Pre-production review: Paris Is Burning

Paris is Burning is a documentary looking at Drag nights in New York. Queens are interviewed/observed preparing for these nights and competing in 'balls'. It's a film made in the 1990's and is full of interesting characters and access.

Paris is Burning covers Drag Queens in the 80's and 90's where being a Drag queen was socially looked down on, on top of this it looks at the Black/Latina scene with in the Drag community. 
The filming is in no way faked and the audience are abruptly thrown into the lives of these queens and the abuse/discrimination they face everyday, to the extent where on of the contributors was murdered during filming.
In terms of actuality for the doc it has access to multiple balls and dressing rooms, this allows it to really get into the lives of the contributors while having constructed interviews mixed into it. This helps an audience who at the time of the 1990's would never have know what this community was experience it and relate to characters. The interviews are with Jennie Livingstone (who's off camera) and address subjects like, class, race/racism, wealth, gender orientation and beauty standards.

The budget for Paris is Burning was $500,000 and in it's opening weekend made, $310,127 

The film has a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and reviewers say One emerges from this film not only with a new vocabulary and a fresh way of viewing the straight world but with a bracing object lesson in understanding what society “role models” are all about. -Rotten Tomatoes

Contributors in this doc are all members of the New York Drag Scene, it's led by interviews with them and no voice over. They explain the terminology and how things are done, this makes it more personal to them. It also brings the audience into a community as they are being directly told by the members of it without the filter of a presenter or voice over. This way viewers are more likely to take in the message of the doc.

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From this I learnt about the Drag ball scene and through that learnt about different phrases and terminology that has inspired phrases today. I also learnt how important contributors are, if you use them correctly then you can construct a documentary that has a personal feel about it.