “ Shoah”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XNIrrJe_7g
[10]
Link to Part 1 of “ The Civil War”: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FN2huQB-DmE
[11]
Eitzen (ibid.) P. 415
[13]
Jack C. Ellis and Betsy A. MacLane ( “ A
New History of Documentary Film”) Continuum Press, 2006. P. 335
[14]
James Monaco (How To Read a Film) Fourth
Edition, Oxford University Press, 2009,p.318
[15]
Rudolf Carnap (The Philosophical
Foundations of Physics) Basic Books, 1966, p.283
[16]
Carnap (ibid.)p.232
[17] From Dai Vaughan’s summary of
Dziga Vertov’s Kino Eye Manifesto in
Lewis Jacobs ( The Documentary Tradition)
Second Edition, WW Norton, 1979, p.53
[18] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogme
[19]
Hicks (ibid.) p.
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