Documentary fiction is a staged film with real people in a real setting. Unlike a chronicle, there is a script and a director’s idea. The characters are asked to repeat on camera what they once did or are constantly doing, so the documentary accuracy of the story is preserved.
Docu-fiction combines elements of documentary and feature films. This is the format of most National Geographic projects. An example of a documentary is the Oscar-winning 2019 film Free Solo about the free solo climbing of rock climber Alex Honnold.
In a commercial documentary, the focus is always on a real person. Telling its story, the brand also tells about itself: its values, strategy, social responsibility. Casting is important here, as is the creative idea.
The docu-fiction format in advertising most often helps:
STATE VALUES. In the late 2000s, the Dove brand began to use the stories of real women in advertising to finally change society’s view of “beauty standards.” The very first Real Beauty campaign doubled Dove’s sales, and after the viral video Real Beauty Sketches, the brand’s products began to be sold all over the world.
In April 2020, the Ogilvy agency, which has been working with Dove for more than 10 years, released a series of 15-second videos about eight women: lawyers, doctors, detectives.
EXPLAIN THE STRATEGY. In early 2020, Volvo rolled out a 7-minute short film called The Birdman about Professor Carl Jones, a Nobel laureate who saved nine species of birds from extinction.