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Watch Diary: Icarus

Icarus.

Icarus is a documentary surrounding the illegal doping happening in Olympic sports. Film maker Bryan Fogel takes part in doping to document how it affects his performance in a French cycling competition, but unintentionally becomes involved in the details of a doping scandal after asking for the help of Grigory Rodchenkov, the head of a Russian anti-doping lab. 

In Icarus they used formal and informal approaches to interviews, which represented the before and after of discovering the doping scandal, although both types of interview were used before and after. The interviews and phone calls were used to narrate and voice over the film, which kept up a dramatic style, and built tension along with the use of non-diegetic music. In the set up of the documentary and after Fogel's race, they used a lot of archive footage which fit to what they were speaking about in the interviews or phone calls, however in the lead up to the race they stopped using archive footage and moved more to using Fogel's preparation for the race which built tension and meant that as the viewer we were able to see the pressure that Fogel was feeling too, so that we could empathise with him.
The documentary didn't have someone presenting it as such, or really speaking to the audience, which I find quite impressive that they were able to get across such a detailed story without even explaining anything directly to the audience, they just spoke to the audience through the interviews and interactions between Fogel and Rodchenkov. This was quite unusual but it worked, because in a way it made the show more dramatic, and made reveals (such as when Rodchenkov's colleague Nikita Kamaev dies reportedly from a heart attack) more powerful.

It was interesting that the documentary went from one extreme to another, starting with Fogel doping himself to see if he can evade the anti-doping tests, which he did, but because of his bike breaking he didn't do any better in the competition than the previous year. Fogel was potentially putting himself in medical and lawful danger as what he was doing was illegal, and something could have gone wrong with the medication. Once the race was over the documentary moved onto the scandal and how, in Russia, it was claimed that the government knew about the doping in sports and sponsored it, which was damning to the Russian government. This is what hooks the viewer's interest, as there is something that gives people a dark intrigue into such situations where a person may be in danger and they want to know what happens to them. This is all heightened by the deaths of 2 of Rodchenkov's colleagues, and the viewer is pushed to feel concerned about Rodchenkov himself as he flees from Russia to the US to stay with Fogel. 
The tension, danger and damning reveals all create a basis for a hooking documentary. There was not a moment that there was information being told that didn't add to the story.
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