Documentary interviews? Why do they exist?

Documentary interviews are conducted to inform and even excite the viewer on current or past events. Purposes of documentary interviews are there to give the audience satisfaction by interviewing certain people and asking them a number of questions. Interviews tend to gain exclusive information from people and the general public can hear the truth from the person themselves. There are different types of documentary interviews but this depends of what type of documentary TV or film they appear on. Some interviews can be a heart-lighted talk but some can be hard hitting where the interviewee can be pressured but the interviewer or vice versa; this is known as combative interview, where the interview turns into an argument about a subject. Interviews appear on such programmes as magazine shows, debate shows, news, documentaries, chat shows and reality.

Interviews can be used a part of promotion as celebrities tend to be interviewed around a release date for a product, film or television show. This gives the media text recognition and giving interviews gets the word out to the masses. Promotional interviews typically feature in magazine shows and chat shows.

Interviewers used different types of questions to get a response from their interviewee. Most interviews contain open questions so the interviewees can response with an in-depth answer which can change the direction of the interview. The communication skills differ with what type of interview it is. With promotional interviews, the mood of the talk is very energetic and the location of the talk has bright lighting, which sets the mood. With interviews for debates and news shows the setting can be very minimal with minimal lighting to set a different mood. Interviews for such shows can be very argumentative and the setting of the talk represents this. There are many interview styles that programmes use to excite and maintain the viewers’ attention. TV programmes use different editing techniques and multi-camera set ups to keep the interviews interesting. The editing techniques are cutting to different angles and shots of the interviewer and interviewee throughout the interview. The pace of the editing can change when the discussion gets heated between the interviewer and interviewee.