Dismantling the Documentary

When I first started Reassemblage, I was expecting to watch a somewhat "alternative" documentary about people in Senegal, with a narrator informing me with facts and information about what was happening on the screen. However, as the film went on, I began to notice the lack of music and narration, two things that are usually quite prominent in documentaries. I was slightly confused as to what I was watching, and I was having a hard time understanding what point this film was trying to make. 

I was slightly taken aback by Trinh Mihn ha's scarce but calming narration. Her choice to only speak a few quiet sentences at a time is something I really respect. Most documentaries bombard you with information and facts, whereas Mihn ha makes inquisitive and thoughtful statements that relate to the content and make you think about documentaries in a different way. For instance, when I was watching the film and trying to decipher the meaning of the film, the calm, slightly accented voice of Mihn ha said, "I do not intend to speak about, just speak nearby." It was at this point that I began to understand what Mihn ha was trying to say. Instead of deliberately searching for information to present, she chose to just observe and absorb the culture she was in, and in turn, challenge the viewer's idea of what a documentary should be. Most documentaries contain an abundance of information that is carefully edited to be interpreted a certain way. But by straying away from the typical documentarian production, Trinh Minh ha gives the viewer the space and opportunity to interprate the content in their own way.

By looking at the world through an unedited, obervational lens, we are able to learn just as much about certain cultures or tribes than if someone were spewing facts at us. Through Trinh Minh ha's experimental methods, the audience is exposed to things that otherwise may not be shown in typical documentaries. Things like personal interactions and daily rituals are deemed as "not important" to the message of the documentary, and are often cut out in order to make room for information. But these little things are important to our understanding of the unknown parts of the world, and Reassemblage is a perfect demonstration of how observation, as opposed to deliberately searching for answers, can give us the answers we are looking for, and we have the freedom to interperate them in our own way.