Documentaries: Documentary review "My Kid is Transgender"

"My Kid is Transgender" doc review

"My Kid is Transgender" is a documentary following the lives of kids aged around 9-13 years old on their journey transitioning to their true gender. It uses interviews with both parents and kids as well as expert opinions from Dr's and psychologists for accurate facts and opinions.

Sequencing and Actuality

This documentary uses sequencing to introduce it's interviewees, with things like old home movies and photos that have the kids as the gender they were born. Over this we have the parents talking about how their child used to be using their old names and pronouns. After this the child as they are now living is introduced on their own as the gender they identify as. The sequencing then goes further with footage of the child with their friends and family while the interview continues as a voice over.

We plan to use this in our documentary as it gives background to the interviewees, sets up a family structure and also introduces people to the narrative of the documentary nicely. We'd need to keep it relevant to what is being spoken about however, for example here the narrator is talking about how it is now more popular for young children to transition as it used to be something adults did.

Interviews

Interviews are primarily conducted solitarily, parents are interviewed together kids and medical professionals how ever are interviewed alone. Things like doctors and psychologists are intertwined with the medical examinations that the kids go through.

Interviews are carried out with the subject toward one side of the frame, their answers to questions are self contained and they make eye contact with the interviewer not the camera.

We're going to use both this set up and interview style for our documentary as it makes it easier for editing, by having stand alone answers the interviewer doesn't have to be included in the narrative. By also having the interviewee to one side of the frame writing or information can be included about them on the other side which is something we can use to introduce our characters.

Overall this documentary effectively tells the stories of these young teenagers on their transition. Its use of actuality and sequences introduce and set up interviewees very well for the audience also giving it a personal feel. It also follows key 'characters' through the entire documentary whilst having other teens every now and then, this also makes the audience feel like they're going on a journey with them. These are things I would like to try and replicate in our documentary.