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And documentary film television was what La 2 broadcast at after-dinner hours as an inevitable call to nap. They were those soporific productions that the History Channel filled with UFOs and Nazis. What National Geographic turned into a slow broadcast of Siberian reindeer mating. And a very loved product, in all its versions, by the cultural scene. It was all of those things until, with the explosion of streaming platforms and their need to continuously feed an endless catalogue, the marginal became popular.
Suddenly, the mass public discovered that they loved documentaries, although the documentaries they love are far from what they used to be. Their democratization has brought them closer to the general public but has also distorted the vocation of a genre whose objective was the search for the truth.
In the midst of ‘fake news’ and moral relativism, the only truth that matters now is that of the protagonists of this content, who change the covers of magazines for documentaries due to pure promotional interest, to wash their image, reverse public opinion or campaigning, for themselves or against someone. Its truth, embellished as a documentary, is more credible than a handful of headlines, no matter how much, digging a little, it is evident that it is only a careful staging.
The examples are legion, and the ‘Harry and Meghan’ documentary series, now available in its entirety on Netflix, is just the latest case of that trench warfare that streaming takes advantage of, based on marketing. Nothing that Mia Farrow did not do before in ‘Allen v. Farrow’ (HBO Max), which was sold as “the truth” when it was just propaganda, a campaign against Woody Allen, obviously without Woody Allen. No resources are spared, but it costs God and it helps to find in these contents a different opinion, contrary to that of those who monopolize the title and the cover. The complete opposite of what a documentary should be and its relentless search for unpublished, impartial, pure information.
The show, the priority
For further clouding the English monarchy, the Dukes of Sussex have pocketed 100 million euros. What ‘The Crown’ tells of the British Royal House is almost as expensive, but at least warns that it is only inspired by real events. What is in fashion now are not documentaries but hagiographies, because they do not discover anything, and if something new comes their way, they avoid it, as happened in ‘Tiger King’ (Netflix), who preferred to remain in the mockery of the character than to emphasize the underlying theme, of real documentary interest: the mafia that traffics exotic animals. The anecdote and the show above the depth and information.
The golden age of documentaries, which has brought interest in this genre to new audiences, has resulted in overproduction and an inevitable loss of quality. Based on a language taken from the best thrillers, the platforms hooked a large mass of viewers to ‘true crimes’ made with patience and a good eye as ‘Making a murderer’ (Netflix), a hybrid between the investigation and the curiosity of the ‘cliffhanger’. The only way to continue feeding this hungry public is with frivolous products that, dressed in the prestige of the word documentary, are essentially the same as reality television on traditional networks. From Tamara Falcó, to Lola Flores seen by her own daughters in Movistar +, as if “a lot of accent” was not enough. Not to mention the huge amount of praise from athletes. In this field, Amazon Prime Video, by the way, takes the cake. There is something for everyone: from Sergio Ramos –be careful, two seasons– to Rafa Nadal, from ‘La familia’ that makes up the winning Spanish basketball team to Carolina Marín, who, as the title of her documentary says, can because she thinks that she can.
This has meant that the splendor of documentaries has suddenly passed into the era of self-promotion, of the ‘doccurrealities’ that use the term documentary for pure posturing. Fortunately, as always, there are exceptions that save the mud in which the genre is becoming, such as ‘Our planet’ (Netflix), with David Attenborough as narrator; ‘The history of cinema: An odyssey’ (Filmin), by Mark Cousins, or the Spanish ‘The challenge: ETA’, on Prime Video. Also the wonder of ‘The last stars of Hollywood’ (HBO Max), which Ethan Hawke he took off his sleeve to vindicate, through unpublished testimonies, Paul Newman but also Joanne Woodward. Unfortunately they are barely a handful, the sad rarity that confirms the norm.
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