Sensational Documentaries

Godmillow and Shaprio make an interesting point concerning the type of documentary commonly produced today; many of them are sensational in their subject matter and presentation, and many of them portray their "characters" in both tragic and heroic shades. While their effectiveness depends more on the subject matter, I don't believe this to be an inappropriate practice, necessarily. Like any good piece of literature, a movie must be based on an interesting framework or structure, and documentaries are no exception. And there is nothing wrong with the idea of creating a documentary that uses the framework and devices of a fictional story. The best example of this I can think of is a film entitled "Protagonist". Created in 2007, the documentary examines the lives of 4 very different men whose life stories follow the course of Euripides' dramatic structure with remarkable similarity. The story has a plot framework and all four men are portrayed in "tragic" and "heroic" terms. This is what makes the movie so fascinating; the fact that these real-life accounts so closely-- and unknowingly-- resemble a dramatic structure created thousands of years ago. It's help to reinforce the idea that drama should reflect real life, and vice versa. Here, nothing is being manipulated or altered, and the borrowed outline helps to illustrate and important point.