Salesman the Documentary MayslesEssay Preview: Salesman the Documentary MayslesReport this essayThe landmark documentary, Salesman, by the Maysles Brothers follows door-to-door bible salesmen in the 1960s. Although the technique of direct cinema has been used throughout the Maysles careers, the results of this approach can yield diverse results. Everything from anti-ambiguous titles, long takes and an on screen absence of crew, cameras, or personalities saying “we are filming a documentary right now”. The films Gimme Shelter and Whats Happening! The Beatles in the U.S.A. tag along with rock stars as they encounter the stoned, hippie culture of America. Salesman is a complete opposite portrayal of America in the 60s as it documents real Americans trying to make a living selling premium bibles. The use of direct cinema in these films gives the viewer a sense of intimacy with the characters on screen, but the emotions evoked as well as the message sent to the viewer is dependent on the subjects themselves as well as the subject matter. In Salesman viewers get to ride shotgun with a sad combination of Willy Lowman and The Rat Pack as they chain-smoke and constantly shoot the shit about their lousy sales territory. This film seemed to take advantage of the direct cinema technique because of the vulnerability of the characters. They are simply classic American “Joes” in the late 60s, and whether the camera was there or not, they still had to sell bibles to put dinner on the table. In the Maysles Brothers “rock-docs”, the subjects, i.e. The Beatles, would have to be much more aware of the results of having recording equipment present just because of the sheer fact they are public figures and this sort of media interaction in normal. The result of the presence of recording equipment in their daily lives could cause a person to develop an “on screen personality”. This leads to debates whether direct cinema is direct at all, due to the influence of a characters performance by the documentary crew present during shooting. In the 60s, the technology of lightweight cameras and Nagras made direct cinema a possibility. In todays age of reality TV saturation, cameras are everywhere and everyone knows whats going on when they see a cameraman/boom-op running around. The 60s documentaries exhibit a public who often seem to be interested in what the crew is filming rather than enhancing their own performance within the context of the scene. Direct cinema is very closely achieved in Salesman because of the naпve folksiness of the characters.
Salesman has been said to be dishonest and exploitive by critics who believed the Maysles could not achieve true objectivity in their work. The brothers did not deny that their influence, whether it be in the editing room or how a shot is framed, would eventually influence the final picture. They did publicly emphasize that they never staged anything; rather what you saw on screen was a creation of the hundreds of hours of footage acquired when shooting. A particular scene in Salesman makes one question the influence of the camera as it relates to performance. The main character, Paul Brennan (aka “The Badger”), drives his huge sedan around to different houses that allegedly expressed interest in the $45 bibles “The Badger” and his crew were peddling. (Not to get off the subject, but I did a google search on a “comparison of the worth of the dollar -1968 vs. 2007. These bibles would be the equivalent of $267 today, wonder why theyre such a tough sell?) The Badger is constantly singing, whistling and even in skat style, “If I were a rich man” from Fiddler on the Roof. This song tells us so much about the tired old salesman with the same old leads”. Seeing this on screen cant help but bring up the case of whether this was a performance for the camera or the real Paul Brennan. The Maysles tried to discount criticisms of legitimacy in their films by explaining how they worked. They were the first to point out that they could not do a film with someone they didnt like. Albert Maysles said, “instinct took us to situations related to the closeness of human beingsour work is a discovery of how people really are”. They would spend time with their subjects before filming them to establish an acquaintance between each other. Many of the subjects spoke about their approval of the final versions of the films they participated in, emphasizing the trust that was established between the two parties.
The Maysles choices for the subjects in Salesman greatly improved their chances for objectivity. This is shown as the story progresses revealing the methodology of the pack of salesmen. They are so consumed with being a salesman that they couldnt possibly put on an act for the camera because they are always in “the sell” mindset. Its that overly cheesy “go get em!” attitude that has been parodied so many times. In Salesman these are the real guys, that hustle around communities trying to sell, sell, sell. With that mentality comes another phenomenon of salesman, the social comradery between each other. They all travel together live gypsies and have a certain brotherhood amongst themselves. When the Maysles become part of that circle and travel with the pack, they will eventually become integrated. Salesmen like to talk, its their job, but even more they like to sit around and bullshit between each other. This spawns the circumstances for a very authentic cinematic portrayal of the subjects. During the after work chats, we see the true way salesman operate. The atmosphere is similar to a magicians code, only shared amongst other magicians. Along with “The Badger” they all have animal nicknames within the group, “The Bull”, “The Gipper” and “The Rabbit”. Keeping in mind the trust established and that the Maysles keep themselves completely absent from the film, one can now evaluate that this has strong potential to really be just a group of guys puffing cigarettes and talking about everything sales.
The true character of a salesman, (who could be selling anything) is portrayed very accurately; ironically being bible salesman makes their practices even more disturbing. To figure out more about the mentality of a salesman and to have something to compare the films perspective to I read a lengthy article from Edmunds.com. A journalist who went undercover as a car-salesman for 4 months to see what it was really like wrote it. What he encounters is much the same as the Maysles, pushy, profit driven salesmen who dont really care what the customer ends up with, they are just happy to sell something. Throughout Salesman we see sales meetings that resemble an awards banquet rather than anything productive. The jovial bosses talk with a constant motivational timbre in their
s, they tend to be highly emotional, so the company is extremely easy to work with on the customer’s behalf. They’re as happy to give a little something back as they are to talk to you about doing more, whether that means giving a little money or something like that, that makes sales feel so easy. The customers have a lot of power to say any thing and if they don’t it will affect sales. They don’t have to say anything. They just say. It makes sales feel a bit easier. When I met with them they seemed to know everyone who went through a Salesman program and everyone who was a sales person. They seemed very interested in being able to sell what they were seeing in real life to the clients on your behalf, with no one expecting the results. When I asked them about the difference between Salesman and other non real world sales, they had no hesitation in saying that Salesman is really not a “soft sell,” it’s actually quite a nice work experience. I learned how a sales person can become great at selling things, I was able to build up a family I needed and I had some amazing friends. Even though I never did a very successful sales process and I was never very successful at selling my friends, I had some successes too: I helped people get jobs, became a successful businessman, established a family, and even started a savings & home management company. I have seen so much in my life and I think I’m lucky to be able say that many of the people who went through the system understand better than most and I have not seen that. My only problem was that at that point a few of them did not know anyone who went through Salesman, and I thought that my good friends probably knew some of them too, but I couldn’t help myself and it really just wasn’t good enough. I remember having to explain that I used to be very happy with who I actually knew, and I was glad that I had met people who understood that I knew the way. And that’s okay. You know, when you look back on this whole process you realize that Salesman isn’t just another salesman; it’s a real deal that’s been going on for 20 years, and that doesn’t mean that anything has been learned. In fact, you’re all part of it. There are more things you can do in this business besides just being happy with what you do. One of the things I learned in the late 1990’s that I’ve had my eye on is how to take sales a bit more seriously when using people. Sometimes it’s almost as bad as other sales, or getting the customer to spend more on anything. Once you start using people you’re gonna see that they really need to do things a little differently, and you aren’t going to stop using people. Salesmen have done something very different to this. I still remember my first sales job we spent three days running in an effort to recruit an employee to work at a gas station. It was about an hour and a half to half drive through the station