The Spaces Between Grassroots Documentary ... - Ezra Winton

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that these differences need to be acknowledged, made distinct, and championed with a pluralistic approach. Mouffe summarizes this position: Only by acknowledging ‘the poltical’ in its antagonistic dimension can we pose the central question for democratic politics. This question, pace liberal theorists, is not how to reach a ‘rational’, i.e. a fully inclusive, consensus, without any exclusion. Despite what many liberals want us to believe, the specificity of democratic politics is not the overcoming of the we/they opposition but the different way in which it is established. What democracy requires is drawing the we/they distinction in a way that is compatible with the recognition of the pluralism which is constitutive of modern democracy. (2005, p.14) Central to Mouffe’s ‘democratic project’ are the concepts of antagonism, the political, and hegemony. These ideas also provide signposts for the theoretical framework of my discussion connecting community-oriented documentary distribution and exhibition practices with democratic principles, social movements and social research in Canada, and will be teased out in later pages, concentrated in Chapter II, where they will be given the conversation space that they require. While documentary content itself is often cited as a cultural product that embodies elements of these concepts, such as the film This is What Democracy Looks Like (2000, Friedberg and Rowley, directors) research is lacking that connects this conceptual framework with non-production or non-aesthetic elements of the genre; in other words, supra-textual analysis. Similar to experimental and independent films, documentaries receive little of the production funding pie in Canada compared with fiction features, and thus continue to face monetary marginalization at all levels. (Profile 2007, 2007) Unlike the case with fiction features, documentary filmmakers are usually unable to secure funding before the film is finished, not to mention that this kind of “bankrolling” in the fiction market also comes with distribution deals, ensuring the final (fiction) work makes it onto the screen 6
somewhere. Documentaries make up a small fraction of screen space in both the US and Canada, a hurdle at least partly stemming from this built-in bias for fiction over non- fiction within the industry and among lenders and funders. 2 This economic challenge, combined with a lack of commercial faith in the ability of documentary ‘products’ to compete at cinema houses (mostly articulated by industry elite), have contributed to the ‘underdog’ status of documentary film and video relative to the commercial market of distribution and exhibition in Canada, and has engendered a belief that the genre belongs almost exclusively on television. By understanding the relational positioning of documentary film and video as a cultural experience and as cultural texts within a larger increasingly privatized and commercialized public sphere (McChesney, 1999) an investigation into the role of alternative, independent, or grassroots practices as sites and currents of opposition, contention and community-building will be possible. Documentary, as a traditionally marginalized media practice surviving alongside a billions-of-dollars fiction cinema industry, creates what Clemencies Rodriguez refers to as “fissures in the mediascape,” where democratic spaces open up within a tightly controlled landscape dominated by a handful of global entertainment players and new possibilities emerge for publics or citizenry. (Rodriguez, 2001, p. 1) By discussing the social consensus or hegemonic (Gramsci, 1971) elements of the commercial film industry, reviewing the history of film policy, and interrogating sites of alternative community-oriented practices around documentary distribution/exhibition in 2 It wasn’t until 2007, and after decades of pressure from groups like the Documentary Organization of Canada, that Telefilm began discussing the possibility of documentary features being included for speculative funding within the Feature Film Fund envelope. At one time documentaries were considered to only have no commercial exhibition potential and only television broadcast possibilities, and were therefore kept at the “tv hour” length. Of course, filmmakers have over the years challenged this restrictive pre-formatting of the genre and now argue such state funding regulations are antiquated and non-sensical. 7
Page 1 and 2: The Spaces Between Grassroots Docum
Page 3 and 4: iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis wou
Page 5 and 6: CHAPTER I HOT DOCUMENTARIES IN COOL
Page 7 and 8: p.167) Yet what brings Wintonick an
Page 9: Complimenting the celebration of ex
Page 13 and 14: ealm of the marginalized, and furth
Page 15 and 16: short, there is a clear and urgent
Page 17 and 18: discussion and treats them as unnat
Page 19 and 20: content” (Ibid, p.3) reminiscent
Page 21 and 22: examines and exposes these phenomen
Page 23 and 24: some years working as an activist a
Page 25 and 26: grassroots distribution and exhibit
Page 27 and 28: the discursive and physical multipl
Page 29 and 30: attention in some areas, such as te
Page 31 and 32: writes: “The strongest barrier to
Page 33 and 34: its heyday 4 . Stuart Hall, Richard
Page 35 and 36: large multinational corporations wh
Page 37 and 38: it is a complex process of negotiat
Page 39 and 40: globally harmonized by a populist c
Page 41 and 42: (counterpublics) - such is the way
Page 43 and 44: She is concerned with the counter-h
Page 45 and 46: operating with an assumption that t
Page 47 and 48: film through the public sphere.”
Page 49 and 50: commercial exhibition sites, and fu
Page 51 and 52: adicalizing opposition or counterpo
Page 53 and 54: screenings can provide opportunity
Page 55 and 56: authors have chosen to survey the g
Page 57 and 58: demonstrative examples of the acade
Page 59 and 60: conflict(s) as a core of contestati
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consumer-over-citizen modeled (Mouf
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CHAPTER III - HISTORICAL CONTEXT -
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vis the ‘work’ of politicians,
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These authors are introducing the t
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articulations that illustrate the i
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indexes is a revealing exercise, in
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the lens of inequity, where cultura
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of the 20 th Century, was the agent
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As mentioned, d/e has been at the h
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the urban counterpart to the film c
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artist-driven and dedicates itself
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spaces and practices that this thes
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formations (in Dorland’s case) or
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irrelevancy. The social movements s
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in communities for citizen’s acti
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for CFC works was remarkably relaxe
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of documentary - on the oppression
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scholar concerned with progressive
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film industry, while texts that beg
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Montreal-based non-profit übercult
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cinemas, where managers and program
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journalist still stationed in Haiti
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You are on Indian Land and Mike Mit
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Achbar settled down on to the grass
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the report continues, the authors a
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of grassroots I think of an organiz
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spaces through grassroots practices
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Haynes quickly realized there was a
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documentaries in Canada. Haynes add
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people experience the screenings, a
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like Charlottetown, PEI. The initia
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Canadian, and is doing it by way of
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community members who make up the K
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That said, AMC is paying more atten
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example, Achbar relates to me that
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consumers. What I have argued in th
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dominant veneers in culture, so tha
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that build counterpublics with the
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Nos voisons les hommes (USA - Over
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APPENDIX B Sample Interview Questio
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I HAVE CAREFULLY STUDIED THE ABOVE
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Beetham, David. Democracy: A Beginn
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Gramsci, Antonio. Selections from C
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Magder, Ted. Canada’s Hollywood:
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Rennie, Ellie. Community Media: A G
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Yudice, George. “The Privatizatio
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