DOK Leipzig Announces Full Program

Today the full program of the classic documentary film festival in Leipzig was announced. The 67th edition of the festival. 209 films and XR works from 55 countries. An international festival that is also famous for having both documentaries and animation, short and feature duration.

Let me drop some words and names on the documentary competitions. “International Competition
Documentary Film, Feature…” includes only 8 films – for one who has been in juries and easy job as the amount has often been from 15-20. I know one name in the competition from way back being a teacher at the Zelig School in Bolzano, where Francesca Scalisi studied years ago. Her new film has this annotation: “A US Navy satellite communication system on Sicily. Valentina lives here with her parents but wants to become more independent. A tender story of emancipation at a site of global politics”. The title is “Valentina and the MUOSters”.

The same curiosity goes for Daniel Abma, a good friend and a good filmmaker, who now is ready with “Im Prinzip Familie”, where the annotation goes like this: “Touching insights into the daily workings of the youth welfare system. Five boys in a rural residential group who long for a home. And the people who try to give it to them.” Abma is for me a true documentarian with an eye for people and situations. He competes in the German section with Thomas Riedelsheimer – and many others of course – who has his “Tracing Light” as the opening film of the festival that runs from October 28 until November 3.

Lovely to have an Audience Competition and lovely for me to see again the lovely Georgian documentary “Blueberry Dreams” by Elene Mikaberidze, reviewed on this site – https://filmkommentaren.dk/elena-mikaberidze-blueberry-dreams/ – and I am looking forward to see master Claire Simon’s school film “Elementary”. And two more to be enjoyed by the Leipzig audience jury: “Once upon a Time in the Forest” by Finnish Virpi Suutari, a film that was shown at the Magnificent7 Festival in Belgrade recently – the festival directors Svetlana and Zoran Popovic wrote about it here – https://filmkommentaren.dk/virpi-suutari-once-upon-a-time-in-the-forest/ – and of course I am always looking forward to a film by Slovak Peter Kerekes, the new one shown at the Venice Film Festival is called “”Wishing on a Star”.

And the festival has an homage to a great filmmaker, who passed away this year:

“In the section“Thomas Heise (1955–2024): Odds and Ends”, we will pay tribute to the work of the late film director and author Thomas Heise. The programme will include three feature-length documentaries, an evening event in his honour, and this year’s DEFA Matinee.” He has been notified on this site several times – https://filmkommentaren.dk/?s=thomas+heise&ct_post_type=post%3Apage – and the festival includes also, before we started this blog, “Barluschke” from 1997, it was shown on Bornholm at the Balticum Film & TV Festival; my first meeting with Heise, a true Auteur, he was. Photo: Inge Zimmermann.

And much much more is to be discovered, check the site of the festival. And I will be watching and writing from an armchair in Denmark.

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Tue Steen Müller
Tue Steen Müller

Müller, Tue Steen
Documentary Consultant and Critic, DENMARK

Worked with documentary films for more than 20 years at the Danish Film Board, as press officer, festival representative and film consultant/commissioner. Co-founder of Balticum Film and TV Festival, Filmkontakt Nord, Documentary of the EU and EDN (European Documentary Network).
Awards: 2004 the Danish Roos Prize for his contribution to the Danish and European documentary culture. 2006 an award for promoting Portuguese documentaries. 2014 he received the EDN Award “for an outstanding contribution to the development of the European documentary culture”. 2016 The Cross of the Knight of the Order for Merits to Lithuania. 2019 a Big Stamp at the 15th edition of ZagrebDox. 2021 receipt of the highest state decoration, Order of the Three Stars, Fourth Class, for the significant contribution to the development and promotion of Latvian documentary cinema outside Latvia. In 2022 he received an honorary award at DocsBarcelona’s 25th edition having served as organizer and programmer since the start of the festival.
From 1996 until 2005 he was the first director of EDN (European Documentary Network). From 2006 a freelance consultant and teacher in workshops like Ex Oriente, DocsBarcelona, Archidoc, Documentary Campus, Storydoc, Baltic Sea Forum, Black Sea DocStories, Caucadoc, CinéDOC Tbilisi, Docudays Kiev, Dealing With the Past Sarajevo FF as well as programme consultant for the festivals Magnificent7 in Belgrade, DOCSBarcelona, Verzio Budapest, Message2Man in St. Petersburg and DOKLeipzig. Teaches at the Zelig Documentary School in Bolzano Italy.

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