MEDIA 220: Mockumentary and Docu-Genres Quiz Portion

WK 9: According to Banash, what fundamental anxiety does The Blair Witch Project expose about contemporary culture?

Our simultaneous reliance upon and critique of technologies of representation

WK 9: In The Blair Witch Project's narrative, which technologies progressively fail the filmmakers?

Map, compass, and recording equipment

WK 9: According to the Banash, what is the consensus among reviewers about why The Blair Witch Project is effective as horror?

It relies on imagination rather than showing everything explicitly

WK 9: What aspect of the (BWP) film's production contributed to its documentary realism?

Actors retained real names, improvised scenes, and were deprived of sleep and food

WK 9: According to Roscoe, how does the documentary aesthetic function in relation to the horror genre?

It both reinforces psychological terror and distances viewers from it.

WK 9: According to Roscoe, what dichotomies or binary oppositions does the film establish?

Video/film, color/black and white, subjective/objective, science/myth

WK 9: What was the purpose of the Sci-Fi Channel's The Curse of the Blair Witch?

To detail the Blair Witch myth and further authenticate the tapes and story

WK 8: By ‘recursive’, Torchin means ____________.

that “Borat” produces uncertainty about factuality because it seems to work like a mockumentary but it also seems like a performative and reflexive documentary

WK 8: At the dinner party on Secession Drive, Borat’s hosts try to be ____________.

hospitable

WK 8: Borat is distinct from other mockumentaries we've seen in this class because it _____________.

embeds genuine documentary elements (the interviews for example) in a fictional premise

WK 8: Borat loses control of his __________ on the New York City subway.

Hen

WK 8: The narrator in Land Without Bread could be considered condescending and disrespectful when he _________.

describes a picture on a classroom wall as absurd

WK 8: What evidence does Ruoff provide that the narrator in Land Without Bread is deliberately unreliable?

The narrator contradicts himself, claiming death is rare after showing multiple deaths.

WK 8: According to Ruoff, what is the primary target of Buñuel's satire in Land Without Bread?

The viewer and producers of ethnographic travelogues.

WK 8: According to James Clifford's concept of "ethnographic surrealism," how does this approach differ from traditional anthropological discourse?

It attacks the familiar and provokes the irruption of otherness.

WK 8: According to Torchin, how does the opening tour of Kuzcek function in Borat?

As a fantasy of the primitive Other so excessive that the documentary form becomes absurd

WK 8: How does Torchin categorize Borat in relation to hoax documentaries like The Couple in the Cage and The Yes Men?

Borat differs because it refuses to provide a clear backstage or reveal the construction of the hoax.

WK 7: Which of the following is not true in Exit Through the Gift Shop?

Thierry’s work is critically acclaimed by critics and academics for its originality.

WK 7: Walter Benjamin argues that works of art historically ______________.

had a unique and singular existence in time and space.

WK 7: Jameson cites the _____________ as an architectural expression of postmodernism.

Bonaventure Hotel in Los Angeles

WK 7: Who takes over making Exit Through the Gift Shop half-way through the film?

Bansky

WK 7: Jameson distinguishes pastiche from parody by arguing that ________.

It is a neutral and ‘blank’ practice without parody’s ulterior motive or satire’s impulse.

WK 7: Mechanical reproduction, of which film is a classic example, ‘destroys’ aura because it _________.

shatters a work of art’s aura, since film can occur simultaneously across many sites

WK 7: Baudrillard's "The Precession of Simulacra" and Exit Through the Gift Shop both refer to ____________.

Disneyland

WK 7: Before Thierry Guetta became obsessed with the street art scene, he __________________.

sold vintage clothes and worked as a papparazo

WK 7: What is the "death of the subject" and why is it significant to Jameson's argument about postmodernism?

It describes the decline of individual creative genius, explaining why unique personal style is no longer possible and why pastiche has replaced genuine artistic innovation

WK 10: In Exit Through the Gift Shop, Thierry Guetta (Mr. Brainwash) mass-produces street art imagery for his debut show. Based on Benjamin's argument, which of the following best describes what his work lacks?

Aura — since his work is manufactured in bulk without authentic creative origin

WK 6: According to Karel, Roscoe and Hight distinguish 3 different modes of mockumentary: 1) the more or less unreflexive parody, 2) the critique, and the 3) _____________.

deconstruction

WK 6: Karel asserts that audiences are unable to tell whether or not a narrator is unreliable without _______________.

extra and intertextual knowledge

Wk 6: Werner Von Braun took a meeting with which Hollywood studio to achieve the aim of ‘making a rocket launch entertaining?’

Disney

WK 6: The quid pro quo that Hollywood demanded for helping NASA with the space programme included:

electing former leading man Ronald Reagan as president

WK 6: Baudrillard's discussion of the Loud family television experiment ("TV verité") is used to illustrate which broader argument?

The media no longer simply represents reality but constitutes it, collapsing the distinction between observer and observed and inaugurating a post-panoptic order.

WK 6: Baudrillard's concept of the "precession of simulacra" refers most precisely to

The way that models and signs come before and produce reality, rather than following from it.

