critical essay

 Dziga Vertov, a ground breaking documentarian, famous for lyrically composing and combining footage, sound and editing to transform the art of visual storytelling influenced my approach when illustrating the topic of my documentary. As I adopted the conventions of an expository documentary (Bill Nichols) I found Vertov’s perspective of the camera being an extension of the human eye inspiring as I gathered footage of a school environment; I believe this approach will encourage the audience to empathise with the challenges that students face everyday with regards to dealing with the problems raised by pornography. In the early stages of my production I watched many documentaries in order to get a feel of what conventions I might challenge or apply to my own documentary; the Netflix original documentary ‘The Hatchet Wielding Hitchhiker’ (Dir Colette Camden, 2023) informed me of how effective the use of screen recorded footage of the news and social media as it places the audience in the shoes of the director, therefore nudging them to interpret the content from an intended point of view. Throughout my documentary I also referenced Sergei Eisenstein’s revolutionary film ‘Battleship Potemkin’ (1925), as it premiered the use of montage, an editing technique rarely seen within the chronological format of a documentary. The use of montage was a creative way for me to present all of the information and research that I had collected for my topic; additionally, I was able to layer footage and typography on top of one and other in order to illustrate the overwhelming cybersphere that surrounds todays society. 

  The primary target demographic for my documentary is ABC1’s and 2’s, typically aged between 15-21; my secondary audience are A, B media literate consumers who are most likely parents or educators. My primary audience are teens-to-twenties, individual’s who engage with content, like my documentary so that they can relate to the information they are being presented with, and ideally something they can utilise to further themselves socially (Blumler and Katz, Uses and Gratifications Theory). My documentary fulfils this remit as it exposes first hand experiences from interviews with students within a school environment, that many of the intended age group would be able to identify with, creating an open conversation while also providing legitimate research and statistics for dramatic gravitas. Additionally, an over saturated colour pallet has been used throughout, alongside a collaboration of fast paced editing combined with suspenseful plain black screen to hold the attention of the viewer. My secondary audience are those of a more mature demographic who might dissect the documentary as a social commentary, highlighting the toxicity of digital media convergence; as well as an opportunity to gain a level of understanding to the challenges faced by teenagers in a postmodern world (Palmer, Toxic Childhood Hypothesis). Stuart Hall’s ‘Reception Theory’ can be applied to my secondary demographic as he would argue that the audience seek to decode embedded messages within ‘Is Porn On the Syllabus?’ as Hall states that we are always aiming to educate ourself into the position of a preferred reading.  

  As a key aim of my documentary was to expose the injustices within the porn industry and education system, representations surrounding those areas were an integral factor to my production as a whole. By addressing the harmful objectification and over-sexualisation of women in pornography I focused on the representations of women in literature and the media; additionally, two of the interviews featured in my opening sequence were of women. When designing my products it was important to me that I represented a range of age groups, from mature educators to adulting teens. For example, my social media page targets my primary audience of 15-21 year olds through continuous, short production updates; while one of my minor productions has been formulated to appeal to my secondary audience more as it provides a more detailed outline of the backstory of my documentary in and ‘Evening Standard’ magazine format, typography in serif for a more traditional, high brow effect. Throughout my documentary ethnic, gender and age identities are represented, this was intentionally highlighted as I felt that in order to illustrate the extensive damage caused by pornography it was imperative that all perspectives were presented. 

  I used a few minor details to connote a scene of branding throughout the entirety of my production process, one being a specific colour pallet. My blog, instagram, magazine article and final documentary all featured some form of striking yellow, either through a background, title or text. The colour was selected to bridge the innocence and purity of early teens and students, while also depicting the key themes of my documentary topic. My instagram page created a sense of branding as it demonstrated a more personable and hands on approach from the director from the point of view of the audience, as mine is not a voice of a detached narrator throughout the documentary; the social media account also highlighted how the information being conveyed was coming from the first hand perspective of a secondary school student. Another aspect of branding within my products would be the selection of photographs used in my blog, magazine and instagram profile; the image is of me looking at Pablo Picasso's 'Nude Woman in a Red Armchair' (1932), a painting of one of his lovers at the time. I chose to use this picture because I felt it demonstrated how anything can be classed as pornography, a sensual nude painting of a dream in Picasso’s mind could be viewed as erotica in one persons mind while in another’s it could simply be a work of art; the danger of this that harmful ideologies and representations can cause a chain reaction of unfortunate attitudes and behaviours. For example while Picasso was an incredibly talented, groundbreaking artist, he was also known to be cruel and abusive towards women. In addition, I also utilised a still of my documentary in my magazine article, this demonstrates to the audience who is involved, along with the environment as well as advertising the documentary itself.