The World Through Mya's Lens: Documentary Viewings and Research

Everything in life has a purpose.

That’s a strong belief I have as I live out my life. There is always a purpose you can derive out of any situation or decision.

We recently just completed our first really major long-term project of A-level, our documentaries. When first introduced to it, I was definitely anxious. New experiences can be scary, as you lack the familiarity that provides you with a sense of comfort or ease of mind. However, as you think towards the future, I am realizing just how close we are to starting out final component project for this course. With that, we have a choice of producing a short film, music video, or documentary. So, I really set my mind to putting my all into to this piece, as its purpose could be to prepare me and practice for my component project if I took this opportunity to do so.

With this project being such a new experience for me, I really had to dive deep into developing a feel for the conventions for a documentary. I have always actively enjoyed watching documentaries for leisure, but had not really thought about any of them past their surface level as in my eyes they were merely for entertainment. We started to watch a few full-length documentaries in class, American Promise being my favorite.

American Promise (2013)

By Joe Brewster and Michéle Stephenson

The story, produced and directed by the parents of the children, followed 2 little boys (Idris and Seun) through out 13 years of their academic journey. It mainly highlighted their life in a predominantly white school, as they were some of the only colored students enrolled in the highly prestigious prep school, Dalton Academy. This documentary really introduced to me the power and difference between direct and indirect interviews.

Our teacher, Mrs. Stoklosa, also presented a lecture all about not only documentary conventions, but also production, which I took notes on and frequently looked back on during our pre-production process. A lot of research was done to help develop the pre-production of our documentary.