Quote

In terms of so-called fly-on-the-wall documentaries, there's a claim that the camera is a transparent window into a pre-existing reality. What really is happening is that the film crew and the subjects are collaborating to simulate a reality in which they pretend the camera is not present.

— Joshua Oppenheimer

Sentiment: NEGATIVE

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✓Similar Perspectives

If you acknowledge that filming is an occasion where people express things they might not otherwise express, that offers a much more insightful analysis of why documentaries - even of the fly-on-the-wall variety - are powerful.

— Joshua Oppenheimer

Once you get into your stride, the camera becomes like another person in the room. It's like being in a very small theatre where there is no getting away with anything because the audience is centimetres away from you.

— Saffron Burrows

There's something very scary about exposing yourself on camera, knowing that you're going to be put on thousands of screens around the world for everyone to judge, but there's also something very thrilling and exciting about it.

— Eli Roth

A movie camera is like having someone you have a crush on watching you from afar - you pretend it's not there.

— Daryl Hannah

Film gives us the luxury of deciding where the viewpoint of the audience is, and by knowing that, we can very effectively design around what is actually seen on camera.

— Freddie Wong

Television and movies have short-circuited reality. I don't think a lot of people are entirely clear on what is real and what is on the screen.

— Alan Moore

The camera makes everyone a tourist in other people's reality, and eventually in one's own.

— Susan Sontag

✗Opposing Perspectives

I love the idea I can go off with a single camera and a few rolls of film unencumbered... I was not interested in the illusion of reality, I wanted to get close to what was happening.

— Eve Arnold

The Real is ever-present, like the screen on which the cinematographic pictures move. While the picture appears on it, the screen remains invisible. Stop the picture, and the screen will become clear. All thoughts and events are merely pictures moving on the screen of Pure Consciousness, which alone is real.

— Ramana Maharshi

When you make a film that is based in reality, reality will come up all around it.

— Mario Van Peebles