Closer scrutiny of international classical documentaries (Nanook, Land without Bread, Spanish Earth, etc.) has put big question marks behind the traditional (or na?ve?) concepts of documentation and reality, as if any theorist looking for documentary could only find fi ction. On the other hand, the `non-existing’ documentary is ourishing, both in the commercial media and the art houses. Cinema-goers or TV-viewers (though not all of them) seem to appreciate something special in these offerings. The aim of this essay is to analyze some of the classical Hungarian documentaries from Höllering to Schier, Ember and Gulyás: do the artistic methods they used, the documentarists’ discipline and ethics they followed offer us some useful clues to the contemporary discussion about the essence of documentary filmmaking?
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