Documetary: Morgan Spurlock

Documetary: Morgan Spurlock

For this unit we needed to analyse a documentary maker. I have chosen to look at the work of Morgan Spurlock, known for programmes such as "Super Size Me", " Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan's Hope", and "One Direction, This Is Us".

Spurlock is a well known documentary maker who's career frst took off in the early 2000's. Over his career he has constructed a variety of documentaries fullfilling a variety of roles such as presenter, producer, director etc. He is know for following nieche yet very relevant topics, and is very good at manipulating audiences to feel a certain way. 

Super Size Me

"Super size me" is considered one Spurlocks earliest sccesses.

It centred around the idea of obesity (a mojour topical influence for my documentary). It uses a familier style coherant to that of Nick Broomfield and Louis Thourux.

 

Naratively it followed the 1 week journey of the presenter who intended to eat nothing but mcdonalds for a week. It was simple to follow (something which is present in all of his documentarys), and usewd a variety of techniques to grip audiences.

Spurlock is known for rhythmic editing and montages within his documentary (something I intend to experiment with), creating introductions and sequences that fot around a music track and maintain the atention of an audience. This is very present it "Super Size Me", and Spurlock uses theese sequences to deliver hard statistics.

His documentaries are always very character or presenter driven. Something I intend to ustalise in my documentary. He is able to seemlessly blend commentary and PTC and I intend to reflect that technique, as it can help move the narative foward when there is a lack of visual content. 

He is also very fond of using graphics to articualte and deliver his messages. He uses vibrant colours and quick cuts to make sure people pay attention to what his messages. T he message and narative of "Super Size Me" is very hard hitting, despite not intending to create a serious documentary he ended up delivering clear morals to his audience. This is partly due to the expert advice he gained from several different doctors. This is useful to someone like me as I can see he has deliberatly sought out multiple opinions and for a documemntary like mine that is a necessity. There is also mass use of product placement and iconography witin "Super Size Me" which is something I will deliberate as to how effective it could be for my documentary.

One Direction, This Is Us

"This is us" (2013) is one of Spurlocks later works, which demonstrates how his directign style has developed but also what has stayed the same. "This Is Us" followed the band "One Direction's" journey to fame. 

In this documentary Spurlock is'nt trying to deliver a hard hitting message or convince an audience towards a certain veiwpoint. However a lot of his stylistic techniques remain the same. Similarly to Supersize me he is fond of rhythmic editing matching cut aways, stock footage, graphics etc. to the music. Where as in "Super Size Me", he used heavier rock music to get audiences pumped and angry at some of the pounts he raised, here he uses One Directions slower songs to generate a feeling of nostalgia and craete a heart warming journey. 

Spurlock is able to blend hand held and static shots seemlessly inliek "Worlds Fattest Man" and ensures that his interveiws and montages follow the standard conventions. 

Spurlock has the ability to create easy to follow naratives even when there is a lack of commentary; and what I like about "This Is Us" is taht it delivers a subtle message of friendship, hope and success without having to explicitly state it in comentary or PTC (something I struggle with in documentary making). 

Overall I admire the way Spurlock can subtly manipulate audiences opions and emotions. He uses music, colours (e.g. the red of mcdonalds products) and lighting to either get people angry at big corperations like MCDonalds, or feel happy or cry at moments of nostalgia, or feel physically sick at otehr times. He always has the full atention of an audience, and throughout his career can craete a different atmosphere in each of his works simply by following the rules. For example in "A Fans Hope" he uses handheld shots and characters energy to engage the audince and excite them, but in "This Is Us" he uses lighting and colour to create a calm. I intend to take on boardd a number of teh techniques I mentioned.