How documentary films encourage artistic freedom

Written by Alessandra Langit | Read in Indonesian

The documentary film "A Tale of The Crocodile's Twin" by Taufiqurrahman Kifu recently won a Jury Special Mention award at the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, Germany. Capturing the reality of the human relationship with nature in Palu, the film offered an exploration of a different form of documentary films. TFR had the opportunity to talk with Kifu about the possibility of new forms of documentary films and the freedom of visual expression of a film.

Documentary film as a tool to address urgent issues

“A Tale of The Crocodile's Twin” was part of the Living with Disaster programme initiated by Sinekoci to respond to life after the earthquake and tsunami in Palu, Central Sulawesi. For Kifu, disaster is an urgent topic to discuss, as Indonesia lacks disaster archives. Kifu and Forum Sudutpandang sought to convey this urgency through a documentary film. Kifu said documentary film is a video art that has a direct approach and is able to clearly present the reality of the relationship between humankind and nature–in this case represented by crocodiles.

“*A Tale of The Crocodile's Twin*” poster | Source: Forum Sudutpandang & Sinekoci

"Our priority is knowledge and archiving of disasters. We see that documentary film is a direct and communicative approach to talk about urgent issues," Kifu said.

For years, documentary films have served as a tool to relay crises in various sectors to the general public and a wider audience. In 2021, the film "Seaspiracy" by Ali Tabrizi, which was broadcast on Netflix, triggered a lengthy public discussion about the reality of the underwater environment and its fate in the future due to human activities. Various campaigns and movements on social media were created after the film hit the market. BBC producer and documentary filmmaker Parminder Vir in an article for Once Films said documentary films give the average person access to crucial information about global, social and political issues they might not otherwise be exposed to.

Constructing reality by exploring the forms of documentaries

Artistically, "A Tale of The Crocodile's Twin" presented crocodiles in an imaginative way but based on the archived daily life of the people of Palu–from the image of crocodile on tonic to bread in the shape of crocodile with a tire on its neck, crocodile WhatsApp stickers and the myth of twin crocodiles–through the illustrations created by artist Raras Umaratih. Through a mind map made after the research results were collected, Kifu sought to translate the complexity of the existence of crocodiles, one of which is the belief of the people in Sulawesi about crocodiles as their twins.

Stills from “*A Tale of The Crocodile's Twin*” | Source: Forum Sudutpandang & Sinekoci

“We discovered the myth of twin crocodiles and thought, how about we construct this folklore into a reality of its own. The visuals in this film supported the imagination. I myself believe that documentaries can be very fictional; visual artworks sometimes construct their own events," Kifu explained.

Acknowledging that film could be a playground for imagination and perspective on reality, Kifu chose visual art to narrate myths that were born by word of mouth. He said the illustrations in a documentary can stitch together reality and myth. The use of other arts in documentary films makes it possible to project the reality of Indonesian people who live alongside myths and other issues that are difficult to translate. The unusual visuals can spark audience imagination almost automatically. As Kifu said about his film, "Let the audience imagine crocodiles."

Animated documentary is actually not a new or foreign term for Indonesian filmmakers. In 2020, Chonie Prysilia and Hizkia Subiyantoro launched a short animated documentary titled “KOsOng (No One Inside)”. Not much different from “A Tale of The Crocodile's Twin”, this film used animated illustrations to reveal an issue that is deemed urgent but considered taboo by most Indonesians, namely women's rights over their own reproductive system. The film, which was screened at the Documentary Film Festival, explored the experience of five women in facing the stigma of being childfree.

In 2018, animator M. Alfath Syahalam released an animated documentary titled “Marzuki”, which told the story of a former football athlete who demanded the government to uphold its promise to guarantee his well-being. The animation reconstructed the former athlete’s life, from his heyday to the days of waiting that left him unanswered until his last day. The illustrations in the film managed to portray the emotions of the documentary subject; a feat that sometimes real footage can’t achieve.

Documentary freedom and freedom from conventions

Kifu's artistic decision in "A Tale of The Crocodile's Twin" was based on his belief that a film can be a film without being shackled by genre. This concept of freedom is, undoubtedly, still foreign to Indonesian people, who are used to watching journalism-style documentaries. The use of other arts in a documentary film to construct real events is still rarely done by Indonesian filmmakers. Kifu got this courage to break the conventions by studying the works of European film maestros, such as Chris Marker who made “La Jetée” (1962).

“Chris Marker in ‘La Jetée’ made fictional stories out of real archives. He used the documentary treatment to compose a fictional film," said Kifu.

Chris Marker constructed a story using still images belonging to people he did not know, transforming meaningless or contextless archives into a fictional story. Kifu also studied the works of French film maestro Agnès Varda who was part of the French nouvelle vague, a movement characterised by its rejection of traditional filmmaking conventions.

“I learned to be open in exploring the forms of documentaries from Agnès Varda's films. Through her short and feature films, I learned that documentaries can be this unrestrained. Documentaries can convey ideas without feeling like journalism. Images and messages do not have to support each other like most documentaries. Agnès Varda is able to convey the idea of reality in a different visual form, this gave her films a poetic feel,” said Kifu.

Kifu also discovered this freedom from conventions when he attended film screenings at the Short Film Festival Oberhausen, Germany. It was a crucial experience for Kifu because there, he saw films being celebrated from an artistic perspective rather than their genre. The festival chose films not based on their genres. Kifu said there are many unique films that if defined within a certain genre group will limit audience imagination.

"Unfortunately, this culture is still underdeveloped in Indonesia although the country has a rich visual arts culture waiting to be explored. For example, there are many myths that can be told in visual forms that are free from genre norms. When 'A Tale of The Crocodile's Twin' was screened in Indonesia, many viewers called it a new form of documentary. Truth is, as a director, I just wanted to have the freedom to play with time and space, without being constrained by certain genre conventions,” said Kifu.

At the end of the chat, Kifu explained that human imagination can be sparked by a montage of different visual forms without losing the idea of reality. In the documentary film production process, filmmakers can freely explore the execution of visual construction.