Searching for Sugarman

Malik Bendjelloul's Searching for Sugarman is one of the most uniquely cinematic documentaries I have ever experienced. Certainly I'm not the only one to feel this way– it won the late Swedish filmmaker the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature at the 85th Academy Awards in 2013. Featuring great music, stylistic animation, and a captivating story clouded in mystery, this is the type of documentary anyone– even the most casual of audiences– can get into.

The effectiveness of the film can be credited to a variety of things, but overall, the element of suspense is what separates it from the great majority of other documentaries. It is, by its title, a "search", and we follow Stephen Segerman on that search to find Sixto Rodriguez. So while the film is meant to be informative in nature, the way that information is revealed is done in a way that keeps the audience guessing as to whether Segerman will reach his goal. This is classic narrative structure that is typically not found in documentary filmmaking, but is what makes going to the movies such an immersive experience for audiences. 

This could be just as good of a film to study for building suspense than any other narrative feature. Rodriguez himself is not fully revealed until just over halfway into the film. If the filmmakers really wanted to create a structurally narrative-based documentary, they could've pushed the reveal to about two-thirds or three-quarters of the way through the film so that the act structure worked better, but that's probably taking it too far– too little of Rodriguez may have defeated the point of the film. 

That being said, I really liked that the purpose of the documentary was not to just inform the audience of this man's life. This was much more about the journey to find Sixto and the impact he had on the South African people and culture than it was on Rodriguez himself. Perhaps it was the right time and the right place, but this music was liberating to these people during the Apartheid. Besides, a documentary all about Rodriguez alone may have gotten boring quick considering how short for words he is. Letting his daughters and those who did the searching for Sugarman talk for him was a smart idea.

The concert at the end to top things off was brilliant, both structurally and on a filmmaking level. It's a huge payoff for all the setup we've gotten throughout the film for all Rodriguez has done for the people of South Africa and how legendary of an artist he is. It's also incredible to see how well the found footage meshes with the recreated shots, to the point that you really don't know what isn't found footage. The scene is put together by a collection of short cuts from a variety of different sources ranging from within the crowd to on the stage to behind the stage, and nothing lasts longer than a few brief seconds. It's seamlessly edited so that it feels like, as an audience member, you are there witnessing this historic event. This is a supremely well-edited film overall. Searching for Sugarman gets a very high recommendation from me.