WK 6: Baudrillard outlines four successive "phases of the image." Which of the following correctly lists them in the order he presents?

Reflection of reality → mask and denatures reality → mask of absence → pure simulacrum

WK 6: Baudrillard opens by inverting a fable by Jorge Luis Borges about a map that perfectly covers its territory. What does this inversion signify in Baudrillard's argument?

The model or simulation now precedes and generates reality, rather than representing it.

WK 6: Baudrillard uses the examples of the mummy of Ramses II being rescued by Western science and the cloister of Saint-Michel de Cuxa being repatriated from New York to its original site in France to illustrate which shared argument?

Both acts of "restoration" are themselves simulations — gestures that destroy the symbolic power of their objects in the very act of claiming to save them.

WK 6: In Dark Side of the Moon cites which of the following as 'proof' that the moon landing images were faked

Shadows that skew every which way and a photograph of Stanley Kubrick.

WK 4: What does Hutcheon identify as essential for parody to function effectively?

The viewer/reader must recognize the text being parodied.

WK 4: According to Hutcheon's discussion, what is meant by parody's "double-voiced" or "bi-textual" nature?

Parody speaks both its own message and simultaneously references the form it mimics.

WK 4: How does Hutcheon characterize parody's relationship to its target text?

Parody's "transgression is always authorized" because it depends on the tradition it imitates.

WK 4: Jeanine manages the band according to _____________.

the zodiac.

WK 4: Examples of how Spinal Tap struggle to perform include:

1. being trapped in their onstage pods

2. falling over and requiring assistance to get up

3. getting lost on the way to the stage

4. remembering their lyrics

1,2,3

WK 4: Derek Smalls is detained at airport security because he _________.

none of the above

WK 3: In analyzing the Sullivan Ballou letter scene from Ken Burns's "The Civil War," Eitzen argues that viewers primarily respond to

The emotional and melodramatic elements

WK 3: What does Eitzen conclude about the film "No Lies" when viewers discover it is scripted fiction rather than cinema verité?

It remains a documentary about documentaries, even while being fiction about r*pe

WK 3: Bill Nichols defines documentaries through three discursive arenas or sites. Which of the following is NOT one of these?

A government regulatory body

WK 3: What does Eitzen argue is the relationship between a documentary "frame" and the textual features that suggest documentary?

The frame is applied by viewers based on conventions and context, not solely textual features

WK 3: Eitzen's central thesis proposes that documentary should be understood as:

A mode of reception or "reading" applied by viewers

WK 3: The example of The Watermelon Woman demonstrates which key function of productive fake documentaries?

Using fabricated history to address real gaps in historical documentation and empower marginalized voices

WK 3: According to Juhasz, what is a key limitation of fake documentaries as a political tool?

Fakery is inherently conservative because it is always authorized by and dependent on the tradition it parodies

WK 3: According to the text, what broader significance does Long Lance's performance in The Silent Enemy represent?

An intercultural impersonation that attempted to subvert North American racial taxonomy while the film itself reinforced myths about Native American extinction

WK 3: Forgotten Silver includes archival footage of Colin McKenzie serving in _______________.

The Spanish Civil War

WK 3: Colin McKenzie's premiere of Salome in Wellington was ______________.

an unqualified critical success

WK 2: All documentary conventions (formal choices of expression such as sound, image, effects, animation, pacing) arise out of a need to __________.

convince viewers of the authenticity of what they are being shown and told

WK 2: Documentary filmmakers have the same technical choices as fiction filmmakers.

True

WK 2: Conventions can be hard to see because they are 'conventional'. One of the easiest ways to see how documentary style and convention operate is __________.

through parody and satire

WK 2: Nichols' discussion of Nanook of the North as simultaneously a reenactment and a documentary raises what fundamental question about documentary ontology?

Whether reenactments should ever be allowed in documentaries

WK 2: The concept of "epistephilia" in documentary viewership suggests what kind of spectatorial relationship that differs from fiction film engagement? 

Documentary activates desires for mastery through knowledge of the historical world rather than pleasures of narrative identification.

WK 2: Nichols describes documentaries as "the creative treatment of actuality." Why does this definition present a challenge for understanding documentary?

It acknowledges that documentaries both represent reality AND shape it through creative choices

WK 2: What problem does Nichols identify with assuming that authentic documentary images automatically make a documentary's argument true?

The same evidence can be used to support different interpretations or arguments

WK 2: In Cinema Verite Defining the Moment, Barbara Kopple points out which of the following?

When documentary subjects are fully engaged in a dramatic event they 'forget' the presence of a camera and the need to 'perform' for it.

WK 2: When Nichols discusses documentaries as participating in "discourses of sobriety," he implicitly argues that:

Documentary shares institutional frameworks with other knowledge-producing discourses that claim material effects on the world

WK 2: When Nichols argues that documentary images enjoy an indexical relationship to the pro-filmic event but that this does not automatically validate any particular argument, he is fundamentally claiming that

The evidential status of images must be distinguished from the rhetorical use of those images in constructing an interpretation

WK 9: Which character in The Blair Witch Project disappears first?

