<Entering our BAD IDEA Art of Confession competition? Here's some guidance on what a confessional documentary might be
Ignoring the obvious religious and criminal contexts, a "confession" is a humorous or intimate revelation about a person's private life, occupation, or personal beliefs.
Confession is an oft-neglected art - the most direct and revealing form of personal storytelling there is. Throughout history, personal confession has been highly valued and much sought after. It took the Spanish Inquisition hours of torturing heretics before they could declare a confession "true and free", the best part of two Star Wars films before Luke Skywalker could shake a confession of secret fatherhood from Darth Vader (and he lost a hand in the process), and 30 years before "Deep Throat" informer W. Mark Felt told an American magazine about his role in unraveling the Watergate scandal.
Today, our notion of "confession" has been debased somewhat, as the word is most commonly associated with sensational 'kiss and tell' tabloid culture, and supermarket till-side magazines.
We at BAD IDEA and FourDocs would like to redress this state of affairs by inviting young filmmakers to reinvent the modern confessional in the form of the documentary short
You, and the people around you, are endlessly fascinating subjects, and we want to know about your lives. It's time to dish. We want to see confessional documentary films from the furthest frontiers of contemporary British life, we want to be surprised, and we want to be entertained.
This guide is about the theory of making a confessional film. As for the practical stuff, you don't have to be an experienced filmmaker to enter this competition, in fact you don't need any experience at all: all you need is your ideas, talent, and a good confessional story. For the nitty-gritty of documentary-making, especially if you haven't made a documentary (or any film) before, take a crash course through the Make Docs section of the site, where you'll find 20 short video guides to making documentaries.
To upload to FourDocs, you need to register on the site, and get your film in the right format for it to get to us. For full information on how to compress and then upload your doc to us, our specifications can be found in the Compression Clinic.
If you need any help at all on the technical/uploading side, then please email us
What makes a good story? Screenwriter William Goldman wrote that ""A good story is something with an interesting premise that builds logically to a satisfying and surprising conclusion." It's a pretty succinct definition, and also a useful guideline. Exactly how interesting is the premise of your story? If it covers a well-worn subject, are you taking a unique angle to make your story stand out? Does the film confound our expectations? Is there a strong ending? If you can reasonably say that your documentary confessional satisfies all aspects of Goldman's "good story" theory, then the chances are you're onto a winner.
This applies just as much to documentary-making as it does to fiction-making. "Out there" in the world around us, there are an abundance of significant narratives to uncover - apparently mundane people, lifestyles, and events that are, on closer examination, startling.
The trick is to recognise these stories in the world around us, capture them with precision, and then use your imagination and flair to tell a story with originality
Compelling stories are everywhere if you look with the right eyes: maybe your obsession with reality television has made you develop an untapped creative talent? Perhaps your mates' leisure habits offer an unheralded insight into the nebulous psyche of British youth? Or maybe the unconventional business practice of your local newsagent offers a solution to the looming pensions crisis? It could literally be anything, but your film needs an element of personal confession to be considered.
We are looking for confessional films that enlighten us, grip us, catch us off guard, and also challenge our preconceptions. The rest is up to you: there are no rules to telling a story, you can make your film as experimental, weird, or demented as you like, just as long as it investigates the idea of personal confession. Animated docs, experimental docs - anything goes!
Good luck!