Documentary - Critical Self Reflection

 

We were instructed to make a 5 minute documentary opening with a subgenre of our choice, and our group chose the subgenre of mockumentary. The mockumentary is about a person who fears interactions with women. 

How do your products represent social groups or issues?

The documentary is about a person who fear interaction with women, and that person is the main character. In the real world, this person is akin to an incel. Typically they are represented negatively in media, with common stereotypes including stupid, ugly. smelly, unattractive, and unemployed. Because we are making a makeover of this person, we both reinforce and subvert the stereotypes surrounding them. In the beginning, we will portray him negatively, however, as we progress, the person becomes better and better. In our mockumentary, we call this phenomenon as Bufo Ferulabitus, a disease also known as Conc. The patient (main character) was dressed poorly. The interactions we had with the patient was accompanied by sad and eerie music, which creates this negative and creepy aura when the audience sees him.

This can also be seen in our thumbnail, where it features the main character staring at a bright television screen in a dark room. A common stereotype of these people are that they waste their time glued onto a computer screen. We decided that this would be the main attraction in out thumbnail. The dark room symbolises the isolation that these people experience.

The issue that our documentary is tackling is the dangerous and growing culture of incels, or people who develop hostility towards females due to feeling unattractive and unwanted. We are hoping that we could spread awareness of this issue in a comedic way.

How do your products engage with the audience?

Our target audience are teenagers, mostly male, and those who fears interaction with women. The themes and jokes that are found in the documentary align with them more so than other groups of people, as out jokes are relatable to the issues that the modern generation share. Thus, everything from the thumbnail to possible social media sites are made based on their interests. Our mockumentary is satirical, and although it is inspired by a real world phenomenon, nothing in it is meant to be taken seriously, so viewers should not expect to have their lives changed from watching this show.

How did your research inform your products and the way they use or challenge conventions?

We are inspired by the show American Vandal and Cunk on Earth, as we share the same themes. However, we also draw inspiration from other shows and create original ideas to make sure we are the most unique in the mockumentary subgenre, which according to the genre theory, is essential in ensuring that viewers don't get bored watching your show. From our research, we concluded that there are several things that are commonly found in almost all documentaries. Those are J-cuts, narration with random shots (usually long shots of something). We then incorporated these common features into our documentary. We also conducted research on thumbnails by scouring through Netflix and observing other thumbnails of other shows. We concluded that thumbnails should not be too overly complicated, and that the title should be big and clear. We implemented those conventions by having a big title and not having too much things on the thumbnail. The only observable thing you see in our thumbnail is the main character staring at a television screen.