Filmmaker’s theories: Peter Watkins
Peter Watkins, born 1935 in Surrey, is an Academy Award winning documentary filmmaker. He is best known for his films The War Game, Privilege, and La Commune. Watkins work largely focuses on historic events, or possible future events and ‘what if’ scenarios.
Watkins is known as one of the pioneers of the docudrama. The docudrama genre focuses on dramatising and reconstructing real or possible events. A well known example of this is Chernobyl (2019) which dramatises and deconstructs the events of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear plant incident. One of the benefits of this style is that it allows the filmmaker to present a point of view whilst never having to directly state it. Rather, they can let the events of the film speak for themselves. In The War Game, Watkins never has to say ‘nuclear war is bad and should be avoided at all costs’. Instead, he can let the audience see how horrific a nuclear event would be, and recognise that it should be avoided for themselves. This much more effectively gets across the message, since the audience member doesn’t feel like an idea was spoon fed to them. Rather, they feel that the idea was their own, which spreads Watkins’ message much more effectively.
Peter Watkins’ films are also known for their use of fictional interviews. In many of Watkins’ films such as The War Game and Culloden, Watkins follows the dramatised events as if he was a reporter, filming the events and interviewing people. This allows Watkins to construct his narrative without directly inserting himself into the film. Watkins is able to insert himself into each of the characters and have them react in ways which he chooses, which isn’t possible in a typical documentary that is trying to be genuine.
Watkins is known for his pacifist and radical ideas which are commonly spotted throughout his filmography. For example, in The War Game, he presents nuclear war as an unthinkable, tragic event, and urges viewers to consider the governments eagerness to construct bigger and bigger nuclear weapons. This would have hit the audience especially hard during the Cold War, when nuclear weapons production was at the highest it has ever been.