Documentaries are easy to make. I mean, what do you really have to do? Just set up some interviews, film some b-roll, throw in a couple Wikipedia facts, and bam! You're on your way to Sundance! It's been my experience lately that many documentarians are forgetting that just because it's a different genre, doesn't mean that the normal filmmaking elements don't apply. It doesn't matter how important or groundbreaking the material, if it isn't well made it becomes irrelevant. The unfortunate part is that this lack of good filmmaking does a huge disservice to the most important of topics.
The 2009 documentary Tapped is an excellent example of this problem. It strives to tackle the bottled water industry and unfortunately, fails miserably. The structure of the film, one of the biggest problems, is completely meandering and nonsensical. 20 minutes in and you're already getting the "we have options, the people can make a difference!" speeches before launching into another example from this grocery list of issues. It's true that documentaries are "made" in the editing room since as a filmmaker you can't be sure what material you're going to collect until you've actually done it. But that can't be an excuse for not having a clear structure in your mind before ever hitting record.
So the one thing you figure a documentary should do is prove it's case, especially those of the social-activist variety. For Tapped, that means long stretches of ridiculous b-roll (think local-news style) and a few random numbers chucked on the screen. I can only watch empty water bottles washing up on the beach so many times before I'm yelling at my TV to just, give me something! An entire section of the film, about the production of plastic and health effects on the local town, continues without one hint at hard evidence. We're supposed to be convinced of this by repetitive interviews with locals who have to pause to breath through their oxygen tanks rather than the facts that are indeed out there if you just take a second to do some real research. Documentarians aren't just filmmakers, they're also journalists and Tapped is an example of extremely lazy journalism.
Yeah, you get to see a lot of this shot.
Rather than just focusing on getting the public to understand the facts behind bottled water, the film eventually resorts to vilifying the industry via interviews with 2 corporate buffoons. I'm immediately skeptical of this because all it tells me is that you don't have enough material to support your own argument. It fails miserably and actually provokes me to side more with those corporate suits than the irritatingly cocky filmmaker.
Ultimately, Tapped doesn't respect the viewer. The material is so dumbed down that unless you've been living under a rock for the last 10 years, you aren't going to learn anything from this film. I can tell you more about bottled water and the privatization of this natural resource from one semester of Ecology in college. And what a shame, too, since this important material in more capable hands could actually make an impact and hopefully garner up some action.
