ABSTRACT
Good documentary storytelling, with few exceptions, depends on good research. You need to find a subject, understand your story, and be sure you’re presenting a balanced and accurate point of view-at least, you do if you want to get the pro gram to a general audience. Remember that balance and accuracy do not mean that you can’t, as the filmmaker, take a partic ular position, or that your subjects can’t take one. But if you expect the audience to take you seriously, you must allow them to weigh the evidence for themselves, which means that you need to research and present that evidence. This is true for what may seem like a surprising range of filmmaking styles. In an interview by Jason Silverman, filmmaker Alan Berliner describes working on his personal documentary, The Sweetest Sound. “I began where I always begin, with a tremendous amount of research, with a passion to understand the total landscape of whatever subject I’m entering.”
