Louis Theroux
Louis Theroux is an English Documentary filmmaker best known for documentaries that investigate lifestyles and celebrities such as; 'Savile', 'Drinking to Oblivion' and 'Transgender kids' among a few. He looks at challenging subject matter and shocking beliefs such as the Westboro Baptist Church in his documentary 'America's Most Hated Family In Crisis'. He has a calm demur and informal questioning style to his interviews, he quiet often becomes involved with the subject and uses this to gain their trust and get more information.
"America's medicated kids"
"America's medicated kids" looks at kids in America with disorders such as OCD and the medication they are being prescribed, Louis tackles the question of whether children of such young ages should be prescribed medications like anti-depressants. His aim was to live among the families and to get to know the medicated children.
The majority of children within this documentary are under the age of 15 ((the teenagers featured in our doc are around this age mostly)) and are living their day to day lives in therapy and at home while Louis observes and questions parents, medical professionals and the children themselves.
Something I found in this documentary was there was next to no sequencing or actuality, the entire piece was basically like and extended interview embedded into the daily lives of the interviewees. This meant that for children with disorders where their behaviour was rather erratic that change in emotion was caught on camera, similarly because sequencing for children is often used to show a 'before' state to the audience it also shows that for many of these kids they have been like this their entire life, there is no 'before' state.
Interviews from Louis are very informal, in one instance he takes one of the kids out for ice cream while he asks questions and gets to know him, this not only allows the subject to become more relaxed but means that Louis can see his behaviour first hand instead of having a filtered recounted telling of it from a parent or doctor.
Theroux also gives the impression that he knows how to talk to children very well, he makes special allowances for their disorders such as not making eye contact or staying away when they ask. However he also talks to them as though they are an adult which many children appreciate as they feel they are equal and could be more willing to talk and answer questions.This is something I'd like to try and replicate in our documentary, because although some of the people we are interviewing are under 18 and stereotypically are regarded by society as not knowing what they want in life and can't understand emotions like love yet, it is important to me that we treat a 13 year old's feelings and emotions with the same care, respect and validity as a 25 year olds.
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Websites used:
Netflix to watch 'America's medicated kids' and other Theroux docs
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