Could the BBC's Sleigh Ride Slow TV have been even better?

BBC4 - The Sleigh Ride

The long awaited Sleigh Ride on BBC4 has been and gone. With the precedent of All Aboard! The Canal Trip earlier this year I was hopeful for more of the same. Since becoming aware of it several months ago I'd eagerly awaited this next exploration of the BBC into Slow TV. It's an important format, able to be many things at the same time to many people and I'm eager to see it be taken up in its optimum form by broadcasters outside of Norway.

If I appear to be having a moan, it’s not just for the sake of it. I did enjoy the The Sleigh Ride but I know Slow TV can be a lot more as a production and do a lot more for the audience. Hopefully I'm being constructive!

I feel The Sleigh Ride gripped the potential of what Slow TV could be for the BBC even less than The Canal Trip. It seems from following comments on social media that many who had no issues with The Sleigh Ride are relatively new to watching Slow TV. My concern is that unfamiliarity with what Slow TV can be, for many, will make easier acceptance of lower production values, not so good a framing of the concept of slowness in Slow TV, and the consequent relation of the subject being shown to the viewer. Although it was good, it was neither enough of an ambient TV experience nor a TV event.

Five ways in which The Sleigh Ride could work better as Slow TV

EXPERIENCE NOT INFORMATION

BBC4 - The Sleigh Ride

Slow TV is orientated around the experience of viewing, not a flow of (re)articulated information. Slow TV is not about digesting a stream of information, facts and figures. I felt The Sleigh Ride was on the verge of conforming to a traditional documentary mode with so many wayside facts and figures. Yes, some information which sets the context of the subject, establishes parameters of the activity, but not so much that it distracts from the journey related by the camera. When the embedded text appeared, our attention was diverted to it (especially when appearing in the distance) and the imperative rush to ingest the fact before it disappears. Let the experience be the primary source of information, especially in a Slow TV production where it is the image that is the medium of the experience, not the words said or written.

TV NEEDS TO ACCOMMODATE THE WHOLE THING

The subject of a Slow TV broadcast gains a sense of wholeness when the entire expanse of time which that subject requires is accommodated. Not an arbitrary section which neatly fills limited TV schedules. The implicit message of Slow TV, is that it is something extraordinarily ordinary, and that message hits home when the TV schedules are forced to accommodate it. 

Think what happens to the schedules when a major sports, national event or news event is happening. It barges into the schedule. "Oi! I'm important and you're going to watch me!". Slow TV needs its subject not be trimmed and not edited into so it conforms to a time conscious medium.

THE ACTIVITY OR JOURNEY NEEDS TO BE THE COMPLETE THING

Why was the journey picked up at the point we began? Why did it end where it left off? It felt like an arbitrary section of the journey which would fill the schedule. Instead of showing us the passage of A through to Z, it gave us E through to H. I watched The Sleigh Ride with three others, all of us left wondering where the sledge was actually going and why we were left where we were. A map was shown at the hour point illustrating the entire route but not the section of the journey concerned. As my father in law commented, “We watched that for nearly two hours and didn’t know where they were going or why they were going there”.

IT NEEDS TO LET THE VIEWER HAVE TIME TO ASK THEIR OWN QUESTIONS OF THE PICTURE

BBC4 - The Sleigh Ride

Slow TV needs to make the viewer ask questions of what might happen and not leave the big questions unanswered. It needs to facilitate a mental questioning, such as what the animals might do next? what could be appearing around the next corner? Small things which engage our curiosity, akin to ‘people-watching’ at train stations and airports which make us ponder the minutiae of the narratives we see. When I visit a coffee shop, I usually prefer a window seat so I can glance up and ponder the many small stories happening outside. This kind of wondering is quite absorbing, and for The Sleigh Ride it was when the reindeer was digging for food around 1 hour 15 minutes in the broadcast and the aurora borealis for a couple minutes at the end. Both moments allowed undirected and unmanufactured events to enable the viewer to ponder the tiny nuances of the stories being shown. More moments like these will further immerse a viewer in the film and give, in some senses, a self-populating content in this documentary format.

