What is a documentary

A documentary film is a nonfictional motion picture intended to Document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record. Documentaries are a very good and successful way of learning about various subject matters. these ranging from animals to space. There are many different documentaries based on the same topic area, however depending on how it is films and the way it has been shown can give the viewer many facts, details and perspectives on that particular subject. 

Documentaries are a very strong way of showing people lots of different facts and  information about all kinds of subjects matters. Documentaries can be made based on any topic, i have seen documentaries varying from world wars to a pizza delivery guy. However no matter what the documentary is about it will always have these key features 

• Interviews with various different people
• Archive footage
• Key facts 
• voice overs
• reenactments
• written text

Documentaries are a way of showing the world things of the past in a different perspective. many documentaries will of had their story told. but told by the news or even a book or magazine article. however these would of been told the time of the incident or subject matter. having no time for the real details. Documentaries are a way of an individual film maker and their crew to research one topic looking deeper into it for many years, they will interview many different people views and opinions on it all using past facts finding more facts to tell the story. 

Documentaries can be a very bias way also of showing the world something, the film maker has done many years of collaborating different fact and different views, but is the truth really what they want to show? yes some documentaries are just all facts and figures about one topic area and you can tell that it is just an 'untold' story. Some film makers may leave some of these facts out or even edit their film differently to give a different perspective. The perspective they want to get across. But there argument, or neutrality, is accurately grounded. 

Documentaries can vary in time, some can be 5 minutes long and some can be 2 hours long. The longer documentaries will be, mainly the big topics areas they are.  A documentary however only becomes a documentary if it has a story, storytelling comes across in documentaries, you can tell people the facts, but documentaries show this about someone life or an event they will go from the beginning to the end, the middle is mainly the main event, what people want to find out about.

During this unit i have watched many different documentaries, studying the different formats in which they have been laid out and the similarities between them. However one producer has produced what i feel a very simple but fascinating documentaries, the way they are filmed and documented make them suitable for any age. David Attenborough was the producer that i felt captured his subject very professionally.

He is best known for writing and presenting the nine Life Series, in conjunction with the BBC Natural History Unit, which collectively form a comprehensive survey of all life on the planet. His documentaries are on nature, he has many many small documentaries about 45 minutes long. Attenborough is the writer producer and narrator or all his documentaries, throughout his career he has spend many years collecting all the filming and information he needs to collect to produce his work.