1a-) Bloody Sunday (Greengrass, 2001) shows the story of the peaceful march incident on 30 January 1972. In Blaney’s essay, she states Bloody Sunday presents itself as a counterfeit document. The main reason of her statement is that, Bloody Sunday specifies itself to viewers as a docudrama style film. In order to make Bloody Sunday a counterfeit document, Greengrass replicates the real footages and iconographic photographs.
Photograph is a frozen moment without story however in Bloody Sunday, the Greengrass injects time to particular iconographic photographs such as the moment of the marching crowd or the moment of the father waving white and bloody handkerchief as a peaceful sign to reach wounded man. Bloody Sunday reaches the level of a cultural memory of the historical incident by merits of the intimacy of its reenactments. In order to make Bloody Sunday more docudrama film, the Greengrass gives role to nonprofessional actors such as real soldiers or veterans and this clever way of filming increases its realism.
Furthermore the Greengrass shows the known historical incident as it really happens even so the other versions shows the historical event in nicer way. All factors above are the main reasons of why Blaney expresses Bloody Sunday as a counterfeit document. This filming style corroborates the ideas and brings them back to that moment for the informed viewer on the other hand for the uninformed viewer, it provides the basis information of the history of incident. 1b-) In order to develop particular film style, Blaney evokes two essential techniques in her essay which are acting, and camera movement.
In this case, particular film style means docudrama style film. In addition the transition techniques are crucial for docudrama style films in order to convey the message. In Bloody Sunday, Greengrass gives role to unprofessional actors to re-enact the historical moment and performs the scenes where soldiers film without knowing how the scenes are going to be or without any former knowledge. This kind of acting makes film more professional because the real job of nonprofessional actor is being soldier and they already know how to act as soldier and also this kind of acting show the historical credibility of Bloody Sunday.
We can see the benefit of using real soldier in radio talk scenes and we can see how unprofessional actors act perfectly as a soldier. In Blaney’s essay she states that the decision of Greengrass which is casting professional soldiers that are unprofessional actors is the most important key the success of Bloody Sunday. This decision that made Greengraas gives viewers historical credibility and make Bloody Sunday more authentic. All these factors above increases the quality of docudrama style film and make Bloody Sunday different from other nicer versions.
Besides the acting, conveying the action of incident is essential for docudrama style films. Greengrass transmits the action with using camera style. The camera technique that Greengrass uses is handheld recording. In her essay, she explains “digital, handheld cameras recording high-speed, televisual sequences as they closely monitor the Paras recreate the “liveness” of the historical event. ” (Blaney, 2007) This recording technique includes viewer into historical incident. The scene when soldiers runs, viewers feel like they are running behind the soldier moreover the scene when rebels are dogging bullets viewers also are dogging bullets.
All of these above makes film more realistic and increases the quality of docudrama style film. On the other hand we cannot see any perfect frame in Bloody Sunday because the main factor is catching and being part of In addition there are no fancy color in Bloody Sunday as a matter of fact colors in Bloody Sunday are desaturated. There are two major transition techniques that are fade in/fade out and cross cutting these helps viewers to understand and catch the important scenes easily in docudrama film style. 2-) Come and See (Klimov, 1985) delivers viewers flawlessly the effect on World War 2 on adolescent boy.
Klimov uses close-ups and low-angle shots frequently as cinematography technique. He also uses lots of diegetic sounds as sound technique. Come and See also has a characteristic of a perturbative and ruined landscape which filmed in blurry color. Come and See is stunningly sincere with viewers due to close-ups and low angles. In one particular scene when Flor becomes numbs by the portrait of Adolf Hitler which is floating in a pond, Klimov uses low angle shot. Showing the dominance of Flor against Hitler to viewers is the main strategy here. With the close up shot viewers can see the anger and hate of Flor against Hitler.
Klimov also adds bunch of German military montage to film while Flor is shooting portrait of Hitler. At the end of montage Flor stops and viewers see the baby Hitler Klimov shots Flor’s face with close ups and viewer can see his emotion. At the end of scene, question raises in viewers head “Does Flor have a right to shot baby Hitler? ” The cinematography technique that Klimov uses leaves the answer to viewers. Moreover Klimov uses tracking shot with Steadicam in scene that Flor walking towards his burned dad and viewers watch the scene from his point of view.
The main strategy of tracking shot with Steadicam is to integrate viewers with the scene here. All the strategies that Klimov uses above explains how he uses cinematography, Klimov uses lots of disturbing and unpleasant sound to show the viewers the effect of ruthlessness of war on adolescent boy. Viewer still can hear that irritating sound after 20 minutes. In the scene that Glasha and Flor meet for the first time Klimov uses diegetic sound. First they see the aircraft and then they hear the sound without knowing its source. This ambiguousness gives alert them and viewers and they start running.
That is the main strategy here to make viewers more attentive. Then Flor becomes partial deaf after bombing and Klimov forces viewers to hear irritating bombing sound till Flor sees his burned father. Viewers still hear the sound in swamp scene thus viewers understand the Flor’s suffering. With the using diegetic sound that long Klimov achieves to pass the madness of war to the viewers. Also when Flor sees his burned father, diegetic sound hits again in his head with the sound of baby screams and the sounds of crying people. Klimov transmits the Flor’s pain to viewers. Klimov films Come and See in very foggy landscape.
Viewers see lots of unprofessional camerawork. In Come and See, it is really hard to talk about lightning. This is the way he films. This strategy makes film more realistic in viewers’ eyes. For the makeup viewers can see the dramatic change in Flor face and they can interpret how war makes adolescent boy older in few month. They can see the pressure and the stress on Flor easily. All the strategies that Klimov uses above represents the how he implements cinematography, sounds, and mise-en-scene in his film to see audiences differently. 3-) Schindler List (Spielberg, 1993) shows the story of the businessman