IT SHOULD BE ‘REALITY REVEALED’ NOT REALITY RECONSTRUCTED

So, in terms of The Sleigh Ride, we never knew the purpose of the Sami women's journey at the time of filming. Yes, it was an old postal route but were they delivering or collecting parcels and post on their journey? We're not told. They had logs on their sleighs, but what else?

BBC4 - The Sleigh Ride

The subject is best served by being an activity or journey which would happen anyway, whether or not the cameras were there. Not a specially crafted reconstruction. The producers of Norwegian Slow TV in the NRK Hordaland region have referred to the format as being 'reality revealed' - the closest thing to a fly on the wall documentary. It's not reality reconstructed. It's what is actually going on which the camera is there to capture. When it’s a Slow TV about nature or a journey it should be one which happens anyway; film that, let us know the reason why it happens, and let the camera reveal what would happen if the camera were not there, insofar as possible.

SLOW TV: NOVELTY STOCKING FILLER OR MAIN PRESENT?

So, while it was a welcome Christmas broadcast, it felt like it could have been more. It felt more like a novelty stocking filler. Very good and engaging in its own right, but not hugely memorable and not noticed by as many as it could be. The ratings for The Sleigh Ride didn't match that of The Canal Trip and didn't break out of BBC4's usual market share. Slow TV can be a novelty stocking filler but for the short time given for this Slow TV it was trying to be more than a stocking filler.

BBC4 - The Sleigh Ride

When you know Slow TV can also be the amazing main present hidden behind the sofa for maximum surprise and which will be seen and talked about by many many more and remembered for a long time, The Sleigh Ride felt like a falling short of the potential of the format. It was too busy with information to thoroughly sink into the ambient aspect of it - or the broadcast should have been considerably longer with the information shown on the screen for a few more seconds.

Slow TV can be many things from the personal ambient TV trip to a national event celebrating a journey or activity. If you’re not familiar with Slow TV, don’t think it’s just a two camera stocking filler - it can be much more than that. It can be the big present which will thrill and delight most of those who experience it. 

So, yes please, BBC, let’s have more Slow TV - longer, less information, more opportunity to experience what you’re showing us.

If you want to experience All Aboard! The Sleigh Ride, it's on the BBC iPlayer until 25th January 2016, right here. Subsequent repeats will likely put it back on iPlayer in the future. Geoblocking of content may well apply outside of the UK.

Coming in 2017 (hopefully!) - A week of live Slow TV reindeer migration on prime time main channel TV in Norway

What was so right with Russia's War and Peace Slow TV - война и мир?

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What was so right with Russia's War and Peace Slow TV - война и мир?

russia.tv

Oh those Russians. Two things Russia has produced in the past year have really impressed me. Assuming readers are familiar with a certain notable annual song competition, in May 2015 you may recall a first half of the vote announcements of the Eurovision Song Contest as a slog-it-out between Russia and Sweden. 

The second half of the votes saw Sweden surge ahead and take the top spot from Polina Gagarina. I think it was more the cute Swedish guy and endearing animation which helped the song win. Polina’s belting out of a power ballad got my vote last year, and would you not agree that this year’s competition would have had a lot of additional interesting dynamics if Moscow had been hosting Eurovision 2016?

So, Russia’s 2015 Eurovision entry, A Million Voices, came second - but later in the year about 1,300 voices participated in a monumental Russian Slow TV transmission. In December, Russia 1, Russia Kultur and Radio Mayak broadcast a live, real time reading of Tolstoy's War and Peace. It represented the very best of what a Slow TV broadcast can achieve. 

While its subject wasn't the progressive linear journey through a pretty landscape or watching a craft activity pass in front of the camera, it was like NRK's 60 hour continuous sing-through of the 899 Hymns of the Norwegian Hymn Book in 2014. It was the celebration of literature with national resonance which framed a Slow TV broadcast with such punch.

