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Lumiere brothers' 'actualities'
L'arrivée d'un train à La Ciotat
Documentary genre began when the first films were invented by the Lumiere brothers in 1895. The Lumieres created a camera that could only hold 50 feet of film stock and their films called 'actualities' were short unedited clips capturing the life around them e.g train coming into a station or workers leaving a factory. -
Dziga Vertov issues a manifesto
Russian filmmaker Vertov insists that the future of cinéma depends on reporting the truth. In 1922, he began to produce Kino Pravda (literally "Film Truth"), a series of news reportage films that foreshadowed both later newsreels and later documentary styles, including cinéma vérité . -
Robert Flaherty films "Nanook Of The North"
Nanook Of The North is generally cited as the first feature-length documentary. The film employs many of the conventions of later documentary and ethnographic filmmaking, including use of third-person narration and subjective tone, and a focus on an indigenous person as the film's hero. -
John Grierson coins the term "documentary."
John Grierson , a young Scottish academic pursuing an interest in mass communications in the US, writes a review of Robert Flaherty’s ethnographic film Moana for the New York Sun (February 8, 1926). In the review he coins the term "documentary." -
John Grierson joins EMB
Grierson joins British Empire Marketing Board (EMB), a governmental agency, and organizes the E.M.B. Film Unit. In the EMB, and later in his work with the film unit of the British General Post Office, Grierson gathered around him a group of talented and energetic filmmakers, including Edgar Anstey, Sir Arthur Elton, Stuart Legg, Basil Wright, Humphrey Jennings, Harry Watt, and Alberto Cavalcanti. -
Dziga Vertov films "The Man With The Movie Camera"
Man with a movie camera
This film is famous for the range of cinematic techniques Vertov invents, deploys or develops, such as double exposure, fast motion, slow motion, freeze frames, jump cuts, split screens, Dutch angles, extreme close-ups, tracking shots, footage played backwards, stop motion animations and a self-reflexive style -
"Drifters"
First documentary by John Grierson. British documentary advanced to an established movement. -
John Grierson becomes the head of GPO
Grierson went on to head the GPO, General Post Office, film unit which led him to be able to put across his idealsand his views on how Documentaries should be created and became a large influence in the creation of a poetic outlook on documentaries as seen by his feature film, Nightmail -
"Triumph of the Will" was filmed
German filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl was commissioned by Adolph Hitler to film the annual Nazi Party rally of 1934.‘Triumph of the Will’ is a Documentary film which was renowned for its use of camera movement,and for being the first Documentary to use political propaganda. -
The Worker's Film and Photo League is formed
It formed in the US (subsequently transformed into Frontier Films in 1937) with the purpose of making independent documentaries with a politically and socially progressive viewpoint. Members include Paul Strand, Ralph Steiner, Leo Hurwitz, Willard Van Dyke, and Joris Ivens. -
Conference of "World Union of documentary films" in Warsaw
Conference in Warsaw featured famous directors of the era: Basil Wright , Elmar Klos, Joris Ivens and Jerzy Toeplitz. -
Period: to
Cinémavérité
Cinéma vérité Cinéma vérité is a french cinema movement created in the 50’s and 60’s. Cinéma vérité heavily uses handheld camera work, diegetic sound and natural lighting. Constructing simplicity, Cinéma vérité falsely convinces the audience that they’re DIRECTLY viewing the film, without the pretence that is conventionally employed in Documentaries. -
Armstrong Circle Theatre
Armstrong Circle Theatre is first broadcast on American television. The program is generally considered the first continuing sixty-minute series to utilize the form that would come to be known as "docudrama"—dramatic recreations of real events. -
production of The Candid Eye
The National Film Board of Canada begins production of The Candid Eye—thirteen half-hour films, many of which demonstrate the new ideas of what will come to be called Cinéma Vérité, or direct Cinéma . -
first fully portable synchronized camera
Drew Associates developed the first fully portable 16mm synchronized camera and sound system. -
Drew Associates produces 'Primary'
Drew Associates produces Primary, the first film in which the sync-sound motion picture camera is able to move freely with characters throughout a breaking story (John F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey in the 1960 Wisconsin Democratic presidential primary). Primary is widely regarded as the earliest example of American directCinéma . -
New Day Films
New Day Films cooperative is formed by feminist filmmakers Liane Brandon and Amalie Rothschild to distribute social issue films by independent filmmakers--the first distributor to be run entirely by and for filmmakers. -
Start of 'mockumentaries'
Mockumentary was Particularly popular in the 1980’s, It's a modern type of Documentary, which comedically mirrors the conventions of Documentary, and reveals how easy it is to fallunder the facade that they create. -
Madonna: Truth or Dare
Biographical documentaries started getting more popularity in 1990's after the ewolution of music related films emerged in 1970's/80's. "Madonna:truth or dare" was directed by Alek Keshishian and starred,narrated and produced by Madonna herself. -
Bill Nichols-6 modes of documentary
Documentary mode is a conceptual scheme developed by American documentary theorist Bill Nichols that seeks to distinguish particular traits and conventions of various documentary film styles. Nichols identifies six different documentary 'modes' in his schema: poetic, expository, observational, participatory, reflexive, and performative. -
Stella Bruzzi criticism
Stella criticised Bill Nichols theory of 6 modes of documentraies for suggesting that documentary makers have aimed for perfect representaton of the real as they'd fail in this impossible aim. She also said "What's the point of worrying about authencity".
