Piss them off Once in a While
Sean Farnel, former programming director at the festival Hot Docs, and one of the few North American with a deep knowledge of the European documentary scene, has written an interesting and refreshing article that touches upon many essential questions about documentary filmaking of today. One of them is the potential for European films in North America – here is a text clip, but READ THE WHOLE ARTICLE:
“In fact, from DocLisboa and through Jihlava IDFF, DOK Leipzig and CPH:DOX, one enters a bizarro nonfiction film universe. The majority of the films I see on this tour will not make it over the festival rainbow. North American distribution? Ha! Many of these works have long takes, lack narrative (or narration) and big music cues. Sometimes there’s no colour. And often one cannot even tell if they, the films, are “real” or not. It becomes evident, in comparison, that most of what is represented as political or “social issue” filmmaking in North America seems to be pitched, formally speaking, at audio-visual infants. I submit that film festival programming can be a political act too, and I would like some of the more radical acts of Euro curation exported to my homeland. There a responsibility not just to feed an audience, but to nourish and sharpen their senses, too. And even to piss them off, once in a while…”
Photo from “Winter, Go Away” by the students of Russian Marina Razbezhkina. Sean Farnel writes about the film in his article.
