Bradford International Film Festival - 29/03/14

This weekend, I visited Bradford International Film Festival, and attended a screening of a new documentary called American Promise, followed by a Q & A with the filmmakers, who were also the family involved within the content of the film. Although this was a documentary screening and not a fictional drama, I found the way in which it visually carried the theme of journey and transitioning through different times to be really interesting and done very well, and it made me think about how the theme of journey within our drama film can be visually shown as well as interpreted in a number of different ways.

American Promise (2013 (USA), Dir. Joe Brewster and Michele Stephenson)

The documentary, directed by parents Joe Brewster and Michele Stephenson, follows a twelve year journey in the form of documenting their African- American son and his friend's personal day to day school life through the American education system. Documenting a twelve year journey through film and then condensing this down to 2 hours 15 minutes worth of documentary footage was also something that I found interesting, and the filmmakers openly talked about the challenges included within this and how they went about achieving this, along with dealing with the moments that were unexpected during a twelve year time period, yet were captured on film.

I found the documentary really interesting to watch, and from a viewers perspective it really did feel that the theme of journey came across very strongly, as I felt I was given an insight into the character's lives having watched them progress from the beginning of the film.

As each stage of the son and his friend's education progressed to a new level, the film held onto single shots that summarised some part of their previous or upcoming next few years. For example, one particular shot that I remember clearly was taken from ground level in a sports hall, with the focus being on a basketball positioned close to the camera. This fit in within the past stage of the film, as there was a point that it showed in quite a lot of detail whereby the son faces challenges surrounding fitting in at school and adapting to this within playing for the basketball team. I found these held shots to convey the idea of a journey and reflection, as whilst these were on screen they gave time to think about the progression in the film and some of the broader themes that the documentary uncovers.