Screen Australia: What is a Synopsis? An Outline? A Treatment? Page 11
The documentary treatment
The documentary treatment, like the drama treatment, tells the story of the film as you plan to have
the audience experience it, either stating or implying the style in which it will be treated/told.
But since documentaries may utilise a wide variety of resources not used in a straight drama, the
documentary treatment should specify these, eg interviews, reconstructions, archival footage,
photographs, maps, diagrams, graphics, etc.
As an example here is a portion of the treatment for Eternity:
Ruth Ridley is the strong and feisty daughter of the preacher John Ridley. She sits in the studio
before a beautiful, stylised landscape of a sea at sunset. She explains the influence her father
had on Arthur Stace, who was later to become known as ‘Mr Eternity’. A photograph of John
Ridley appears. It was Ridley’s sermon, ’Echoes of Eternity’, which supposedly converted Stace
to Christianity in the 1930s. It was after this sermon that Stace took a piece of chalk from his
pocket and wrote, in beautiful copperplate script on the sidewalks of Sydney, the one word that
would influence many for the next four decades: ‘Eternity’.
The image of Arthur Stace appears, recreated, as he walks away from the Sydney Harbour
Bridge, wearing a dark coat and Depression-era hat. 1920s archival footage of two male
swimmers, seen from overhead, lying on a cliff face. The turbulent sea hits the cliff as the sea
runs over their bodies. John Ridley’s poetic sermon booms loudly as the sea returns to hit the
cliff face and the swimmers hold on tightly.
The experienced reader can infer at once the resources to be utilised by this filmmaker: research,
interviews, photographs, voice over narration, aural recreation, graphics, dramatic reconstruction and
archival footage.
If it is essential to include background material on the subject or characters, and evidence of your
access to them, do so in a separate document, so as to preserve the narrative flow of the treatment
itself.
Funding bodies and broadcasters recognise that in the case of some documentary projects –
observational or verite films for instance – it is impossible to write a detailed treatment. In such
cases, the full burden rests on the outline, or proposal (see above), which must convince the reader
of the potential of the story and provide evidence that the filmmakers have or can gain access to the
subject(s) and the resources necessary to make the film.
A scene or a sequence in a drama film, given adequate resources and competence, will be realised
more or less as written. The making of a documentary, however, may involve the elements of discovery
and even surprise.
The documentary treatment, therefore, like other synopses, is a statement of intent. It is a description
of the film you want to make and think you can, given what you know and what you have access to
when the filming begins. With a drama, it is said that the final draft is written in the edit suite; with a
documentary this is literally true.
The information included is of a general nature only. It has been drawn from a variety of sources and is
not intended as legal, accounting or any other form of professional advice. Screen Australia makes no
representations that this information is a substitute for external professional advice obtained from a third
party. Nor should the inclusion of any organisation be seen as an endorsement or recommendation of
that organisation. No representation is made regarding the appropriateness of any organisation to your
project. Screen Australia has undertaken all reasonable measures to ensure the accuracy of information
included. It specifically disclaims any liability, for loss or risk, personal or otherwise, which may be
incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly, of the use and application of any of the contents of this
information sheet.
© Screen Australia, March 2009