Bayer, Gerd. “Artifice and Artificiality in Mockumentaries ” in Rhodes, Gary Don; and Springer, John Parris (Eds). Docufictions: Essays on the Intersection of Documentary and Fictional Filmmaking. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Co, 2006. 164-178.

In an ironic twist on viewers’ expectations, mockumentaries make use of the mediatory qualities of film for heightening the alleged veracity of their content, or rather, for emphasizing the unavoidable status of film as a mediation and therefore interpretation of reality. I argue, first of all, that the ostentatious use of artifice in mockumentary films functions as a means to lessen the sense of artificiality usually attached to cinematic texts and, in a second step, that this emphasis on the mediality of film derives from the metannarrative criticism of mockumentaries. 164

In addition to including generic clues derived from documentaries’ project of “representing reality,” to follow the title of Bill Nichols’s important book, mockumentaries make the production side of filming visible, thereby creating in their viewers a conscious awareness that they are indeed watching a film, that is, a constructed reality. This flaunting of a film’s artifice ironically heightens the sense that what is witnessed must indeed be a genuine document, since it is not so much represented, but rather presented. 165

However, as critics at the time were already quick to point out, the intended veracity of this style should not obscure the fact that even cinéma vérité films are representations: “The issues of mediation were not removed by the new style. Shots were still framed. Films were still edited. Stories were still created.” The realization of this mediated role of cinema returns again with the emphasis that mockumentaries place on a film’s artifice. This time around, though, the mediation itself becomes a central concern for the makers of mockumentary films. 165

There seems to exist an unexpected contradiction between the effects that artifice and artificiality have on viewers: mockumentaries take pride in their artifice; they present their constructedness. By doing so, they manipulate their viewers’ perception, causing them not simply to suspend disbelief, but rather to discard all skepticism. 165

Within the framework of mockumentary film making, the presence of staged artifice disavows a film’s actual artificiality. Whereas the cinematic aesthetics of fiction films—through its perfected hyperrealism of imagery—clearly if subconsciously indicates that the visual representations really must be artificial, the absence of this perfection within the (mocku-) documentary genre aims to indicate that reality is presented in its actual form. It is partly through the inclusion of intentional imperfection that mockumentaries create their false sense of reality, a process which relies heavily on genre traditions that viewers decode into specific expectations. As a number of critics, such as Jane Roscoe and Craig Hight in Faking It, have already pointed out, the question of a film’s generic affiliation is answered to a significant extent by the knowledge and behavior of its viewers. It is they who determine—during the act of watching the film, and based on their specific expectations—what the film will be. In order to come to an appreciation of the parodistic and hence critical characteristics of mockumentaries, viewers need to be aware of the cinematic traditions that are being mocked. 165

In Zelig, then, the viewer is taking pleasure in being fooled, and rejoices in the idea of a false sense of reality, more so, maybe, than in a regular feature film. Allen’s film thus sheds further light on Bill Nichols’s concept of “epistephilia” as found in the reception of actual documentaries. Nichols argues that part of the attraction of documentary films lies with the enjoyment of learning. This epistephilic joy undergoes a specific metamorphosis in the context of mockumentaries that corresponds with the meta-critical attitude of the genre. Since the content of mockumentaries is by definition fabricated, the pleasure of viewing such films stems from learning about the making—and artifice—of mockumentaries, and by extension, of cinema and the media industry at large. 167

Indeed, mockumentaries should be viewed as semiological commentaries on the textual practice of cinema. John Fiske points to the fundamental stylistic differences between documentary and dramatic conventions of film making: “The documentary conventions are designed to give the impression that the camera has happened upon a piece of unpremeditated reality which it shows to us objectively and truthfully: the dramatic conventions, on the other hand, are designed to give the impression that we are watching a piece of unmediated reality directly, that the camera does not exist.” Both traditions comment on the project of representing reality; both are engaged in a mimetic task. However, the choice of genre in and of itself does not guarantee a specific epistemological position, as Erik Barnouw argues: “Some artists turn from documentary to fiction because they feel it lets them get closer to truth. Some, it would appear, turn to documentary because it can make deception more plausible.” Yet others, one might add, turn to mockumentaries to address the original problem of cinema: its mediated, or symbolic, referentiality. 168

The mockumentary tradition follows in his footsteps, and presents staged imitations of reality that nevertheless contain an element of authenticity, often using only roughly-sketched scene outlines and relying heavily on impromptu dialogue. 168

The sub-genre of the mockumentary indeed forms a response to cultural and philosophical phenomena of the late twentieth century. In particular, mockumentaries relate to the discourse on the non-referential nature of signs, what / Banash, writing about The Blair Witch Project, describes as the “the horror of confronting a world that cannot be represented.” The unavoidable deferral of meaning that characterizes all logocentric systems leads (postmodern) artist almost by necessity to an engagement with the medium of communication. In mockumentaries, precisely such a fascination with the mediality of cinema occurs. 169-170

Commenting on a similar moment of cinematic mimicry, Kurt Scheel emphasizes that Woody Allen’s Zelig is particularly successful in re-creating the style of documentary filming through the inclusion of ostentatiously flawed material. Mentioning the shaky camera work, the very poor sound quality, and the jump cuts, he concludes: “all this is of the perfect faultiness of documentaries that actual documentary material cannot have.” 170

By adding to Zelig the question of generic affiliation, Allen turns the film into a quest for cinematic form. While retaining a ludic tone, his mockumentary also contains a critical perspective. 171

