The Secrets of Making a Documentary by Frederick Wiseman

A cameraman, an assistant and a sound recordist, and of course Frederick Wiseman himself. No interview, no questions, no comments. No music other than that belonging to reality captured by the camera and the microphone. Lots of rushes, lots of time spent editing. With these few rules as a basis, in nearly fifty films of which he is also the producer, the American filmmaker Frederick Wiseman has built, since the beginning of the 1960s, one of the most important documentary works in history. cinema.

The literary dimension of Frederick Wiseman's documentary films

The literary dimension of the work of this great lover of the novel, Hélène Frappat underlines it in this broadcast, second part of a series that she devoted to Wiseman while he was working in Paris on the editing of his film on the Ballet of the Opera. A program in which Frederick Wiseman explains his working method and defines the nature of the view on the world that he seeks to arouse in the public through his films.

This immense documentarian was also remembered for his late foray into theater and fiction with, in 2002, The Last Lettertaken from chapter 17 of Vassili Grossman's novel, Life and destiny.

Find the entire archive program “Frederick Wiseman, like an American novel”proposed by Albane Penaranda.

• By Hélène Frappat
• With Frederick Wiseman (filmmaker), Marie-Claude Treilhou (director), Claire Doyon (director), Éric Chauvier (anthropologist)
• Excerpts from films by Frederick Wiseman – Lectures Hélène Frappat
• Director: Angélique Tibau
• Surprised by the Night – The Phantoms of the Opera: Frederick Wiseman or Scenes from American Life 2/2 (1st broadcast: 04/17/2008)
• Web edition: Radio France documentation