Watching the Documentary Searching for Sugarman was pretty interesting, I had never listened to the music depicted in the doc but it was really cool.
Ok first off I wanna talk about the Genre: I think the genre of this film was more of an informative film but I can also argue that it also had a touch of comedy to it, because at many points in the film they would talk about the casual stories they had while looking or sugar man. Which were pretty funny at times.
Second is the Filmmakers Role: He had a big job in this documentary because he was more or less in charge of how the documentary would look when it’s all said and done. He got the landscape shots he was in charge of getting the setting shots the found footage and all of the interviewing shots. He shaped the film into being a “Where is Waldo sort of video”
Third is Visual Imagery: Now back to the filmmaker’s role we know that he is in charge of shaping the film to how he wants it to feel, but we can go into depth. He shot it with a tripod for one thing, since all of the shots were clean, he also made sure he always framed up the shot and made things pleasing to look at, such as the thirds rule and so on. We can also talk about how the imagery is made. The images are created by lighting a subject and the light entering the camera. There are also times when you need animation and that is made when an animator hand draws the animation and it is played in succession. The images in this documentary are very clean and found footage to give the contrast between THEN and NOW.
Fourth is Theme: The theme of the documentary was a where in the world is…. kind of story. This was because of the overwhelming fame of the artist Rodriguez and his alleged death. They used this to build upon the idea that this man was a lost man and it was their job to follow the trail and get to the bottom of his “death”
Fifth is Stakes: This documentary’s main objective is to tell those who don’t know about this artist about the story he told. He tried to make a living as an artist in America and nobody cared but the audience in Africa were insane! They loved him there but because of this the media ended up writing a bogus story about how he killed himself on stage. And that was that but they wanted to prove the news wrong by searching for this man.
Sixth is Editing Style: The editing style of this documentary was fairly simple, and followed most of the documentary styles. Not much to say here. Most of the cuts in this documentary were rather good because none of them stand out to me.
Seventh is Questions, Emotions, thoughts this film provoked: After watching this film I found myself in the mindset of the artist, but it still left we with the question of What happend to his carrer in Africa? Why did he go into hiding? Why didn’t he go against the media? some of these questions were answered but they were MY questions ones that this documentary made me ask myself. Overall I can agree with the filmmakers decisions on this documentary and I would agree that the subject was handled as best as it could have been.