Documenting success

The recent box-office success of documentary films such as Life (生命), Let It Be (無米樂) and Jump! Boys (翻滾吧！男孩) has suddenly put the marginal art form in the spotlight. People are amazed by the "new documentary phenomenon" and wonder how these works achieve something that most local feature films cannot: money and recognition.

Indeed, as a genre overlooked by the market for decades, the documentary's sudden popularity seems rather overwhelming. Yet, to those who have been devoted to the industry for years despite sparse funding, it's a validation long overdue.

Non-fictional cinema started to flourish around the lifting of martial law in 1987. Before this time documentary films mainly referred to newsreels, public-service films and propaganda pieces made by state-controlled film companies. Because of strict government monitoring, socially and politically sensitive issues were taboo to documentary filmmakers.

The genre experienced its first revolution around the mid-1980s, when independent filmmakers and social activists picked up their cameras to record and participate in the social and political movements that flowered in those years. The advance and popularization of technology gave filmmakers unprecedented freedom to express themselves with affordable and easy-to-operate filming equipment.

Meanwhile, waves of social movements springing from loosened political control gave filmmakers opportunities to look into subjects and issues hitherto unexplored and unknown to the public.

In the 1990s, government agencies and public institutes started to look at documentary cinema as an important part of cultural industry. Series of collaborations with private groups strengthened the development of the documentary film industry. The quality and quantity of documentaries have both gone up, while training available for young artists has built up a solid base.

Medium of change

Full Shot Foundation (全景傳播基金會), established in 1988, is the foremost filmmaker workshop devoted to documentary production, promotion and education. Full Shot's approach to documentaries is to co-opt the medium so it functions as a social witness of society.

"Most of the works made by our members deal with social issues. We go to minority groups, communities, or tribes, we stay with them for a long time, and bring out the issues to generate public discussions in the hope to make a change," said president of the foundation Tsai Jing-ru (蔡靜茹).

But the foundation does more than just make films. "Since 1990, we have held workshops to train anyone who is interested in documentary making on and off depending on our budget," Tsai said. The Council for Cultural Affairs (文建會, CCA) worked with Full Shot on this project in the past and there were workshops all around Taiwan providing six-month training courses.

"What we do is very challenging for a small group like us. But we take our social responsibilities very seriously," Tsai said. "We make films to open up dialogue and understanding among communities. We provide knowledge and skills to those who want to join the industry. And we seize any chances to show works in any occasion so that more people can see what has been going on in our society."

Public Television Service (公共電視台, PTS) also plays an important role in the development of documentary cinema in Taiwan. PTS started a documentary program in 1999 and it's still the only channel that regularly presents local documentary productions. The program provides funding to those who knock on its door with good proposals. "We accept submissions all year round," executive producer Zuo Pei-hua (左珮華) said. "Starting in 2002, we have also put more emphasis on training young talent."