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Kemp vs Theroux vs Mcintyre

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Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,458 ✭✭✭senorwipesalot


    Donal Macintyre did a documentary on the Chelsea Headhunters (hooligan firm) where he went undercover and became one of them. A lot of the footage they captured lead to the arrest of some of the Headhunters.

    Sad story a few years later where Donal was out for lunch one day at a pub with his wife and he bumped into some of them. Donal's wife had a brain tumour at the time and they had decided to go to the pub the day before she had a scan due. He told them this but they still beat him unconscious. Horrible thugs.
    What they did was wrong but not surprising,after all he became one of their inner circle and then shopped them.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 81,060 ✭✭✭✭biko


    Thread is ghey.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,443 ✭✭✭Bipolar Joe


    He was put in his place in the one he did on the wrestling!

    He kept pushing them on kayfabe and they got annoyed and pushed him through some of the training they do; he then saw what kayfabe was!

    I love his shows, but this was one of the few times, maybe only time, where I think he fell short of understanding his subject matter.

    I always thought he did that on purpose. He has this way of pushing people, so they get agitated without really having a whole lot to respond with. With the wrestling one, he really enforced the whole it's fake thing in his dopey manner, like he WANTED them all to get offended and see what the mentality was behind their motivation to do what they do.

    EDIT: In a fist fight situation, I think Kemp and Macintyre would be all ready for fisticuffs, and Theroux would play them against each other, then when they'd beaten the snot out of themselves he'd wear the remaining one down until they were bent over all puffed out, push them over and run away.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2, Paid Member Posts: 23,380 ✭✭✭✭Ash.J.Williams


    Donal Macintyre did a documentary on the Chelsea Headhunters (hooligan firm) where he went undercover and became one of them. A lot of the footage they captured lead to the arrest of some of the Headhunters.

    Sad story a few years later where Donal was out for lunch one day at a pub with his wife and he bumped into some of them. Donal's wife had a brain tumour at the time and they had decided to go to the pub the day before she had a scan due. He told them this but they still beat him unconscious. Horrible thugs.
    In fairness, regardless of his wifes health he was owed a beating and he got one. That's the downside to going under cover.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,109 ✭✭✭MaxSteele


    Louis Theroux for me. While I do enjoy Ross kemp's docs, Louis is so awkward, innocent and naive, it just makes blissful television. Hero. Extreme World with Kemp is quite good too I think.

    McIntyre on the other hand is just a spineless little weasel of a thing. He's a sh*t stirring, exaggerating tell tale. A younger versionn of Paul Williams.

    Some bigtime Nottingham cannabis dealer let Donal do a doc on him years ago. Then as soon as filming was over, he sold him out to the police with hidden camera footage he recorded during the documentary. Absolute dickhead.

    Those Chelsea Headhunters gave him his dues I think.


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  • Moderators, Regional East Moderators Posts: 23,257 Mod ✭✭✭✭GLaDOS


    Louis would just talk the others into conceding the fight

    Cake, and grief counseling, will be available at the conclusion of the test



  • Closed Accounts Posts: 353 ✭✭RADIUS


    I will probably get flamed for this but here it goes anyway!

    Having watched most of Kemp and Theroux I will stand up for Kemp here.

    I find Louis lacks that human touch and seems to make his interviewees very uncomfortable. He comes across as quite false, dishonest and I constantly get the impression he is privately mocking the subjects.

    Although he does put himself into interesting situations with unusual people, his facade of being an innocent documentary maker is poorly maintained. Instead he comes across for the most part as being smug, seedy and stuck up, always trying to push people into a corner.
    I always think the interviewees must breath a sigh of relief when he leaves, whereas with Ross they seem only too happy to talk and talk.

    A good interviewer makes his subjects feel comfortable, gets onside with them, lets them show their true faces and knows how to ask the tough questions without alienating the subject. I think Ross is very good at adding that human touch that makes even the most evil hard line scumbags feel at ease with him.

    Louis makes for awkward silences, feeling exposed and uneasy, and like they are being backed into a corner in attempt to extract something vile for the productions entertainment value. His smugness is tangible and he constantly alienates his subjects.

    Louis takes after Michael Moore far too much, and Moore is a vile creature who enjoys sowing dissent and won't let the facts get in the way.

    I can think of nothing likable about Louis Theroux. I enjoy the subject matter of his documentaries, I just wish he wasn't the one asking the questions.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,047 ✭✭✭Da Shins Kelly


    RADIUS wrote: »
    I will probably get flamed for this but here it goes anyway!

    Having watched most of Kemp and Theroux I will stand up for Kemp here.

    I find Louis lacks that human touch and seems to make his interviewees very uncomfortable. He comes across as quite false, dishonest and I constantly get the impression he is privately mocking the subjects.

    Although he does put himself into interesting situations with unusual people, his facade of being an innocent documentary maker is poorly maintained. Instead he comes across for the most part as being smug, seedy and stuck up, always trying to push people into a corner.
    I always think the interviewees must breath a sigh of relief when he leaves, whereas with Ross they seem only too happy to talk and talk.

    A good interviewer makes his subjects feel comfortable, gets onside with them, lets them show their true faces and knows how to ask the tough questions without alienating the subject. I think Ross is very good at adding that human touch that makes even the most evil hard line scumbags feel at ease with him.

    Louis makes for awkward silences, feeling exposed and uneasy, and like they are being backed into a corner in attempt to extract something vile for the productions entertainment value. His smugness is tangible and he constantly alienates his subjects.

