Blog Post 2

The documentary I watched was called “Immigration in Italy” by Matt Colburn. It covered a few of the biggest issues Italy is facing right now with a focus in social factors. Italians have a lot of preconceived notions of what immigrants look like. They often think they are young, African men who are coming to cause trouble and steal their jobs. In reality, the majority of immigrants coming into Italy are women from other European countries. Another big problem is citizenship. There are only two ways to become an Italian citizen as an immigrant. The first is to work in the country for 10 years uninterrupted. The other is to marry an Italian and apply after 3 years. This can make it really hard for immigrants because losing your job or getting divorced can cost you the opportunity and rights of becoming a citizen. I noticed a lot of similarities between what Italy is facing and what America is facing right now. There is a lot of fear and misinformation. This makes it hard for immigrants and also citizens because of the huge disconnect. Another similarity are the amount of barriers people face to citizenship. Both countries have high barriers because they want to regulate their population and border.

This documentary does a good job of raising awareness of the issue, but not much else. It does a good job of conducting interviews with knowledgeable people. However, there are many things that could be improved upon. No actual immigration or citizenship processes are touched upon. No important people in the conversation are mentioned. There is no footage of some of the things they talk about. They also don’t have any next steps of what to do with this information. One of the reasons for this may be that this was a very small film with a minimal budget. It was just one guy with a camera. He may not have been able to afford amenities like special effects or stock footage. Regardless, next steps would have been helpful. It is apparent that the director didn’t think too far ahead past completing the project. This is linked to the article about the downside of measuring social change. It is so hard to measure and market the change a documentary highlights because often they don’t have the budget. In “Immigration in Italy” following up to see the results of the documentary would probably involve funding a whole separate documentary. This shows the give and take. Your message really only travels as far as your pockets are deep. Measuring this documentary for impact wouldn’t have very much effect. It was a small documentary on YouTube. This documentary isn’t going to cause legislative reform in Italy. However, it will raise awareness of the issue. For its target, I think it did a pretty good job.

I think using reality TV in a documentary setting is a good way to inform younger and lower educated viewers. Reality TV is universally entertaining. It blends the ridiculous with daily life. This way, people who don’t like consuming information in a traditional standard can still get it while being entertained. For example, I looked around the room while watching Sweatshop: Deadly Fashion. What I noticed was a high level of engagement. The protagonists were teenagers like us and influencers. There were characters like in a fiction novel that the audience can grab onto. During the Puerto Rico episode, there was significantly less engagement. The protagonist was older and the content was more cut-and-dry. It reminded me a lot of episode of Vice. That’s not to say that it wasn’t successful in achieving it’s goals. It was clear that it wanted to stress the fact that Puerto Rico feels like it has no support from the U.S. However, it terms of engagement from a younger demographic, Sweatshop: Deadly Fashion is much closer to the kind of show a college kid is going to want to watch.

I think that Anthony Bourdain does a good job of catering to his audience. You can tell that by this point in his series, he has established what type of show he has. He has a unique style that blends together many elements of typical documentary while inserting himself directly in the situation. It reminded me a lot of Morgan Spurlok’s “The Greatest Movie Ever Sold.” Instead of just being a narator and a fellow onlooker, Bourdain is inserted directly in the situation. It makes for an authentic interaction in his interviews. It’s nice to see his personality and point of view. However, it’s important to remember his lens. While he may be right in the U.S. not paying much attention to Puerto Rico, it’s still important to remember that there are two sides and the U.S.’s side should be examined as well.