Evaluation 3 Road to Rampage - Meet the Riders

This is a proper five minute length mountain biking documentary, all about some of the top riders in the sport as they prepare for Red Bull Rampage one of the biggest events of the year. The video shows their riding from previous years on the course and also interviews them about there goals for this year and about how they are generally feeling about their year of riding, at the same time as this their is an overall commentary about the dangers of the sport as a whole and how the rider have placed in the previous years of Rampage.

The cinematography in this edit is really like a standard t.v. documentary, the riders all have a special interview in their homes where it is just there face in shot so the audience can see the emotion and reality of the riders talking about their careers. There are also some of the usual riding shots, like long shots of the tricks and riding and also a lot of tracking shots following the riders as they pack for the various upcoming events. This sort of documentary style film is quite unusual for a riding video as most people come to watch the riding rather than the story behind the riders lives, I personally find this video really interesting as it gives you a very personal insight into how the rider feel about there careers and this specific event.

The editing in this is also very traditional to a documentary on t.v. as there are very long cuts of the riders faces and a small part of their riding, there is still a few minutes of fast cuts of riding and the riders falls and win. However the main part of the film is edited in a very traditional way for documentaries with the long interview scenes intercut with small segments of riding. This style makes for an interesting finish to the video as it stays both informative and exciting for the general audience, it does not really fit into the general codes and conventions of a mountain bike documentary as it is mostly commentary and less riding but the video itself work in the genre as a unique film.

The sound in the entire video is almost entirely diagetic as it is the riders talking in interview, there is only a small part of non-diagetic sound and that is the commentary over the top of the interviews and riding through out the film. Yet again the lack of music is not sticking to the codes and conventions of the genre however it really works for this video as the audience are watching it to find out who the riders are and their specific stories. This is why the sound can simply just be them talking as it really doesn't need and music over the top to take away from the commentary and interviews.

Overall this video is very unique to the genre but it does work for many reasons, the fact there is less riding and more interviews makes the video very informative and gives the audience the story from a very first hand viewpoint. This video however does add to the representation of professional rider in the sport as very chilled out and not as competitive as in other areas of biking. The three riders interviewed in this video all say that winning is not why they compete at these events, this is the general representation of slope-style riders that the audience gain from videos like this, this is a polar opposite of say the world cup riders who are all out to win and dont mind telling the audience that its the most important part of the sport.