Daughter from Danang and Born into Brothels: Story Analysis

Daughter from Danang (2002) and Born into Brothels (2004) are two award winning documentaries that effectively tell the story that they are intending. Both documentaries do this in their own unique way, but maintain some similarities. I will compare these two documentaries’ story structure to find how they are different and similar. I will be analyzing story, sequence, shot, and act structure.

Daughter from Danang’s tells the story of Heidi Bub’s return to her mother after 20 years of separation. Heidi Bub is a half-Vietnamese woman that was separated from her during the 1975 Operation Baby lift. Now the question or “train” that this documentary attempts to answer is “will this reunion go well?” (Bernard). This documentary approaches its “train” with a clear and very “traditional” interview based three-act structure.

Daughter from Danang’s first act has an excessive amount of dialogue and backstory, but the point of attack — the point in time at which the director starts the documentary — was a creative solution to the aforementioned problem (Bernard). Daughter from Danang starts just before Heidi Bub leaves for Vietnam and ends just as Heidi initially meets her mom. This act builds the up the tension for this meeting through interview bits from Heidi’s birth mom, Heidi’s friends, relatives, and Heidi herself. While this tension of the meeting is building, it allows each interviewee to provide Heidi’s backstory in an intriguing way. For example, While Heidi describes her anxiety from the culture shock she is expecting, interview bits and b-roll describe the racist town she grew up in. The viewer’s attention is never lost in the first act.

The second and third acts of Daughter from Danang follow Heidi’s visit to Vietnam and her family there. These acts are split into several scenes that are not necessarily chronological, but rather describe different aspects of her trip. For example, one scene uses interviews from Heidi’s financially poorest sister and footage of Heidi visiting that sister’s home. The living conditions are obviously exceedingly below what Heidi is accustomed. This scene illustrates a point: Several of Heidi’s relatives in Vietnam really want assistance from Heidi.

The scene with the poorest sister and several more scenes that are similarly structure all build up Heidi’s uneasiness about her formally unknown family. Finally, in the scene centered around Heidi’s most affluent brother, Heidi is asked to create a consistent line of financial assistance to her Vietnamese relatives. Heidi predictably breaks down into tears. This scene initiated the third act which concludes Heidi’s visit. Once Heidi returns home, she (temporally?) cuts off communication with her relatives in Vietnam as she is unsure how to deal with them. The documentary returns Heidi’s birth mother for one last interview where the mother expresses her concern that Heidi will never return.

Born into Brothels is a documentary about a photographer, Zana Briski, that temporally decides to live in Calcutta’s Red Light — A district notorious for illegal drugs and prostitution — to teach the prostitutes’ children photography and possibly provide an exit for the kids. The train of this documentary is the story Zana Briski’s attempt to educate the children and get them enrolled in schools. Born into Brothels, like Daughter from Danang, follows a three-act structure.

Born into Brothels takes an approach similar to the second and third acts of Daughter from Danang, that is Born into Brothels sets up several scenes that center around one person or event to illustrate a point. Than intercut with footage of these events is footage and narration of Zana’s attempt to get the kids into school. However, these scenes start at the beginning of the documentary and last until the end. This unlike Daughter from Danang which “switches gears” for the last two acts. For example, one scene focuses on Avijit Halder. Avijit’s scene shows footage of his home life; some of his photographic adventures; photos and narration of his backstory; and this culminates in stills of his photography. This whole scene is interwoven with Zana’s immense struggle to get Avijit enrolled and motivated to attend school. Zana claims that Avijit is the most talented of the kids of the Red-Light district, but he is stubborn. Eventually though, Zana gets Avijit to enroll in school. This scene structure continues well into the third act all the way up to the documentary’s conclusion.

Born into Brothels concludes with Zana success in enrolling some of the children, however text just before the credits informs us that all but two kids were successful in their education. This ending is well built up and emotional because of the structure of the rest of the documentary. Each kid has their own scene and we get to know them fairly well.

Both documentaries listed in this post do an excellent job of telling their stories. They accomplish this through a clear three act structure and excellent scene composition. They both have a clear “train” to follow.

Sources:

Sheila Bernard’s Documentary Storytelling: Creative Nonfiction on Screen.