HOW TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE

I'll keep it short for this week's post, in part because you have no reading assignment in Crafting Truth. I would love for you to watch How to Survive a Plague on Netflix Instant, mostly because I'm curious to know what you think of this film, particularly about the way it uses archival footage to tell its incredibly potent and ultimately life-affirming story.

Write whatever you'd like this week, but please remember to support your assertions by referencing specific moments, scenes or sequences from the film. And if, in your reply, you can address concepts of Authenticity, Authority, Evidence, Responsibility and how they relate to your understanding and appreciation of How to Survive a Plague - all the better.

Good luck, and please remember to post your response both here and on Moodle by no later than Wednesday morning at 9am!

TABLOID

We're jumping ahead a bit in Crafting Truth this week to Chapter 9: The Profilmic, which deals with the creative treatment of reality and the ways in which visual display can be used to generate meaning. In honor of this chapter, please watch the documentary Tabloid on Netflix Instant and consider how its style and sensibility, as well as its main nonfictional performer - contributes to the meaning of the film.

Errol Morris is one of the most influential filmmakers working today. Before his death, Roger Ebert wrote, "After twenty years of reviewing films, I haven't found another filmmaker who intrigues me more...Errol Morris is like a magician, and as great a filmmaker as Hitchcock or Fellini.”

Write whatever you'd like, but please be sure to address your feelings about the way Tabloid utilizes the aesthetics of filmmaking to tell its story (Morris himself says Tabloid is in many ways a story about the way stories are told). Is the film authentic? Was the filmmaker responsible to its subject and main character?  Would you have made it differently? If so, how?

Finally, do you think the film's main subject Joyce McKinney was right to file a lawsuit against Morris (article here) and travel around the country attending several screenings in protest (even more amazing article here)? Needless to say, this story is a hoot, Morris is a genius, and I look forward to discussing both with you in more detail when we next meet.

In the meantime, I hope you enjoy Tabloid and can't wait to read your thoughts about the film and its aesthetics - by no later than 9 am on Wednesday of course.

ROOM 237

This week's reading in Crafting Truth (Chapter 6: Dramatic, Poetic and Essay Documentaries) looks at two types of non-fiction films: those that use dramatic conventions to tell their stories, and those that, as the book states, "aim at developing experimental or poetic ways of arranging story information."

Some documentaries - called "essays" - contradict the assumption that the world can be known in a definitive way. The "essay" film shifts the focus from the end product of the investigative effort to the process by which knowledge is created. To speak metaphorically, it is the movement, not the destination, that matters the most.

Consider this as you watch Rodney Ascher's fascinating 2012 film Room 237 on Netflix Instant. What specifically about the story - poetically or otherwise - resonated with you? Is the film dramatic? Is it poetic? One thing's for sure: Ascher's film draws attention not only to the various theories and hidden meanings in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining but goes further to reveal the subjectivity of the documentary maker and the subjective nature of knowledge and understanding itself.

I look forward to reading your answers to those questions, along with the rest of your comments, here (and on Moodle) by Wednesday morning at 9 am.

PARK AVENUE: MONEY, POWER AND THE AMERICAN DREAM

The Crafting Truth chapter you're reading this week (titled "Argument") states that "Documentaries have an overall structure that helps determine the way the socioshistorical world is transposed on the screen. And it is because of this structure that we understand the 'messages' in the film."

For this week's post, please watch Park Avenue: Money, Power and the American Dream on Netflix Instant and let me know what you think. In particular, let me know what you think the film's argument is, and please provide details about how the director Alex Gibney structures that argument. What is the message in the film? Is Park Avenue authentic? Does it present its evidence with authority?

Have fun watching and writing - and make sure your comments are posted by no later than Wednesday at 9 am!