HERB DI GIOIA AND DAVID HANCOCK: A CASE STUDY IN EARLY OBSERVATIONAL CINEMA

Herb Di Gioia and David Hancock are key figures in the tradition of observational cinema. Their work, however, is barely known. Between 1971 and 1975 they completed a series of film that charts an observational cinema in the making. This essay is concerned to trace the process by which Di Gioia and Hancock forged a distinctive documentary path that differs in significant ways from the more established model identified with David and Judith MacDougall. A proper appreciation of their work is central to any critical assessment of observational cinema as a mode of ethnographic enquiry .