Uniting filmmakers and practice-led researchers, Essay Film and Narrative Techniques: Screen-writing Non-fiction explores the evolving language of essay film through various methods of narration, including production diaries, self-critiques, interviews, and theoretical analyses. Including canonical works and unconventional approaches, this collection emphasizes how essay films blur the lines between personal expression and collective storytelling.
In this volume, renowned scholars and practitioners unpack the conceptual and contextual dimensions of screenwriting for essay film, considering its role as both a cinematic and research tool. Whether reflecting on the personal camera or hybrid creative methodologies, the essays provide invaluable insights into how essay films are written and realized.
With its interdisciplinary scope and innovative approach, this work is a beneficial resource for academics, filmmakers, and students of documentary and experimental cinema, offering a nuanced understanding of how screenwriting shapes nonfiction storytelling.
Table of Contents
List of Figures
Preface
Laura Rascaroli
Introduction: Essay Filmmaking as Creative Research: ‘Behind the Scenes’ of On-screen Thinking, Narrative Techniques and Processes of Knowing
Kiki Tianqi Yu and Romana Turina
Part One: Journeys and Nature of Thinking
1. Chaos or Process? Some Remarks on the Work Process of an Essay Film
Jouko Aaltonen
2. The Collector/Sampler/Editor: A Feminist Perspective on the Screenwriting Process
Judith Rifeser
3. The Future of Thinking: Notes on Animation and the Essay Film
Richard Wright
Part Two: Dialogic Practices
4. Father-land: Narratives of Memory in a Place of Conflict
Kayla Parker
5. Heliographies of Change: Marianna Christofides’ Days In Between (2015)
Brenda Hollweg with Marianna Christofides
6. Personal monument: remembering an awkward love Personal monument: remembering an awkward love
Louis Hothothot
Part Three: Work-in-Progress: From Still to Moving Images
7. Three Sisters in a Sketchbook: Photography as Prosthesis in the Essay Film Form
Romana Turina
8. ‘Into the Frameless Distance’ and ‘The City of (No) Memory’: Itinerant Research for Photo/Filmic Practices
Patti Gaal-Holmes
Part Four: Nature of the essay film and Cinema as Knowledge Production
9. Black Essay-filmmaking and Essay-filmmaking as ‘Black’
William Brown
10. Filmmakers as ‘magicians’ and cinema can be dangerous Filmmakers as ‘Magicians’ and Cinema Can Be Dangerous
Kiki Tianqi Yu in Conversation with Lei Lei
Notes on Contributors
Bibliography