March 1, 2007
Attention to Detail in Waiting for Guffman
One of the things that made Waiting for Guffman feel like a real documentary was the attention to detail. Every single aspect of the sets were thought out in relation to the background. Whether its the posters on Corkeys wall or the various knickknacks on his desk. The point is that all of the characters personas matched the worlds that they lived in. In the process of thinking this through Christopher Guest made the characters more believable for the audience. In "real life documentary" when a subject is interviewed the background surrounding them is usually a place that they are comfortable making it more believable. Although the film is ridiculous with its characters it is a believable documentary because of the story world that they live in and because of the characters feel that they are truly being documented for their talents rather than their flaws.
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3 comments:
The character-related details in Waiting for Guffman were amazing - each character had their own little back stories that the audience can become familiar with quickly, which is lucky since the film moves so quickly. The detail paid to each character is careful and exact and carried on through the entire film - be it through the costume, dialogue, or actions. These details made the film a very interesting visual experience.
I used to not appreciate films like this as much- simply because of the improvisation. I used to think anybody could make a fake documentary and just have people make stuff us as they go along. However after watching Waiting for Guffman, you realize the tireless staging that goes into each character. The attention to detail is pretty much what sold me on this film.
I completely see where Vince is coming from. A couple years ago, I wouldn't have given this film a second thought, especially in relativity to documentaries. Waiting for Guffman truley exhibited practice, character realization, as well as great dialouge and the ability of each character to feed off of one and other. Watching it was like watching a circus.
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