We spend today’s lesson watching a documentary named ‘The Devil Made Me Do It’, which looked at the murder of a Nun, and the murders which happened to be three teenage girls. The documentary looked and raised questions on Marilyn Manson’s influence his music had on the teenager’s state of mind, and essentially what part his music and influence played in the murder of the nun. We took down a few notes whilst watching the documentary, commenting on aspects such as camerawork, narrative structure, mise-en-scene, archive material, editing, graphics, and theme’s and sound. In tomorrows lesson we will be continuing to watch the documentary and discussing our notes to see what opinions others have on the documentary.
The general idea of today’s lesson was to discuss in a lot more depth the aspects of the documentary that made this programme so interesting and thought provoking.
Documentary type : Mixed - the contents consisting of interview, observation and narration
Themes - The effect Marylyn Mansions music had on influencing the teenagers to murder a nun
- binary opposition
- Good Vs Evil (This theme is reinforcing with the use of things like camera work, and lighting. For example when the interview with Manson himself is taking place we see a unique and deliberate lighting technique, with half of his face light up and the other half in darkness)
Camerawork -
. Tracking shots of both women walking underground to catch a train and police men walking towards the camera with the camera tracking backwards.
. Interviews – The interviews were mostly similar in the shots with either close ups, or medium close ups used. The subjects was also famed to either the left or the right of the scene
. Mason’s personal interview – His interview was shot in low angle which contrasts with the normal, straight on angle everyone else is shot in. Maybe this is to give Manson an air of authority and power
.Concert – In the Marylyn Manson live concert the camera man puts himself in the audience as if he was one for the fans. This heightens the experience for the audience watching at home.
.Long shot - At the beginning of the programme we see a long show of a deserted alley way. This signals where the murder takes place? We see a variety of shots of deserted streets or town in either high angle shots or slow pans.
Religious iconography – various shots of stained church windows, crosses,
. Shots of Jesus Christ on the cross – This is very important In that Jesus on the cross is the only other character to be shot in low angle other than Manson. Does this suggest that Manson could control and influence children with him music in the same way Jesus could with his speech?
Mise-En-Scene
. Interviews – The interviews seems to slightly represent and reflect the subject of the interview. For example teenagers in their bedroom together and the couple filmed in two shot on a couch. The subjects are subconsciously revealing a bit it of there lives to the audience.
Chief Police Officer – Carefully constructed mise-en-scene in these shots. The chief’s hat is placed deliberately on the table right in front of the camera. This helps to anchor the relevance the specific person has to the subject matter of the documentary. We are basically seeing the man through his occupation, as he himself is of no relevance.
.Beginning shots and End – The is huge contrast from the beginning of the programme in which we see a beautiful, traditional Italian town shot with slow planning to create an atmosphere of relaxation, to the last show if the teen-filled city with loud cars speeding past. Shows maybe the corruption the town has faced in relation to the trial and murder.
MacDonald’s – We see a shot of Manson being shot going into MacDonald’s with his girlfriend and two security men, This suggests to me that Manson is a powerful manipulator in that his character profile does not fit eating at MacDonald’s however no one seems to be aware in the filming of how hypocritical this gesture is. We do not expect this rage filled, rock and role star that stands for freedom of speech and individuality to be eating at one of the most capitalistic associations in the world. This should remind the audience that Manson is actually just a stage character, and Brian is constantly playing him.
Sound
Music – We hear religious choral music in the beginnings, matched with the slow planning and shots of the traditional Italian city.
Sound effects - background sound effects of for example heart beat, stabbing noises, church bells.
Italian Voice over translation – Each individual voice over in the documentary seems to reflect the gender and ago of a different teen. The voice over had an Italian accent which helps to convey something about the way people speak.
Editing
Cutting – the main editing technique used throughout this documentary is cutting, and cross cutting. Using simple editing techniques like this means the audience can focus on the subject of the programme in more detail instead of stopping and acknowledging the camera work. The audience therefore throughout ‘the Devil Made ME Do It’ are not distracted by fancy editing.
Fade to black – There are a few fades to and from black through out the documentary, these are generally used to show passage of time.
Montage – Before the title appears on the screen the audience see a montage of clips taken from the show. This is simply to grab the audience’s attention and persuade them to watch the whole show.
Archive Material
Manson’s music video
Footage of Italian talk show
Shots and filming of newspaper cuttings
Graphics
Names and date – Graphics were used throughout to inform the audience of the speakers name and of the date.
Introductions – There were graphics used when, usually when a new person was introduced to the documentary. This helped to anchor the meaning the person had to the subject and narrative of the programme.
Time passage – Graphics were also used to present passage of time.
Title – The graphics included in the title where important because already at the very beginning of the programme the theme of juxtaposition and good versus evil is being foreshadowed. The font used for the text has huge connotations of evil; the text is some what gothic and creates weariness. However in contrast to this we see a small image of a cross appear in the title which links to the theme of religion.
All the graphics used where the same bold white text. The graphics were all very plant and were clearly there for the only purpose of proving information. They were deliberately simple as t not attracts the audience’s attention away from the subject or person.
That Thing Analysis
Type of Documentary:
. Mixed – consisting of interviews, achieve material and has the use of a main voice over which holds the whole narrative together.