Here are nine things I think are so RIGHT with Russia’s War and Peace Slow TV.

A SENSE OF COMPLETENESS

voinamir.com - Война и мир - Читаем роман

It was a complete work, all the way through, no edits. No cutting out less interesting bits. The parts less racey, less dramatic helped give definition and greater meaning to the dramatic parts. The whole thing, a self defined work independent of anyone’s thinking ‘this is too long, we must shorten it’.

SOMETHING WHICH EXISTS INDEPENDENTLY OF TV PRODUCTION

It was a work which existed independently of the production, not devised for it. Whether or not the production had happened, the work is there. This means that there's an audience, there's an interest in what is related by the TV cameras before the TV cameras get involved. Yes, it was assembled into a TV broadcast but was not contrived into being as a 'new' idea for TV. Unlike other reality formats which contrive and fix a subject or activity for a broadcast, the book exists aside and before a production company brings it to the screen.

IT WAS GIVEN AS LONG AS IT TAKES TO DO IT

It was given as long as it was needed on a TV broadcast (as well as the internet and radio). It was not truncated, abridged, edited to make it shorter so it would fit a scheduled regular slot on TV. By disrupting the usual broadcasting schedule it communicates that it is not usual broadcasting.

IT WAS GIVEN A PRIME TIME MAIN CHANNEL FOCUS

voinamir.com - Война и мир - Читаем роман

The broadcaster accommodated it prime time on principal channels as well as a specialised channel and online. With its main focus being verbal content - the reading of the book - radio accommodated it too. Yes, online viewing is significant in today’s broadcast landscape but consuming media on a main TV channel on primetime is still the thing which make a large number of people think ‘this is important’.

IT WAS SOMETHING IMPORTANT TO A LOT OF THE AUDIENCE

It was something culturally and historically significant for the country which broadcast it. Tolstoy’s War and Peace is cherished and embraced as something which captures the essence of national pride and identity. People care about it and are deeply interested in the broadcast. It wasn't in itself a novelty but something which matters, presented in a novel manner.

IT WAS PARTICIPATORY

voinamir.com - Война и мир - Читаем роман

It was participatory. Russians famous and not famous, Russians around the world and across the country, able bodied, disabled, blind, uniformed, un-uniformed, military, civilian, religious and spiritual, in palaces, on the street, in the space station, in the arctic. In all about 1,300 representing every aspect of Russian diversity and perceived nationhood participated.

IT ALLOWED ENOUGH TIME FOR VIEWERS TO SEARCH THE PICTURE THEMSELVES

It may not have been ‘ambient’ wallpaper like natural scenery, but allowed three minutes or so of each reader, their context, location, sometimes more when several readers were in the location. You become aware of the immediate story of that person while reading their page, and over many readers, a much bigger story. 

voinamir.com - Война и мир - Читаем роман

There were opportunities to view what was going on around or behind the reader - the natural landscape, the city landmarks, the human activity, the museum exhibits, the historic environment. So much to take in, even if you don't know what the reader is saying.

IT WAS A TV EVENT

It created a sense of an event, an attention grabbing but significant novelty. Too much and too frequent, the novelty becomes annoying or ignored. A balance of the above factors, it is a meaningful distraction from the typical TV schedule - and like important national events or major sporting events - it is accommodated entirely and even disrupting scheduled broadcasts after it.

IT WAS A CELEBRATION OF MORE THAN A TV PROGRAMME

voinamir.com - Война и мир - Читаем роман

It was a celebration - of reading, of a book, of a country, of history, of identity, of places, of diversity.

I hardly understood a word of it. I knew "Mir" before (thanks, space travel). I understood "Niet, Natasha" (which seemed to be said a lot). Without knowing much about Russia, except what a diet of Western Media and an occasional foray on to Russia Today when your own domestic broadcaster becomes overly repetitive, I got a wider idea of Russia. Its diversity.

