Wedding in poetic Karjala (A.O. Väisänen, 1921)

Häidenvietto Karjalan runomailla - A Wedding in the Karelian Songlands is not only Finland's first ethnological film, but it is also the country's first extensive film made with an accompanying musical score. The film produced by the Kalevala society depicts an archaic wedding in Suojärvi, Border Karelia, on the northern side of Lake Ladoga. This region, which in the early 1900s was home to kalevala-metre rune -singing, Karelian ethnic religious practices and the Orthodox faith, has belonged to Russia since the Second World War. Drawing from two of his earlier operas, composer Armas Launis arranged the musical score for the film.

 
 Häidenvietto Karjalan runomailla (A.O. Väisänen, 1921)

History of ethnographic film (1895-1960)

(Chrono-Photographic Shots, Felix Regnault,  1895)

Malu-Bomai Ceremony at Kiam (Alfred Cort Haddon, 1898)
Information in the Colonial Film Catalogue

Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer (Thom Andersen, 1975)

Australian Expedition (Baldwin Spencer, 1901)

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In the land of war conoes (Edward Curtis, 1914)

Nanook of the North (Robert Flaherty, 1922)

A Stone Age People in New Guinea (1936-7) from Pitt Rivers Museum archive films on Vimeo.

Ladakh (1939-45) from Pitt Rivers Museum archive films on Vimeo.

Walkabout: A Journey with the Aboriginals (Charles Mountford, 1946)

Childhood Rivalry in Bali and New Guinea (Gregory Bateson & Margaret Mead, 1952)

Trance and Dance in Bali (Gregory Bateson & Margaret Mead, 1952)

Les Maîtres Fous (Jean Rouch, 1955)

Moi, un Noir (Jean Rouch, 1958)

Fake or Mock Documentaries

"Fake documentaries are fiction films that make use of (copy, mock, mimic, gimmick) documentary style and therefore acquire its associated content (the moral and social) and associated feelings (belief, trust, authenticity) to create a documentary experience defined by their antithesis, self -conscious distance" (Juhasz, 2006: 7). 

 "Fake documentaries can readily educate viewers about the uncertain links among objectivity, knowledge, and power—usually the hidden, ugly secret of straight documentary" (Juhasz, 2006: 12). 

 A recent one: Operación Palace (2014)

Video link

Some classics

Las Hurdes (Luis Buñuel, 1937)

David Holzman's Diary (Jim McBride, 1967)

F is for Fake (Orson Wells, 1973)

Daughter Rite (Michelle Citron, 1980)

Bontoc Eulogic (Marlon Fuentes, 1995)

Bibliography

• Juhasz, Alexandra & Lerner, Jesse (eds.). (2006).  F Is for Phony. Fake Documentary and Truth's Undoing. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
• Roscoe, Jane and Hight, Craig ( 2001). Faking It. Mock-documentary and the Subversion of Factuality. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

More information

• Fake and Mock Documentaries list at the Media Resources Center of the UC Berkeley 
• Library Mockumentary: Reflexivity, satire and a call to play

Through Navajo Eyes

Worth, Sol & Adair, John. (1972). Through Navajo Eyes

¿Cómo representarán su mundo con una cámara de cine personas sin conocimientos cinematográficos? ¿Estarán condicionados por la estructura de su lengua, tal y como presupone la hipótesis de Sapir-Worf?

En el verano de 1966, los antropólogos Sol Worth, Peter Adair y Richard Chafen visitaron una comunidad navajo en Palm Springs, Arizona. Proporcionaron cámaras de 16 mm a siete navajos (Mike Anderson, Al Clah, Susie Benally, Johnny Nelson, Mary Jane Tsosie, Maxine Tsosie y Alta Kahn), los entrenaron en el manejo de la cámara y les dieron libertad para filmar sobre temas elegidos por ellos. De esta manera rodaron películas sobre la orfebrería, el tejido, las ceremonias curativas navajo, etc.

Los navajo no descubrieron el principio de continuidad en el montaje. Su manera de montar la película reflejaba su manera de entender la acción y estaba relacionada con su lengua, pero no condicionada por ella.

Navajo Film Themselves (1966)

Old Antelope Lake (Mike Anderson, 1966)

In this film Mike decided to make a movie about a lake. First he shows what turns out to be the source of the lake, or the mouth by which it is fed. He then proceeds to move sunwise (again) around the lake showing a variety of details of both animal and plant life. He also has a sequence of his younger brother washing clothes at the lake. The sequencing of shots in the film follows an almost exact natural order. That is, not only must the sequence be in a sunwise direction around the lake, but also certain shots must be followed by the appropriate animal and direction of action. The time element isn’t very important in this film. Scenes that were shot in the morning appear later in the film than scenes that were shot in the afternoon. What was important to Mike was that we first saw the source and then moved all around the lake showing the unity between the natural things and the human beings in the environment.

Una película contemporánea con la que comparar.

13 Lakes (James Benning, 2004) - Crater Lake, Oregon

Una lección sobre edición.

Constructive Editing in Robert Bresson's Pickpocket from David Bordwell on Vimeo.

Lecturas:

Worth, Sol & Adair, John (1972). Through Navajo Eyes. An Exploration in Film, Communication and Anthropology. Bloomington: Indiana University Press

Banks, Marcus. (2010). Los datos visuales en Investigación Cualitativa. Madrid: Morata. Capítulo 1.

Empezar a mirar

New Mothers (Rineke Dijkstra, 1994)

Julie, Den Haag, Netherlands, February 29 1994. Hace tan solo una hora que Julie (la amiga de un diseñador con el que Dijkstra estaba trabajando) acaba de dar a luz y su  cuerpo  delgado lleva todas las señas del parto: cicatriz, miedo, satisfacción y un bebé todavía enrojecido entre brazos que cubre su pecho.

Tecla, Amsterdam, Netherlands, May 16 1994. Tecla (una amiga de la artista) dio a luz hace un día por lo que su vientre aún está hinchado, tiene el rostro enrojecido y un rastro de sangre recorre su pierna mientras sostiene a su recién nacido contra sus senos y mira a la cámara con perplejidad.

Saskia, Harderwijk, Netherlands, March 16 1994.  Saskia (una amiga de otro artista) dio a luz hace una semana después de un parto por cesárea. Su cabello es corto y su mirada tranquila, mientras sostiene a su recién nacido contra su pecho.

New Mothers | Rineke DIJKSTRA | contemporaryartnow.wordpress.com/

Window Water Baby Moving (Stan Brakhage, 1962)