Frankenstein Documentary Analysis

Type

This documentary type would be labelled as mixed due to its content consisting of three keys areas in a documentary; interviews, observation and an narrator. Also this documentary contains archive footage along with many other key features to help structure a successful product.

Themes

There are many themes that are consistent throughout the documentary. It subjects the horror genre of media and its growing audience throughout the decades, how far the original Frankenstein story has come throughout his aging as it has been remade and performed in theatres, the movie industry, myths and gothic styles of film. Mis-En-Scene is used to illustrate this using props like dolls heads footage.

Camera

The rule of thirds is employed on the interviews within this documentary allowing them to appear conventional to viewers. There are many different shot types used to create the final product using camera such as crabbing shots, a crane shot and establishing shots to show landscapes. For the interviews the conventional medium close up is used for easy viewing of the interviewee.

Archive Footage

With in this documentary there is footage of rock bands, footage from different eras in history showing how the story has effected people and footage from certain remakes of the original e.g. the theatre version. Lots of the archive footage is black and white which allows connotations of the age of Frankenstein so viewers understand how historic this story is which adds to the narrative.

Narrative

The narrative of this documentary is single stranded as its main focus is the story of Frankenstein and sub genres that relate back to it. The structure of it however is linear as it dabbles in both present day productions/interviews and archive footage from past productions.

Editing

This documentary includes the use of montage in its editing. There's are many clusters of archive footage strung together to form a montage which allows the audience to grasp an understanding of all the different versions of this story in a short period of time. Also cuts from scene to scene occur regularly, the use of a roll and b roll footage is employed when an interview is taking placing and the scene cuts to footage of the topic the interviewee is discussing.

Graphics

During interviews the credentials for the interviewee usually appear upon the screen, regularly in the bottom right or left corner. This allows the audience to gather information such as the name of the person being interviewed and their relevance to the subject.

Sound

There is both diegetic and non-diegetic sound employed in this documentary for different purposes. In one slow pace scene a piece of music from the rock genre begins to play in order to direct the pace into a more busy/rapid scene. This allows for a good flow throughout the documentary. Parallel sound is also used. Also sound effects are inserted to heighten some scenario e.g. a heartbeat sound effect was edited in during a particularly intense scene.