Docuseries likeThe Voware televisions latest prestige offering, but theyre not so different from their trashier predecessors.
Save this article to read it later.
Find this story in your accountsSaved for Latersection.
I feel like my life with Bonnie was stolen, Vicente says.
Bonnie got there first.
Hes referring to her realization that the organization they had devoted their lives to was a cult.
I think some things are going to crumble, Bonnie says.
Cut to closing credits.
I was so compelled I let my kids breakfast oatmeal congeal in the pot behind me while I watched.
This, I realized, is the way producers onThe Bachelorwould have told this story.
That sounds gross and bad!
In its documentary sensibility,The Vowis part of a vital, well-established school of fly-on-the-wall filmmaking.
Its creators, Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim, are award-winning directors.
J.: Made in America.In recent years, the form has flourished.
Documentaries have always carried with them an air of legitimacy and highbrow sheen.
(See bawdy Renaissance plays, 19th-century serial fiction, soap operas.)
They come with the added voyeuristic kick of being real.
Real enough for that oomph of busybody pleasure.
Theres an important distinction between the way most reality shows are made and the foundational ethos of a docuseries.
Docuseries, for the most part, film their subjects as they are.
That difference is key to the legitimizing link between the two forms.
That comes across in the packaging, too.
In its form and its style,The Vowscreams elevated.
Beingabouta reality show feels superior to being one.
Its like being in a room with couples as they discuss their most private thoughts.
People want to go deeper, he said.
People want to feel like theyre going chapter by chapter into worlds.
One of the great innovations of the European novel was free indirect discourse.
What better comparison to the overwhelming intimacy ofThe Vow?
How often have I heard TV creatives describe their prestige dramas as novelistic and Dickensian?
Docuseries are the newest conversation-consuming form adding a nod to Dickens is just the chefs kiss of TV legitimacy.
