Analyzing docudrama as a mode of argument, Steven N. Lipkin explores the ethical, historical, and ideological functions of docudrama to discover why these films based on true stories offer such appealing story lines. That appeal, Lipkin discovers, is rooted in docudrama s representation of actual people and events by means of melodramatic narrative structures that play on the emotions of the viewer.

The dual nature of docudramasblending narrative and documentary style argues for a moral view of reality-based subject matter. The ethics, the ideology, the very presence of docudrama on...