The critical leanings of many mockumentary films, evident in their tendency to provide a meta-documentarian commentary on the limitations of medialized representations, also emerge in the Belgian film Man Bites Dog (1992). This low-budget movie made by film students pretends to portray the daily life of a serial killer. It uses the generic and stylistic framework of documentary films and thereby speaks out against the fascination with violence that increasingly dominates the television screen. The film’s ideological proximity to Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers (1994) emphasizes the meta-critical intention of Man Bites Dog. It furthermore lends credibility to the claim that mockumentaries should be thought of as meta-documentaries that criticize the generic conventions and discursive expectations viewers bring to the question of truthfulness in visual media. 171

[Man Bites Dog]: The contrast between the stylistic proximity to documentary film making and the ethical conflict surrounding the chosen object of the film points to the problematic relationship between ethics and visual representation, in particular to the question of whether documentary films exacerbate and even profit from the social ills they chose to present. Above all, the film presents, in its form and style, a serious engagement with the contentious nature of documentary film making. 171

It is not by coincidence that documentary truthfulness exists only on the level of the narrative framing of the film and not in the story presented therein. This shift in emphasis reinforces the earlier claim that mockumentary films are predominately interested in questions of narrative, that is, in film’s power of framing a story. 172

During a deadly shoot-out in an empty industrial building, the film’s sound man is shot and killed. With remarkable attention to detail the film turns silent for a few seconds because the body of the injured technician covers the microphone, blocking all sound. In a similarly ostentatious gesture, the film ends with pictures from a camera dropped to the floor as a result of yet another shooting involving both the object of the film and the film crew. Both the visual and the aural physicality of the film thus stress its medial nature: the artifice of filming and its lack of immediacy. The recurrent reminder of the mediacy of the image, supported by the presentational character of the narrative, denies the audience the possibility of immersing themselves in the picture’s simulated reality. 172

Other mockumentaries involves the creator of artifice in a different manner. Both Blair Witch Project and Man Bites Dog end with the death of the on-screen film makers. The text terminates the author. The criticism implied in this development is directed against the position of the author within the context of documentary film making. 173

[two sentences later]: These gestures imply that the camera is almost independent of the film maker and that the camera eye represents reality in a subjective and direct manner. The director appears to possess only limited powers over the final product. On a superficial level, it is the ultimate statement of the film’s veracity, emphasizing in a grand finale the artifice of the presented text, thereby reassuring viewers of the authenticity of the mockumentary content. The amount of irony involved in this process, of course, is enormous: in order for the film material to be developed, edited and cut, and finally put into presentable form, another director had to take over. What the on-screen death of the “film-maker” therefore demonstrates is the insidious presence of yet another level of framing and, therefore, of control. From this critical relationship to the discourse of power derives the fascination many viewers develop for mockumentary films. 173

This chapter has repeatedly described as one of the central aesthetic devices for the creation of the mockumentaries’ false sense of authenticity the making-visible of the artifice of the filmic text. The emphasis on the constructedness of the cinematic representation harks back to the postmodern awareness of the discursivity of all texts, but reaches its own ironic reversal in the mockumentary mode. The antagonism between presentation and representation, allegedly sublated in the deconstructionists’ understanding of the deferential meaning of all signs, is reinstated in the conscious appropriation of the medium of film for the process of creating believable fiction. It remains debatable whether the aesthetic and critical interest behind mockumentary films stems from their alleged topics, such as the dog show in Christopher Guest’s Best in Show (2000), or from the fact that a select audience of cognoscenti enjoys the satirical portrayals of the films’ clichéd characters, bringing treats of everyday average life to the screen. 174

Rather than joining to the political or historical project of documenting actual events, they choose to fabricate events. In doing so they contribute, inadvertently or not, to the discussion about the status of documentary film making. 174

In Christopher Guest’s Waiting for Guffman (1996) and Best in Show, for instance, the tongue-in-cheek parody and mockery of not only filmic genres but also professional and social peculiarities encourage a decoding of the films that is more active and participatory. The predictability of the individual characters as well as the returning cast of actors in Guest’s mockumentaries both resist a fully immersive response to the films. Rather, the on-screen narrative unfolds parallel with the audience’s enjoyment of the parody and, in the process, with the metannarrative of the mockumentary. 175

Due to the instability of a film’s generic affiliation, it is not surprising that the original emphasis on artifice within the first mockumentaries has since given way to a more assertive and less artificial presentation of mockumentary films. Since the early days of Zelig and This is Spinal Tap!, mockumentaries can claim their own heritage and therefore no longer feel required to signal to the audience their hybrid qualities. 175

Rather, these second-generation mockumentaries proudly locate themselves within the parodistic tradition that was started by the first films of that new sub-genre, but they no longer follow the aesthetic framework initially developed. Gone is the artifice and gone is the ironic proximity to the cinematic language and style of documentary film making. 176

One of the last remnants of the documentary legacy of those later mockumentaries is the inclusion of on-screen names and professions for the films’ characters. Having dropped all pretences of being a genuine, historical document, A Mighty Wind proceeds without overt stylistic references to the genre of documentary film making and its claims of veracity. Guest’s first two follow-up films to This Is Spinal Tap! were already released as mockumentaries: other than the original rockumentary, they did not attempt to create a narrative framework that includes the documentarian, and they did not follow the cinematic style of vérité camera work and sound. Rather, they came with the glossy shine of “normal” feature films. 176