Abstract

This study seeks to address the use of music in the film “Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool”. The theoretical reference for the analysis is Bill Nichols (2005). Among the ways Nichols addresses to delineate the boundaries that separate a documentary film from a fiction film is the audience, or the viewer. This is viewers, when watching the film, may assume that the sounds and images in that film originate from the historical world. I argue that in documentary film the viewer can retain their belief in the authenticity of the historical world represented on the screen, but this does not prevent their understanding of the film as a perspective on the world. It is part of the tradition of documentary to be able to convey an impression of authenticity, even if the close correspondence between image and reality is not guaranteed. However, when the music used is original, in this respect the correspondence with factuality gets closer.