Theme:
.Power of the Media – In this case we look at the case of computer gaming and the power they have in empowering women.
.Feminism – The documentary looked into the visual appearance of Lara croft. Is there a certain amount of pressure on women to have to perfect appearance? Stereotypically Lara croft has a tiny waist and large chest.
Icons – Representation of women in general.
Narrative Structure:
.Non Linear – no time line involved at all throughout the documentary
.Closed narratives - In that there were no questions left in the audiences mind unanswered.
.Single strand - One consistent narrative running through out the programme.
Camerawork
.Interviews – The documentary showed creativity with the use of camera angles in the interviews. We seen Big close ups in the interview with the creator of Laure Croft, Medium close ups and tilted frames.
.Point of View Tracking shot in the room with a lot of computer gamers.
Mise-En-Scene
.Interviews – the interview with the creator of Lara Croft was treated differently from the other interviews. Cleverly he was presented as an actual computer game character himself, with a computer screen around his face.
.Cromeky – this was used in the back ground of a lot of interviews, with either filed footage or game footage being played in. It is also important that the background was deliberately out of focus, perhaps in an attempt to draw the audiences attention to what is actually in focus.
.Front projection on face of women being interviewed – This is possibly used in order to make the interviewees face appear to be in the game being played in the background. To create this effect the producers would have simply placed a project in front of the interviewees face.
Sound
Voice Over- The voice over is male and speaks in Standard English with young sounding voice. The age of the male providing the voice over is important as it reflects and is appropriate to the contents. It sounds almost as though the voice over man who is the type of person to actually play on of the video games.
Music – When the images are playing into the background there is a lot of music throughout. Throughout the whole programme there is a variety of different music playing. The music played seems reasonably modern, the music in particular convey the idea of a young target audience. We hear dance music that seemed to turn into Madonna’s music track. This Madonna music was used as in relevance to a comment that was mad about her in the programme.
Music from the sounds of the game
Editing
Fast motion – the editing was done as so the camera seemed to be the audience speeding round the room. This was a major example of a point of view tracking shot.
Superimposed – The interviewee was imposed on top of the footage of the game playing in the background during an interview.
Angelina Jolie – Through the programme we see snaps of an interview with her, the editing is clever in that the interview is filmed in medium close up, however there was one part which showed a close up f her face.
Cut - Throughout the short documentary there was a fair few amounts of simple editing techniques used, for example the use of cutting. This is to not draw the audience’s attention away from the subjects or person in the documentary.
Archive Materials
Website shots
Fan Forum
Recorder emails on screen
Extracts from the game
Nike advert
Angelina Jolie – Footage of an interview with Angelina Jolie.
Graphics
Conventional – There was a conventional use of graphics throughout the documentary, for example the way that the graphics appeared on the opposite side of the screen of that with he person was on.
Interestingly the graphics were specific in the use of no capital letters at all. However the name of the person appearing in the documentary’s name was in larger font, and then occupation or relevance the person played to the subject of the documentary was in smaller font.
Title – the title was in speech bubbles, this suggest discussion and is unique for the programme.
The Music Biz
In today’s lesson we began watching a new documentary, this time one based on the music business and also marketing, in particular Meatloaf. After spending all of today’s lesson watching the programme we will think about the theme, type of documentary, narrative structure and other features tonight and then make notes on it in tomorrow’s lesson.Type of documentary
Mixed – Voice over
- actuality footage
- interviews
Themes-
- Marketing
- the music industry
- manipulation of audiences
- power of the media
- the way meatloaf’s image is sued to influence the buyers
Narrative Structure
- Non Linear
- Single stand
- Closed narrative
Camera work
- Low angle shots in board room
- Interviews use conventional camera work – close up or media close up used, other than in the interview with one man who sits side ways. Filmed in profile which felt strange and unconventional to the audience because we can not see his face, no eye contact is being made. This proves that the conventional rules have been broken.
- Hand held – Actuality footage – Camera is observing the press
- Point of view shot – the person holding the camera shows there VIP pass in front of the camera and to the bouncer. This gives the audience a feeling of exclusivity.
- Zoom and Pan - especially on still images – creative and interesting when the image is slowly revealed. This happened in images such as magazine covers and posters.
- Handheld – Part of press conference. We are not observing the media here, we are part of it.
Mise-En-Scene
- Chromakey – more commonly know as blue screen or green screen. This is used as a background throughout interviews and ensures the interview setting is relevant to what is being spoken about. The background is overlaid behind the subject’s interview.
Sound
- voice over –male, Standard English. Holds the narratives together
- sound effects, E.G heartbeat
- Music – tense sounding music in background
- No sound in the background when the interviews are taking place and all questions have been edited out. This ensures not to distract audience listening.
Editing
- Cut – most commonly used throughout, simple editing keeps the audience paying attention to the subject.
- Dissolve – man dissolves in and out of interview
- Spinning Effect – used on newspaper and magazine shots
- Montage
- Fast motion – outside HMV. Public walking past in fast motion
- Slow motion – On meatloaf
Graphics
- Unique title
- Used to introduce new people to the documentary – normally displaying persons name and occupation
- Anchors relevance the person has to the topic
- Plain, simple, bold - Not to distract attention
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