Reflexive Mode

While in the participatory mode the filmmaker would be engage with a cause showing it to the audience. This mode shows also the filmmaker, but engaging the audience to evaluate the process of doing a documentary. The two films that we watched a great examples of these mode.

The French film Chronicle of a Summer starts showing all the process of displaying a film in the movie theatre. It also portraits the work of the director or cameramen, filming within the film how the cameraman films his subjects. One of the most obvious moments of the reflexive moment is the end of the film when the director has a meeting with all the people he already interviewed. He shows his work to that people and they would comment on his work. At the end of the film he will also make comments about how hard is to make a documentary and his thought about his final product. I found really interesting how the process of evaluating the film was portrait in this film, not as an staged conversation, although it has some previous preparation, but mostly as an evaluation process that help the viewer to understand an value the work of the filmmaker and his own work in display.

Also the film This is Not a Film is another original, and to me not so exiting documentary. I waited for something to happen throughout the film. Because that “wasn’t a film,” nothing happened, but only the hard work and thoughts that this filmmaker was trying to put into his next film or story. The director struggles on telling a story and making a film that is not a film, and to my point of view that is what makes interesting about the film. Although I couldn’t sympathize

 very much with the character, I completely empathize with his situation, and I found terrible to not be able to make a film for so long.

In conclusion, this mode exalts not only the subject but also the people who is involved on telling the story. The reflexive mode put the audience to evaluate and think about the value and the importance of documenting in general.