Errol Morris shows real ‘Team Spirit’ for ESPN

Last week we showed you The Invisible Bicycle Helmet by Fredrik Gertten as a ‘best practice’ example of a short doc. This week we have another superb short for you, this time by no other than the master of the form; Errol Morris.

Morris was asked to deliver a short documentary film on sports fans and their love of sports by broadcaster ESPN. Instead of showing diehard fans surrounded by weird memorabilia, which we would kind of expect, Morris came up with the idea of being a sports fan in the afterlife.

“People say when you’re a fan, you’re a fan for life. But that may be a little shortsighted…”

The 8-minute video - which has now been viewed over a million times on YouTube – shows how to be creative with a commercial brief, teaching us to look beyond what we would expect or think others will expect when dealing with a certain subject.

If you were to be annoyed that you were doing adverts for money (while what you really wanted to do is make documentary films to be creative) then I’d say this is the way forward; explore the ordinary for the extraordinary.