I saw palaces, museums, landscapes, cities (other than Moscow), even learnt a few characters of the Cyrillic alphabet. I got an interest in learning more about Tolstoy's tremendous tome (how convenient that a BBC drama of War and Peace of it registered on the TV schedule horizon shortly afterwards).

voinamir.com - Война и мир - Читаем роман

Most of all, I felt this was a broadcast that nails the benchmark of a masterful Slow TV broadcast as well the best of the Norwegian NRK Slow TV broadcasts to date - something audiences and broadcasters can learn from as more countries begin dabbling with Slow TV. It's not something to dabble with. It's something to take a big, calculated, well produced run, jump and plunge. Slow TV represents a genus of TV format which can be odd and quirky, a nice visual trip. It can be an attention grabbing benevolent broadcasting behemoth. It can be that novelty wallpaper TV but it can be a national celebration which many feel compelled to watch.

LINKS FOR WAR AND PEACE

"War and Peace - We Read the Novel" was broadcast live online HERE with archived segments available, with some segments falling on Russia 1 (Россия 1) and Russia K (Россия К - dedicated culture channel also featuring material about War and Peace) and Radio Mayak (Радиомаяк). Look for the hashtag "#войнаимир" on social media.

Slow Television - The Slow TV Blog

Which countries seem the most interested in Slow TV?

Dear blog readers and visitors - thankyou for making 2015 a great year on the Slow TV blog! Have just pushed through the 22,000 unique page views mark today (31st December 2015).

In the next few days I'll bring my review of the BBC's All Aboard! The Sleigh Ride, a summary of Slow TV in 2015 and what we might look forward to in 2016 for us Slow TV lovers.

Which countries have been the most interested in Slow TV according to the Slow TV blog's hit counter?

In 10th place is The Netherlands. Not yet produced any of their own Slow TV productions but I have been contacted by an intern for a Dutch production company and two undergraduates studying Slow TV from different universities in The Netherlands.

In 9th place is Ireland; not able to explain that one directly. Maybe by virtue of shared interest with the British Isles.

In 8th place is Brunei - and this only in the last month. What is happening in Brunei to give such a surge of interest in Slow TV? Please let me know - I've had a dig around but can't explain that one.

In 7th place with a beastly 666 views is Germany. ARD Alpha did some Slow TV earlier in 2015 and coupled with a steady interest in the subject, I expect will remain a steady source of hits.

In 6th place is the Ukraine. Again, a slightly puzzling source of hits; even before Russia's War and Peace Slow TV in December, The Ukraine gave a steady source of interest in Slow TV.

In 5th place is France; what with a prerecorded Slow TV by the French (The Tokyo Reverse) this may explain a consistent steady level of interest from France. Vive La France!

In 4th is Russia, which blasted up the hits counter from November through December - the marathon live read through of War and Peace mainly responsible. More on that in the next couple days.

In 3rd is good Ol' Blighty, the UK. With several Slow TV productions during 2015 on BBC4 we can assume there will be more to come. Coupled with BBC Research and Development having some discussions with me about Slow TV, it is something I know ought to happen much more.

In 2nd place, is Norway - the motherland of Slow TV as we know it since 2009. I know about 1/3 of the Norwegian tally comes from one solitary link on the NRK website, so it probably ties with the UK in second place. Knowing that NRK have years of Slow TV planned, our friends in Norway will continue to find the Slow TV blog.

In 1st place is the USA. The most accelerated editing paced nation in the world is the most interested in a reduced editing pace format - real time - which is the essence of Slow TV. Hopefully 2016 will see the go ahead and broadcast of a Norwegian format USA Slow TV broadcast which will celebrate 12 hours of an (iconic?) American road journey, in Slow Road Live.

Thanks for visiting the Slow TV blog in 2015 - keep coming back for more in 2016. Should be four new posts in the first week of 2016 alone, with more exciting news from the Slow TV blog as the year progresses.

Happy Slow TV New Year from me, Tim Prevett, at The Slow TV blog.