Sunday, November 15, 2009

Listening Journal #4: Long Form Documentary #2 - The Trouble with Hubble Bubble


Producer: Nicola Humphries

Series Producer: Perminder Khatkar

Narrator: Connie Hark

Title: The Trouble with Hubble Bubble

Length: 24 min. 17 sec.

Link to the documentary:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/asiannetwork/documentaries/troublewithhubblebubble.shtm

The documentary is about the harmful effects of shisha (hookah/water pipe) on one’s health and how a great amount of people is unaware of the fact that shisha is actually worse than cigarettes. Some of them are aware of the health risks but do not take it as seriously as they should.

What’s most interesting about the documentary is the use of background music that really fits the story. Shisha mainly comes from the Middle East/Asia and the use of Middle Eastern/Asian music really adds to the story. It was not distracting and made the documentary more interesting and unique. The choice of the songs was very good. How the music fades in and out is very well done. The documentary is also very informative and the great amount of research done to produce such a piece is very apparent. There was a good variety of different and diverse people interviewed, from health experts, shisha users, doctors…etc.

The quality of the narrator’s voice and the sound bites are very good. The background music does not overshadow the narration at all which was very well done.

I like how elaborate the documentary is and I believe the length of the documentary was fine. 

No comments: