This is an organized documentary production movement led by John Gleason in Britain, which began in 1930s. Grierson opposes movies with fictional stories and artificial scenery, which is regarded as the misuse of the most influential art media.

The British documentary movement was deeply influenced by Soviet films in creative thinking, especially Wiltoff's "movie eye" theory. At the same time, they also widely absorbed Walter Rutman's "symphony" montage technique, various tendencies of French avant-garde and the experience of joris ivens and Flaherty in the Netherlands. On the one hand, they attach great importance to the social significance of movies, and advocate that documentaries should be creative treatment and direct propaganda means for real life scenes;

On the other hand, when reproducing real life scenes, great attention is paid to artistic treatment. The main works of the British documentary movement are: Gleason's Fishing Boat with a Drift Net (1929), Rhett's Song of Ceylon (1934), Red and Walter's Night Mail (1936), Cavalcanti's Coal Miner (650).

John Gleason:

He is the leader of the British documentary movement and the nominee of the British "documentary". He first put forward this statement when commenting on Flahadi's second film, Ocean Romance. Grierson was deeply influenced by Soviet movies in his creative thinking, especially Wiltoff's "movie eye" theory. At the same time, he also widely absorbed Walter Rutman's "symphony" montage technique, various tendencies of French avant-garde and the experience of joris ivens and Flaherty in the Netherlands.

He attaches great importance to the social significance of movies and advocates that documentaries should be a creative treatment of real life scenes and a direct means of publicity. In addition, when reproducing real life scenes, great attention is paid to artistic treatment.

His masterpiece is the famous film Drift-net Fishing Boat, which was shot in 1929. This film describes the fishing life of fishermen in Beihai. The greatest significance of this film lies in the practice of his film theory. In terms of artistic skills, Grierson used the structural principle of symphonic films developed by Eisenstein and Pudov King and powerful editing skills, which was picturesque.

Drift-net fishing boat;

It is the first and only documentary filmed by Gleason, the leader of British documentary genre from 65438 to 0929. The theme of the film is to reflect the working life of herring fishermen in Beihai, highlighting the "rhythm and significance of human labor".

Grierson was obviously influenced by Flaherty in this film, but he accepted the theory of Soviet Montage School in photography and editing, and the theme of the film was also directly related to the works of Wiltoff and Roesman. The film was shot in real scenes, which creatively dealt with real-life scenes. As a means of propaganda, it has great social significance.

The film adopts the technique of symphony montage, which produces an exotic beauty and is poetic. Because of the success of Fishing Boat, a group of young people who are keen on movies were United around Gleason and formed the famous British documentary movement.

(From notes) For more details, please see Share, the public study room.