Sheila Curran Bernard
  • HOME
  • ABOUT
    • News & Links
    • Honors & Awards
  • FILMS & SERIES
    • Project Development
  • Books & Articles
    • Archival Storytelling >
      • Reviews, Archival Storytelling
    • Documentary Storytelling >
      • Reviews, Documentary Storytelling
    • School
    • Articles
  • Presentations & Events
  • Dramatic Writing
  • Contact

Return to books page
News & Links
Picture
Documentary Storytelling, 5th edition
Paperback: 
Published: To be published late spring, 2022!
ISBN: 
Imprint: Focal Press/Routledge/Taylor & Francis

For nearly two decades, Documentary Storytelling has reached filmmakers and filmgoers worldwide with its unique focus on the key ingredient for success in the global documentary marketplace: storytelling.
 
As this revised, updated fifth edition makes clear, nonfiction storytelling is not limited to character-driven journeys, but instead encompasses the diverse ways that today’s top documentarians reach audiences with content that is creative, original, and often inspirational, all without sacrificing the integrity that gives documentary its power. The book is filled with practical advice for writers, producers, directors, editors, cinematographers, and others committed to reality-based filmmaking that seeks to reach audiences, raise awareness, address social issues, illuminate the human condition, and even entertain.​

In this new edition, Emmy Award-winning filmmaker and author Sheila Curran Bernard offers:
  • a closer look at the way ethical nonfiction filmmakers take creative, authorial leaps while also remaining transparent with audiences;
  • new tools for understanding how documentaries are structured, how they may rearrange time for storytelling effect, and how a simple narrative throughline can convey complexity without being a conventional “hero’s journey“;
  • new conversations with filmmakers and educators including Dawn Porter, Madison Hamburg, Tracy Heather Strain, June Cross, Heidi Gronauer, and Julie Casper Roth, and another look at conversations with Stanley Nelson and Orlando von Einsiedel.

Documentary Storytelling, 4th edition

Picture
Paperback: 378 pages, also available on Kindle
Published: December 2015
ISBN 13: 978-0-415-84330-0
Imprint: FOCAL PRESS

Documentary Storytelling has reached filmmakers and filmgoers worldwide with its unique focus on the key ingredients for success in the growing global documentary marketplace: storytelling. This practical guide reveals how today’s top filmmakers bring the tools of narrative cinema to the world of nonfiction film and video without sacrificing the rigor and truthfulness that give documentaries their power. The book offers practical advice for producers, directors, editors, cinematographers, writers and others seeking to make ethical and effective films that merge the strengths of visual and aural media with the power of narrative storytelling.

In this updated edition, Emmy Award-winning author Sheila Curran Bernard offers new strategies for analyzing documentary work; new conversations with filmmakers including Stanley Nelson (The Black Panthers), Kazuhiro Soda (Mental), Orlando von Einsiedel (Virunga), and Cara Mertes (JustFilms), along with discussions previously held with Susan Kim (Imaginary Witness), Deborah Scranton (The War Tapes), Alex Gibney (Taxi to the Dark Side), and James Marsh (Man on Wire).

Click here to see the Table of Contents or to request a Complimentary Exam Copy


Foreign editions

Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture


  • Documentary Storytelling, 4th edition has been translated into Japanese (Tetsuro Shimauchi, translator), November 2021. An Arabic edition and Chinese edition are forthcoming. 
  • Documentary Storytelling, 3rd edition is available in Polish, Korean, Chinese, and Japanese (abridged). 
  • Documentary Storytelling, 2nd edition is available in Portuguese, Korean, and Chinese.  ​

Filmmaker/educator interview chapters, all editions:

Ascher, Steve and Jeanne Jordan:  1-3
Bruce, Victoria and Karin Hayes:  2-3
Burns, Ric: 1-3
Casper Roth, Julie: 5
Cross, June: 5
Culp, Brett: 3
Else, Jon: 1-2
Fraser, Nick: 2-3
Gibney, Alex: 3-4
Gronauer, Heidi: 5
Hamburg, Madison: 5
Kim, Susan: 3-4
Marsh, James: 3-4
Mertes, Cara: 4
Nelson, Stanley: 4-5
Pollard, Sam: 1-3
Porter, Dawn: 5
Rabin, Kenn: 1-2
Saari, Per: 2
Scranton, Deborah: 3-4
Simpson, Susanne: 1
Soda, Kazuhiro: 4
Strain, Tracy Heather: 5
Von Einsiedel, Orlando: 4-5
Wambu, Onyekachu: 2
News & Links
​(c) 2022 Sheila Curran Bernard all rights reserved
  • HOME
  • ABOUT
    • News & Links
    • Honors & Awards
  • FILMS & SERIES
    • Project Development
  • Books & Articles
    • Archival Storytelling >
      • Reviews, Archival Storytelling
    • Documentary Storytelling >
      • Reviews, Documentary Storytelling
    • School
    • Articles
  • Presentations & Events
  • Dramatic Writing
  • Contact