Monday 23 October 2017

Professional Pre-Production: Mockumentary Genre

I have chosen to make 'Pleasure Park' a mockumentary series.

WHAT IS A MOCKUMENTARY?

 According to the Oxford English Dictionary a Mockumentary is 'a television programme or film which takes the form of a serious documentary in order to satirise its subject'. This means the situation within the programme is fictional, but takes the form of something that is non-fiction.
War Of The Worlds

It can be argued that the first ever example of mockumentary in popular media was in 1938 when Orson Welles broadcast 'The War of the Worlds' on the radio, causing mass panic amongst it's listers who believed it to be a real event. The radio broadcast was portrayed as a news broadcast, however the actual contents of the broadcast was fictional. This fits in with the definition of a mockumentary.

From the 1980s onward, the mockumentary genre has become more and more popular in the film industry. In the 80s there were productions like Woody Allen's 'Zelig', a film about a man who can transform into anyone near him, and Rob Reiner's 'This is Spinal Tap', a film about a fictional British heavy metal band. In the 90s there were more productions like 'Man Bites Dog', a film about a team of filmmakers following a serial killer, and Peter Jackson's 'Forgotten Silver', which was about a fictional pioneer filmmaker called Colin McKenzie.
REC

In the early 2000s the film industry saw more and more mockumentaries emerge, like 'Dark Side of the Moon', a French mockumentary about the apparent faking of the first moon landing. Then in 2007 one of first mockumentary animations was created by Sony Animation when they released 'Surf's Up', a film about a Penguin who wants to win a surfing competition. In recent years mockumentaries have even appeared in the horror genre, although they are often referred to as 'found footage' movies. The most popular example of this is the Spanish film 'REC' which brought the 'found footage' back to the silver screen.

W1A
In television terms, mockumentaries have appeared all over the schedule since the 1990s. From 1997 to 2001, the BBC ran a series called 'Stella Street' which was about a fictional group of UK and US celebrities that had all decided to move to the Surbiton area of London. In Canada there is a popular mockumentary series called 'Trailer Park Boys' which is still on air.

Over the years more mockumentaries have appeared on British television like The Office (UK), People Just Do Nothing, Twenty Twelve and W1A, and they've proved to be popular with audiences.

WHY MOCKUMENTARY?

 I have decided to make 'Pleasure Park' a mockumentary for the following reasons:

- I want people to beleive this place, and the people that work there are real.
- I like the idea that this style will allow the audience to go behind the scenes at an amusement park and see things that you wouldn't normally be able to see.
- These characters are letting cameras into their lives, and letting the audience see them at their highest and at their lowest.

I feel that by making the show a mockumentary series, it will allow me to achieve these three aims. I also feel there is room in the schedule for another mockumentary series, especially one about a theme park, which to my knowledge has not been done before.

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