The Space of Appearance in Deep Underground: A Film Is Being Made and the Documentary Gesture

Abstract

We see a group of young miners descending into an abandoned yet unsealed mineshaft. They look skinny rather than strong, their dark skin is gray from dust. The men carry small digital cameras. In the first shot one can still see the daylight shining through the entrance of the shaft. Then there are only the bundled light beams of the bicycle head-lamps the men are wearing on their heads; they light the way, the rocks and the stones in the absolute dark, sometimes they cross the camera and let everything disappear in dazzling white. The miners are poorly equipped, wearing rubber boots or thin sneakers, worn jeans or jogging pants, T-shirts, hoodies, and backpacks made from plastic bags tied together, no helmets. The shaft descends steeply. We hear grinding noises and the men conversing loudly in Chitonga, a Southern African language. Sometimes, when they speak with others, we also hear Sesotho and isiZulu or isiNdebele. Sometimes, there is English and Afrikaans, too. We listen to their voices and read the English subtitles. The miners are not skilled in filming, yet they have an idea of how a film is being made. They take us to a place unseen and never documented, a dark underground labyrinth, abandoned