THE ARBOR (2010)

The Arbor” by Clio Barnard is mesmerizing and beautiful documentary fusing narrative and documentary on the tragic playwright Andrea Dunbar. It’s cinematography is stunning very cinematic in places and it also uses scenes from Dunbars’ own semi-autobiographical plays to help tell passages of her story. These are performed by actors on a stage set in the middle of a green on the estate she is so intrinsically linked to and the current residents watch on as the scenes play out adding another dynamic to the piece.

The technique that really inspired me however was the use of frank and honest recorded audio to get a real intimacy and honesty from the subjects largely her emotionally scarred daughters. What Barnard then does though is to employ actors to lip synch to this dialogue and also use some beautiful cinematography. Whilst not wishing to replicate this recording lots of audio only first and then creating the visuals around it was also employed to great effect in “The Possibilities are endless”. Perhaps employing it creates a truth to the documentary whilst at the same time allowing for interpretations and a poetic quality through the visuals to accompany it. This is a definite way forward for me for my piece "Poetic Love" where my Grandma has said she does not really want to have filmed interviews but is happy and more comfortable recording audio interviews and I feel she will be more frank and open with these more conversational interviews with me.

However a technique is just that unless it serves a purpose and with further research I found some enlightening interviews with Clio Barnard and agree with her sentiments. She states “Cameras change the relationship between interviewer and interviewee. I think the interviews were intimate because there was no camera, no lights… I want the technique to raise questions about the relationship between fiction and documentary – to acknowledge that documentaries, more often than not, have the same narrative structure as fiction. I want the audience to be aware that they are watching material that has been mediated. It is a distancing technique, a form of direct address. I think that it is important to be reminded of this, particularly when the subject matter is so emotive.”