Documentary Analysis 2: (Part 1)

Documentary Analysis 2
(Part 1)
BBC Documentary
This BBC documentary is one hour and twenty minutes long but my analysis concentrates
only on the first five minutes. The topic, as the narrator puts it, “is about how a small group
of the most brilliant minds unravel our old cosy certainties about maths and the universe” and
these minds being Georg Cantor, Ludwig Boltzmann, Kurt Gödel and Alan Turing, whose
work has profoundly affected us but which tragically drove them insane and eventually led to
them all committing suicide. The participant narrator is David Malone.
The section that I am exploring looks at Georg Cantor, the great mathematician whose work
proved to be the foundation for much of the 20th-century mathematics. He believed he was
God's messenger and was eventually driven insane trying to prove his theories of infinity.
This documentary film has an outstanding cinematography! One of the first shots that we see
is a low angle, extreme long shot of the silhouette of a man standing at the edge of a
mountain. In the composition of this shot, three-thirds
of it is filled with sky which represents infinity while
the use of a tiny silhouette of a man aims to reveal his
insignificance in comparison to that infinity and
suggests a sense of helplessness of the man trying to
understanding it. The following shot is just as
meaningful, but this time the camera captures the
black silhouette from behind in a medium eye level
shot, revealing
the mountains and endless sky in front of him. The
voice-over accompanying the shot hints to us the
meaning behind it by stating “Beneath the surface of
the earth are the rules of science...a matrix of pure
mathematics which explains ... how it is that we can
understand them in the first place”. Thus it can be
concluded that the silhouette is there to represent
mankind while the surface of the earth and the sky in
front raise all the questions that we seek answers to. The sepia colour scheme in both shots
suggests the focus and seriousness of the theme, if the images were coloured the dramatic
effect would not be the same. Moreover, the soundtrack in the background is a classical slow
tempo music played via a viola which creates a harmonic atmosphere that is likely to
encourage us to listen and reflect on what we have heard.
Still part of the introduction, this shot is accompanied
with a voice-over, whispering “To see a world in a
grain of sand, And a heaven in a wild flower, Hold
infinity in the palm of your hand, And eternity in an
hour.” which is the first stanza of a poem called
‘Auguries of Innocence’ written by William Blake.
The effect that the whispering of the words has is that
it makes them sound sacred, like they are taken from
the ‘Bible of science’. The choice of titles positioned in the centre of the frame of a sequence
of shots also adds to that effect: “SEE A WORLD”, “HEAVEN”, ”INFINITY”,
”ETERNITY”;
Fair part of the section of the documentary that I

looked at is dominated with interviews but also as an
interview carries on there are cut-aways to different
images. Here, the interviewee, who is not yet
introduced to us but
will be at a later point
(which I found
strange), talks about having ideas that “are great but
dangerous” and while he is saying this there is a cut to an
extreme close up shot of fire which is used to emphasise
danger and so enforce the point that he is making.
Other cut-aways include recreation of things that Georg Cantor is likely to have done.
Personally, I strongly favour documentaries that visually recreate the stories being told
because firstly, it is easier to understand and secondly, particularly for historic
documentaries, there is something intriguing about
recreating history.
For example, the recreated scene of, supposedly,

Georg Cantor sitting on a chair and staring out the
window suggests that he is suffering from a mental
condition thus it instantly enforces the words of the
narrator: “Once they have looked at these problems
they could not look away and pursue the questions to the brink of insanity and then over it to
madness, suicide.”
Another one of the recreated shots is this extreme

close up of Georg Cantor’s face. The detail that we are
able to see in his expression underlines the so clearly
evident immense concentration. The strong sepia
colour represents power and passion. The blurred
background also indicates that at this moment nothing
else has any importance. It is a very engaging shot as it makes the viewer curious on one
hand and provokes a sense of admiration on the other.
Georg Cantor believed he was God's messenger but he

didn’t believe in Jesus. Instead he believed in the
creator God, “a God who set the planets spinning in
their orbits and whose mysteries are the eternal and
perfect laws of motion.” This shot illustrates his view
as even though the audience can recognise who the
statue is of, the use of a silhouette removes its identity
as Jesus and frees the position for someone else,
maybe Georg Cantor. Whoever the statue represents they are viewed as majestic as the low
angle of the shot suggests. Moreover, the bright light of the sun shining in the background
could symbolise an aura of knowledge which contrasts with the darkness that dominates the
shot which may stand for unawareness and even ignorance. This interpretation correlates
well with the voice-over: “Today we only stand at the threshold of the world they saw.”
After the introduction of the documentary is complete

we meet the narrator. This close up shot of him
captures him looking down upon a tiny yellow leaf
that he seems to carefully observe and sees something
symbolical about it. The extreme close up of the leaf
also emphasises its presence via focusing on it and
blurring what is behind it. The viewer, just like me,
might find this image and its meaning ambiguous as
the narrator does not explain it. It may represent a
colourful season symbolising new findings or it might
be the complete opposite by implying the end of the
summer and the end of an era that has had genius
minds living in it.
This shot that follows comes as a breath of fresh air in

the sense that it breaks out of the intense shot
sequences and constructions that we have observed so
far. It is a long-medium shot of the ordinary every-day
life. There is nothing scientific about it but it is used
as a transition
from the
footage which
until now has left the viewer to only observe but from
now on the viewer is closely engaged as the narrator
speaks directly at him.
Another shot that seemed intriguing was this one,
an extreme close up of, supposedly, the eye of
Georg Cantor, but what is interesting about it is the
captured reflection of his pen
while he is writing. It is
generally viewed that a
person’s eyes are the key to
their soul and the place
where the truth lies so this shot brilliantly conveys his passion and even obsession for his
research which sadly led to his end.

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Documentary Analysis 2

Fair part of the section of the documentary that I

For example, the recreated scene of, supposedly,

Another one of the recreated shots is this extreme

Georg Cantor believed he was God's messenger but he

After the introduction of the documentary is complete

This shot that follows comes as a breath of fresh air in

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