    Louis takes after Michael Moore far too much, and Moore is a vile creature who enjoys sowing dissent and won't let the facts get in the way.

    I can think of nothing likable about Louis Theroux. I enjoy the subject matter of his documentaries, I just wish he wasn't the one asking the questions.

    I disagree about Louis making people feel uncomfortable. Have you seen the episode where he goes to stay in the brothel in Nevada? He was very good with the girls working there in that one. One of them even became quite attached to him and seemed to fall in love with him a little bit.

    I do agree that he does seem to leave people hanging occasionally with the awkward silences. I think it's for comedic effect though, in keeping with his whole 'fish out of water' shtick.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,533 ✭✭✭the keen edge


    If you think Kemp is a documentary maker or, for some bizarre reason, a journalist you really need to take stock of how you are informing yourself of global issues.

    Years ago I had the misfortune of watching him in action in Iraq, embedded with the British Army.
    While smashing their way through the homes of some very frightened rural Iraqis, (who were getting pissed of with the whole scale destruction of their already totally depressingly ****ty village), Kemp, somehow confused by the scared villagers lack of cooperation smarmy screamed at them, in English no less, "What is wrong with you people? Don't you realise that we are trying to bring you freedom".

    The disconnect he had with the situation was astounding.
    He's a total dick to be frank.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 353 ✭✭RADIUS


    Well Ross is clearly a documentary maker in that he makes documentaries.

    Documentaries which I have found interesting and thought provoking. I am not saying he is a nice guy or not, how can I know?

    I am saying that in my opinion he is better than Theroux when it comes to giving interviews on camera.Theroux's on screen presence is awkward and uncomfortable to watch a lot of the time. Maybe Ross's experience as an actor helps him put things across on film in a much more natural way.

    What you say if true is pretty bad, but at the same time, I would never have expected Ross or Louis to be nice in real life.

    Ross does come across as a bit of a crusader sometimes and tends to speak with an air of having the moral high ground. Which in fairness, he does a lot of the time when it comes to speaking with criminals and violent gang members. But not in Afghanistan.

    To be honest I didn't like the Afghanistan stuff, as I am against the whole invasion in the first place, so a documentary following the invaders just wasn't for me.

    I like his Extreme World and Gang's series and I think his team does a good job with this type of stuff.


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  • Posts: 26,920 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    FouxDaFaFa wrote: »
    Theroux was born to be a documentary maker. You can't teach what he has.

    If the three of them got into a fight, I have full confidence that he would somehow emerge the victor. He has massive cohones, check out his documentary in Johannesburg.

    His one in Philadelphia, where he walked up to this big time drug dealer, despite the cops telling him not to, required some serious amount of balls.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 10 thoroughly decent chap


    I liked that in the Jimmy Savile doc, LT dosnt ask that many questions, just steps back open mouthed and lets Savile spout his zany spiel.

    I liked it too, but now that the whole world knows there was so much more to the man than zany spiel, I'm just surprised we haven't heard a bit more from the ttheroux camp about the week they spent with him


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 29,293 ✭✭✭✭Mint Sauce


    Donal MacIntyre

    The man got a Chelsea tat, and shared a car with the four top members of the Chelsea Headhunters.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,078 ✭✭✭onemorechance


    I always thought he did that on purpose. He has this way of pushing people, so they get agitated without really having a whole lot to respond with. With the wrestling one, he really enforced the whole it's fake thing in his dopey manner, like he WANTED them all to get offended and see what the mentality was behind their motivation to do what they do.

    ....

    Never looked at it that way; might be the case. I'm sure it nothing else it showed that despite the theatrics, it has takes a lot of effort and risk.


  • Moderators, Music Moderators Posts: 13,475 Mod ✭✭✭✭iamstop


    I'm watching a Theroux doc on youtube about the Miami jails right now.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 212 ✭✭DainBramage


    RADIUS wrote: »
    I will probably get flamed for this but here it goes anyway!

    Having watched most of Kemp and Theroux I will stand up for Kemp here.

    I find Louis lacks that human touch and seems to make his interviewees very uncomfortable. He comes across as quite false, dishonest and I constantly get the impression he is privately mocking the subjects.

    Although he does put himself into interesting situations with unusual people, his facade of being an innocent documentary maker is poorly maintained. Instead he comes across for the most part as being smug, seedy and stuck up, always trying to push people into a corner.
    I always think the interviewees must breath a sigh of relief when he leaves, whereas with Ross they seem only too happy to talk and talk.

    A good interviewer makes his subjects feel comfortable, gets onside with them, lets them show their true faces and knows how to ask the tough questions without alienating the subject. I think Ross is very good at adding that human touch that makes even the most evil hard line scumbags feel at ease with him.

    Louis makes for awkward silences, feeling exposed and uneasy, and like they are being backed into a corner in attempt to extract something vile for the productions entertainment value. His smugness is tangible and he constantly alienates his subjects.

    Louis takes after Michael Moore far too much, and Moore is a vile creature who enjoys sowing dissent and won't let the facts get in the way.

    I can think of nothing likable about Louis Theroux. I enjoy the subject matter of his documentaries, I just wish he wasn't the one asking the questions.

    Kemp is getting a bad rap on this thread. I quite liked his gang documentaries- while the topic isn't as 'quirky' as some of Louis' material what he does he does well; also the guy has stones judging by some of the dodgy characters hes met/situations hes been in.
    Some are saying here Louis uses his faux-naiivety to disarm and get another angle out of his interviewee but I agree with the above : imo it can make him come across as disingenuous and a tad smug. That said there are very few better documentary makers out there.


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