Please write a 3 pages rough draft for the research paper. The rough draft should be at least 3 pages in length and it should contain signs of a clear direction – a thesis – and it should incorporate at least one reference (whether in quotation or paraphrase). Also provide a Works Cite page in MLA forma

My research question is: How do documentary films make the viewer question the truth?

When I was formulating this question, I realized that the majority of famous documentaries are about false convictions of innocent people that were wrongfully arrested by the police. The most famous documentary that I can think of in recent memory is the documentary Making a Murderer about Steven Avery. That is why I want to explore the way that the documentary director can get the viewers to question the truth through the film. I think that the most interesting aspect of a police/murder documentary is the way that it can actually lead to another conclusion that is separate from the one that occurred in actual history. In the actual case of Steven Avery, the police followed a certain perspective that led them to believe that he was the actual murderer. But through the documentary, the film goes through another perspective to put doubt on the way that the police handled the procedure. What is most interesting about this is that even though documentary films are based on true events, the film themselves are often about questioning the truth.

My research prospectus is:

My research question goes as the following: “What are the techniques used by the documentary filmmaker to question a narrative and how do these techniques provoke questioning the truth”. I believe that a major reoccurring theme among documentary films is their ability to give unseen perspectives about certain narratives. Many notable documentaries, such as Making a Murderer, shows how the police created a narrative to frame a certain individual as a murderer. The documentary film then investigates the case through the perspective of the victim to provoke the audience into questioning the truth. This is an important cultural and philosophical issue when it comes to filmmaking because it offers documentaries a unique position within the medium. Though other fictional and nonfictional films can inspire audiences, lead them to conclusions, and change their minds, it is only through documentary films that audiences can actually connect to a real-world narrative and question their reality. Therefore, this question is not only important to understanding the countless victims of false convictions, it is also important for the viewer to actually understand reality itself. By understanding the different ways that the filmmaker frames the truth, provokes thought, and edits reality, it gives the viewer a better understanding of their world around them.

For my primary literature, I will focus on wrongful conviction documentaries as they are the most notable case of how documentary films subvert narratives and provoke thought into people to find the truth. As discussed above, the documentary series Making a Murderer is a useful primary source to start. Other documentaries of the same genre include Amanda Knox, David and Me, and The Thin Blue Line that are all available on Netflix. I believe that these are very useful documentaries to study as they all share the same subject matter. They all involve the wrongful conviction of an innocent person in a broken and subjective justice system. As they involve the same story and conclusion, it will be easier to compare the different cinematic techniques that each of them uses to prove their point. By comparing and contrasting the different ways that each of these documentaries provoke the truth into their respective cases, it will be easier to understand how the documentary filmmaker uses certain techniques to provoke the truth.

To complement these primary sources, I will be using scholastic articles from the online library that directly tie in with these documentaries. For example, Bruzzi’s article, “Making a genre: the case of the contemporary true crime documentary” directly discusses the techniques used by the documentary filmmaker in Making a Murderer. I hope that by analyzing the way that documentary filmmakers poke into the blind spots of these narratives, I can help find a way of understanding reality much more objectively. By figuring out where these cases have failed to ascertain the truth properly, it will help make it easier for people in their own daily lives to see their own blind spots. By uncovering the case of wrongful convictions, then we can avoid these problems in our own lives.

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