This document outlines potential exam questions for a film studies course focusing on documentaries and the spectator experience. The questions address how different types of documentaries provide varying spectator experiences, the importance of trusting the documentary filmmaker, how viewing context influences response, and whether spectators approach documentaries with more critical awareness than fiction films. Additional questions explore issues of manipulation in documentaries, the pleasures of viewing them, how real people/situations provide more challenge, and whether engaging spectators cinematically makes for the best documentaries.

1. FILM STUDIES
FM4
Varieties of Film Experience – Issues and Debates
Spectatorship and Documentary
Your answer should be based on a minimum of two
films.
SUMMER 2011
With reference to the films you have studied for this
topic, how far can it be said that different kinds of
documentaries offer different kinds of spectator
experiences?
‘Documentaries should never be trusted.’ How
important to the spectator is the sense that they
should trust the documentary filmmaker? Refer to the
films you have studied for this topic.
WINTER 2012
‘Relatively few documentaries are seen on cinema
screens; most are seen on small screens in private
rather than public spaces.’ How far do viewing contexts
influence the spectator’s response to documentary film?
To what extent can it be said that spectators approach
documentary films with greater critical awareness than
when they watch fiction films?

2. SUMMER 2012
Grierson defined documentary as the ‘creative
treatment of actuality’. What are some of the key issues
raised by this definition for spectators of documentary?
‘A common experience for the spectator when watching
a documentary is to be manipulated by the filmmakers.’
How far do you agree with this statement?
WINTER 2013
How far is the spectator challenged by issues of
manipulation in documentary film? Refer to the films
you have studied for this topic.
What are some of the pleasures that viewing a
documentary film offers the spectator? Refer to the
films you have studied for this topic.
SUMMER 2013
How far are documentaries more challenging to the
spectator because they appear to represent real life
characters and situations?
The best documentaries are those which are aware of
the need to engage spectators cinematically.’ How far
do you agree with this statement?

3. OTHER QUESTIONS THAT COULD COME UP:
Compare different documentary techniques employed to
present the 'real', discussing their impact on the
spectator. Refer to at least two documentaries you
have studied.
Do you agree that as spectators we are more likely to
accept at face value what we see and hear in
documentary films?
How far is it preferable as a spectator to be presented
with a documentary that offers a very definite point of
view towards its subject? Refer to the films you have
studied for this topic.
‘For the spectator, the viewing of documentary films is
really no different from that of viewing fiction films.’
With reference to the films you have studied for this
topic, how far do you agree with this view?
‘Watching real people and real events in documentaries
creates a very particular relationship between the
spectator and the screen.’ How far has this been your
experience of the films you have studied for this topic?
‘The best documentaries are the ones that make their
point of view clear.’ How far do you agree?