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On Documentary
Book
- GenresFilmNonfiction
411 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1946
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About the author
John Grierson
15 books11 followersJohn Grierson was a pioneering Scottish documentary maker, often considered the father of British and Canadian documentary film. In 1926, he coined the term "documentary" in a review of Robert Flaherty's Moana.
Grierson graduated from the University of Glasgow with a Master of Arts in English and moral philosophy in 1923. He was awarded a Rockefeller Research Fellowship to study in the United States at the University of Chicago, and later at Columbia and the University of Wisconsin–Madison. His research focus was the psychology of propaganda - the impact of the press, film, and other mass media on forming public opinion.
In 1927, Grierson was employed as an Assistant Films Officer of the Empire Marketing Board (EMB), a governmental agency which had been established in 1926 to promote British world trade and unity throughout the empire. In late 1929 Grierson completed his first film, Drifters, which he wrote, produced and directed. The film, which follows the heroic work of North Sea herring fishermen, was a radical departure from anything being made by the British film industry or Hollywood.
In his essay First Principles of Documentary (1932), Grierson argued that the principles of documentary were that cinema's potential for observing life could be exploited in a new art form; that the "original" actor and "original" scene are better guides than their fiction counterparts to interpreting the modern world; and that materials "thus taken from the raw" can be more real than the acted article. In this regard, Grierson's views align with the Soviet filmmaker Dziga Vertov's contempt for dramatic fiction as "bourgeois excess", though with considerably more subtlety.
Grierson graduated from the University of Glasgow with a Master of Arts in English and moral philosophy in 1923. He was awarded a Rockefeller Research Fellowship to study in the United States at the University of Chicago, and later at Columbia and the University of Wisconsin–Madison. His research focus was the psychology of propaganda - the impact of the press, film, and other mass media on forming public opinion.
In 1927, Grierson was employed as an Assistant Films Officer of the Empire Marketing Board (EMB), a governmental agency which had been established in 1926 to promote British world trade and unity throughout the empire. In late 1929 Grierson completed his first film, Drifters, which he wrote, produced and directed. The film, which follows the heroic work of North Sea herring fishermen, was a radical departure from anything being made by the British film industry or Hollywood.
In his essay First Principles of Documentary (1932), Grierson argued that the principles of documentary were that cinema's potential for observing life could be exploited in a new art form; that the "original" actor and "original" scene are better guides than their fiction counterparts to interpreting the modern world; and that materials "thus taken from the raw" can be more real than the acted article. In this regard, Grierson's views align with the Soviet filmmaker Dziga Vertov's contempt for dramatic fiction as "bourgeois excess", though with considerably more subtlety.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
May 23, 2020
This book starts promisingly enough, starting with an overview of the author’s own Drifters, a 1929 documentary about the United Kingdom's herring fishery, then moves into reviews of the major filmmakers from Russia, England, the United States, with a focus on the documentary makers and the docco form. The first six chapters are very good, although the writing is a bit ‘stolid’ and longwinded.
The later chapters of the book are from the second World War (with a couple set after in a diaphanous late 50s to mid 60s period that isn't) and offer discussion of the creation of the National Film Board in Canada, but mostly they are about propaganda and how to fund propaganda and the progress of propaganda and how propaganda might work to better the world by educating and uniting its communities. Cool in theory, or at least interesting, but we know the practice didn’t quite meet its goals. It’s interesting to see how little progress has been made with these big issues, and how much hope the ‘cutting edge’ (actually, one edge behind television, but whatever) had for a bright future before it too dimmed.
The author makes salient points about how the educational aspirations of the late 19th century, which idealized every worker as a poetry-reading gentleman in a library in off hours (o, you laudable but mad ideal) were replaced by more worldly and practical issues in the 20th. There is plenty of food for thought in this book.
So it’s very interesting, and although generally not fun to read, this book was clearly written by an authority. From a historical standpoint this is a very valuable and intriguing text, though as I am not a filmmaker I can’t speak to that aspect, but I found it interesting enough. Readability suffers from a certain longwindedness… but I suppose it is authentically the voice of Grierson and it is never unfocused, and so good for a’ that.
Recommended for documentarists, cinema and film types, and history enthusiasts with nothing better to read.
The later chapters of the book are from the second World War (with a couple set after in a diaphanous late 50s to mid 60s period that isn't) and offer discussion of the creation of the National Film Board in Canada, but mostly they are about propaganda and how to fund propaganda and the progress of propaganda and how propaganda might work to better the world by educating and uniting its communities. Cool in theory, or at least interesting, but we know the practice didn’t quite meet its goals. It’s interesting to see how little progress has been made with these big issues, and how much hope the ‘cutting edge’ (actually, one edge behind television, but whatever) had for a bright future before it too dimmed.
The author makes salient points about how the educational aspirations of the late 19th century, which idealized every worker as a poetry-reading gentleman in a library in off hours (o, you laudable but mad ideal) were replaced by more worldly and practical issues in the 20th. There is plenty of food for thought in this book.
So it’s very interesting, and although generally not fun to read, this book was clearly written by an authority. From a historical standpoint this is a very valuable and intriguing text, though as I am not a filmmaker I can’t speak to that aspect, but I found it interesting enough. Readability suffers from a certain longwindedness… but I suppose it is authentically the voice of Grierson and it is never unfocused, and so good for a’ that.
Recommended for documentarists, cinema and film types, and history enthusiasts with nothing better to read.
Displaying 1 of 1 review