Josh

WK 11: What is the primary rhetorical concept Farrier uses to analyse the structure of In This World and its production?

Chiasmus

WK 11: How did Michael Winterbottom prepare for making In This World before filming began?

He travelled from London to Peshawar, then made the journey in reverse overland to Istanbul

WK 11: Which of the following best summarises Farrier's overall assessment of In This World?

The film is powerful and provocative, but its self-reflexive production and the filmmaker's inevitable presence create a tension that partially appropriates the very voices it seeks to amplify.

WK 11: The character of Imran, the fixer, is significant to Farrier's argument because_____________.

his multiple overlapping roles — as real fixer, research fixer, and fictional fixer — enact the chiastic blurring between journey and film.

WK 11: What does Giorgio Agamben argue about the figure of the refugee in relation to the nation-state?

The refugee threatens to undermine the link between nativity and nationality on which the nation is founded.

WK 11: Daughter Rite and Medium Cool both negotiate between producing mockumentary's deception in order to deconstruct and a what Landesman argues is a more sophisticated strategy of documentation. 

True

WK 11: According to Landesman, what is a "docufiction"?

A film that strategically blurs or ignores the distinction between fiction and nonfiction, existing along a fact-fictional continuum.

WK 11: According to Landesman, what is the key difference between a mockumentary and a docufiction?

Mockumentaries primarily use fiction to parody or fake documentary conventions, while docufictions maintain a genuine relationship with both fictional and factual modes.

WK 11: Why did Pedro Costa shift from 35mm film to a small digital camera when making In Vanda's Room?

He felt traditional professional filmmaking would not do justice to the community he was representing, and digital allowed him to be unobtrusive and spend extended time with his subjects.

WK 11: Although In Vanda's Room looks and feels like a documentary, what does Landesman reveal about its actual production method?

Most scenes were rehearsed and filmed using multiple takes.

WK 10: According to Bill Nichols, what do observational documentaries typically avoid in their "purest form"?

Voice-over commentary, nondiegetic music, and interviews

WK 10: How does Thompson characterize the relationship between Freud's distinction of "jokes" versus "the comic" and comedy verité?

Comedy verité shifts humor from the constructed joke to observation of comic events

WK 10: What industrial trend does Thompson identify as contributing to the decline of traditional sitcoms?

The dwindling network audience and rise of reality-based programming

WK 10: What semiotic function does Thompson argue comedy verité serves through its documentary-style aesthetic?

It claims greater authenticity by suggesting viewers are observing events as they unfold

WK 10: According to Mills, what has been the prevailing scholarly view about sitcom form since its creation?

It has developed little and remained remarkably stable

WK 10: How does Mills describe the relationship between The Office and the docusoap genre?

It narratively structures itself and is shot as if it were a docusoap

According to Mills, what significant convention does The Office abandon that traditionally signals comic intent in sitcoms?

The laughter track

WK 10: What does Mills argue is the primary reason sitcoms began to adopt documentary aesthetics?

Television has replaced live entertainment as the social arena, so sitcom needed to adopt televisual characteristics rather than music hall conventions to maintain its social role

WL 10: Jackie is Deacon’s ___________.

familiar

WK 10: How do the  vampires gain entry into Boogie Wonderland?

Nick knows the bouncer

WK 12: Baym uses the term "discursive integration" to describe:

The collapse of previous distinctions among genres, social practices, and discursive fields, making it impossible to clearly separate news, entertainment, and politics.

WK 12: Who does Baym identify as the primary real-world target of Colbert's parody throughout Better Know a District?

Bill O'Reilly, the right-wing Fox News commentator

WK 12: What does the "fake interview" with Tom Delay demonstrate about Colbert's approach?

That Colbert uses remixing and recontextualisation to expose how representations can be manipulated, mirroring his broader critique of right-wing media tactics.

WK 12: Baym invokes Habermas's distinction between the "political-normative" and the "aesthetic-expressive" in order to argue that:

The high-modern assumption that these two domains are clearly separable is precisely what BKAD destabilises, raising deeper questions about what counts as legitimate political discourse.

WK 12: Which of the following best describes Corner's "Project of Democratic Civics" as a documentary function?

Documentary funded by official bodies to promote dominant versions of citizenship.

WK 12: Corner borrows the phrase "discourse of sobriety" from which theorist, and what does he argue has happened to documentary's relationship with that concept?

Bill Nichols; documentary can no longer be classified as a discourse of sobriety

WK 12: When Corner describes a "postdocumentary culture," he means:

The scale and conditions of documentary's relocation as a set of practices have changed radically, even if documentary itself continues/

WK 12: According to Corner, what makes "documentary authority" harder to maintain in a postdocumentary context?

Extensive borrowing of the "documentary look" by other formats, and borrowing of non-documentary aesthetics by documentary itself.

WK 12: Corner identifies three classic documentary functions before introducing a fourth. Which of the following is NOT one of the original three?

Diversion and popular entertainment.

WK 12: Corner describes the viewing position offered by Big Brother as one that combines:

Voyeurism and the role of talent-show judge.