This thesis investigates hybrid documentary-fiction films that were constructed through a close collaboration between the filmmakers and the subjects, and in which the subjects’ personal...Show moreThis thesis investigates hybrid documentary-fiction films that were constructed through a close collaboration between the filmmakers and the subjects, and in which the subjects’ personal experiences and ideas about self-representation influenced both the content and the form of the film. The objective of the filmmakers is to raise questions about how to understand somebody else’s experiences, what it means to insert oneself as a filmmaker into the lives of others and how to make the spectator aware of these issues. They do so by using formal methods that are usually associated with fiction filmmaking and by foregrounding the film’s construction. Since the filmmakers do not offer a conclusive perspective on the story or an interpretation of the images, the spectator is made to invest his or her own experiences, which are equally valuable as those of the filmmakers and the subjects of the films. Taking Jacques Rancière’s emancipated spectatorship as a guideline, I will investigate which formal methods associated with fiction filmmaking can employed to activate the spectator, how, and to what effect. I have divided my thesis into three chapters that each treats a specific formal method: identification through ambiguous focalisation; the uncertain relation between voice, text, and image; and database logic as an alternative to narrative logic.Show less
