Documentary Notes What is a documentary? VanderVeen 2024

What is a documentary?

• A. A fictional story created for entertainment

• B. A film or TV program presenting the facts about a person or event

• C. A live performance of a play

• D. A book about historical figures

What were the earliest documentaries in the U.S. and France characterized by?

• Elaborate story-telling and staging

• Being lengthy feature films

• Creative narrative and fictional elements

• Being short newsreels, instructional pictures, or records of current events without creative story-telling

Who were among the first to attempt film-making that can be categorized as documentaries?

• The Coen Brothers

• The Warner Brothers

• The Lumiere Brothers

• The Wright Brothers

What term is used to describe the earliest forms of documentaries that were without any creative story-telling, narrative, or staging?

• Biopics

• Actualities

• Melodramas

• Epics

Documentary Films are considered to be:

• Fictional works of art

• Non-fictional 'slice of life' factual works of art

• Purely entertainment-based films

• Adaptations of novels

What is another term for the style of documentary film-making that is concerned with depicting the everyday lives of people?

• Film noir

• Cinema verite

• Romantic comedy

• Science fiction

What were movie theaters expected to show in the days before television according to the text?

• Only feature films

• Only live entertainment

• A wide range of diversions including live entertainment as well as movies

• Only documentaries

In which century did the film-going habits that the documentary roots in begin?

• The early nineteenth century

• The early twentieth century

• The late twentieth century

• The early eighteenth century

What type of visual material were audiences willing to look at in movie theaters in the early twentieth century?

• Only high-quality visual material

• Only live shows

• Decently made visual material

• Decently and not-so-decently-made visual material

What was the nature of the vast majority of films shown in theaters during the 1890s?

• Fictional stories

• Non-fiction, covering actual events

• Animated features

• Science fiction