Post 3

The text we read suggested that Documentaries can be determined by a simple question. "Could this film be lying?". After reading this article I realize how intelligent this film really is. On the surface it is a synthesis between documentary and biopic. The film is framed by the original author who sits in a recording studio just being himself. Though the introduction to him in the beginning is of him reading a sheet of paper, the film includes dialogue which is totally irrelevant to the film. We learn that Harvey Pekar really likes orange soda. That has nothing to do with the fictitious story we are watching. That is a piece of (assumably) true information about the subject of the biography. These scenes allow for the film to be regarded as a documentary. As the film proceeds, we can understand that the purpose for the documentary aspect of the film is to propose that the biography of Harvey Pekar as played by Paul Giamotti is factual. To me, the most blatant example of the addition of "truth" is the introduction of Toby. Up to that point, we watched Judah Friedlander portray a character who is so different we have to question the legitimacy of his portrayal. "Could this character be a lie?". So, after a few scenes with Judah Friedlander pretending to be Toby Radloff, the shot switches to documentary mode and records a few minutes of the real Harvey Pekar and Toby Radloff talking amongst themselves. Again, this is totally irrelevant to the story that we are watching, but it is a reminder that what you see is in fact what you get.
There is a deeper meaning to the narrative that says: Life is more than just getting by. Harvey Pekar is making ends meet, but it doesn't make him happy. Doing something more than just surviving contributes to his overall sense of fulfillment and therefore the film is making an argument. The argument is that to find happiness you must do, you can not just be. This is a proposed truth, albeit a subject truth. The film then can be attributed with a new definition; It has become "assertive". It is assertive partially because it is preaching a subtle moral, but also because it makes a claim that its portrayal of the state of affairs of Pekar's life is true. It backs that statement up by using character witness' who are the actual people being portrayed by the character. Toby really was like that. Though we can not know for sure if certain scenes really did go the way they are portrayed, or whether the characters really did act and react the way we see them, we are more willing to believe the sincerity of the film after seeing the real people behind the characters. The film itself seems to be trying to support the root material trying to connect a circle of truth. If the film can show that the narrative is true, then transitive properties of logic propose the material it is based on is true.
So the film is a documentary on previously published material which was a biography of a personal history of the subject of the film. Unlike traditional biographies we do not have people sitting in front of the camera giving their opinions about what happened. What we do have are people standing in front of a camera acting as themselves thus giving credence to the suggestion that the film is a documentary and therefore factual. The narrative half of the film, however, plays up to drama. The story of Paul Giamatti as Harvey Pekar moves like any other narrative feature. We have a character who goes through the success' and failures of life. We are invited to consider a world such as this, detached from a need to know if it is real or fake except for the occasional breaks in narrative to introduce real life characters. The documentary is asserting the honesty of the fiction which is a representation of the autobiographical material of this man. A representation is not a truth, but a consideration, where as an assertion is compelling us to believe. We are watching a documentary of a biopic of a biopic (in a different medium) of a historical reality. What needs to be understood is the difference between a biopic and a documentary. A biopic is the story of a historical figure which allows itself open to exaggerations for the sake of character and plot while a documentary states something as a fact, or an absolute truth. The real life (historical reality) is obscured by potentially exaggerated stories in a comic book (biopic) which is presented by a dramatic portrayal within a narrative (biopic) which is validated by the presentation of the real guy (documentary). If we accept Eitzen's dissection of genres, a biopic is inherently fictitious because it is simply "inviting us to consider a state of affairs". Certainly Pollock and Basquiat took a few liberties to make it translatable to film, and this film does the same within the alloted boundaries.
The translation between comic book and film are detected in the editing. The thought bubbles, and exposition boxes are cornerstones of traditional comic book narratives. There are very few jump cuts and instead the camera allows for movement to occur by the actors within the shot rather than movement being created by the camera. This is an allusion to the frame by frame device of comic books. Where comic books would create their tone through color or shading, the film replaces that with lighting and sound. The Jazz creates the mood for the film and the light is kept at lower levels to allow it too look a little more natural. The Mise-en-scene of the film gives it a little more depth of character than a comic book can afford to. For example, in Harvey's apartment we can see wall sized, packed shelves of old records to present the proportional interest Harvey has in records. As in a comic book, the amount of Mise-en-scene is restricted to the size of the frame, but a film allows for a much larger frame than a comic can afford so we get more out of each shot than we might in the comic. Also, the representation of objects are not restricted to the experience of the artist, but easily displayed through the physical image so as to leave no question to its identity.
American Splendor is a perfect translation of a comic to a film. It also creates a new genre by successfully synthesizing a documentary with a biopic edited as if it were a comic book. The director clearly knew what they were doing by juxtaposing a narrative with evidence to substantiate a claim which is not even really stated. We don't feel the need to ask if the story is real because it is a simple presentation of a state of affairs, but we are given the proof anyway. There is both a subtle moral argument and no argument at the same time. Though it could have been anchored by confusion, it allowed itself the levity to afford the audience to disregard the need for truth. Nothing in the film happens that the audience would say "I don't believe it". We are enchanted by both the fake characters and the real people which allows for a very rewarding experience from such an elaborate film. I like to think of this as a documentary of a narrative of an autobiography of a man.