A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
The location is Hnutove, Eastern Ukraine, war zone for years. A village from where – for the very same reason – many Ukrainian families have moved away. But not grandmother Alexandra and 10 year old Oleg, the main characters of…
The Copenhagen audience will next week be treated with the best of the best of documentaries next week. “Machines” by Rahul Jain will have a two week run from wednesday in Empire Bio. My review, highest marks, can be read…
The portuguese director Sérgio Tréfaut/ Serge Tréfaut () was back in Copenhagen with the film Treblinka. The screening took place at the Cinématheque at the Film House. The Cinématheque that we so often have praised on this site for its…
Happy to congratulate Mila and Srbijanka Turajlic, filmmaking daughter and main character of “The Other Side of Everything” with the IDFA Award for Best Feature-Length Documentary. As well as the many others around the film – the producer Carine Chichkowsky…
I have given high marks for 7 of the 15 films at the IDFA competition for long documentaries. There are four films that I have not seen and four I have seen but nor written about. Here follows the mini-reviews/notes…
It stands out. I can not avoid superlatives. And I can not express in words, in a language that is not mine, how I feel after having seen Talal Derki’s new film. Or how I felt while watching it. It…
Unbelievable. Modern slavery. In a country that is a member of the European Union. Shocking. It will be an audience favourite. At the begining of the film I thought “but what is the position of the filmmaker, why does she…
Helmrich is using the Single Shot Cinema technique, a style he developed and perfected himself. He chooses to actively engage with his subject rather than remaining a neutral outsider – a position that typifies Direct Cinema. He aims to record…
It was presented in the dokinkubator session in Malmø and I had met with the director in Prague, when it was still in development. I saw the finished film here at IDFA in Amsterdam with high expectations. I was not…
I am biased. I have known the director Mila Turajlic for the many years that I have taken part in the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade. And I have shared opinions about the films, we have shown at the festival –…
Of course you – as a Dane – are sceptical, when someone wants to make a film about one of the superstars of professional bicycling. Our national hero Jørgen Leth has made, what is to say about the suffering, the…
Look at that picture from a bridge in Amsterdam, where the biggest documentary film festival is taking place these days. It was here that I ran into Ally Derks this afternoon. Are you alone here, she asked, where is your…
The day after the opening of IDFA the director of “Amal”, Egyptian Mohammed Siam met the participants of the IDFA Academy to talk about the film, which they had all seen the night before or that very same morning. Siam…
Thursday was a beautiful evening for the Lithuanian director Mindaugas Survila, who celebrated his world premiere at IDFA with a full hall in the Munt Cinema 9. He was there with his wife, as was the editor Danielius Kokanauskis, who…
It was a brilliant IDFA opening night yesterday at the amazing Royal Theater Carré in Amsterdam. Film and tribute to Ally Derks, who has stepped down from her post as director of IDFA that she co-founded 30 years ago. The…
The second print edition of the documentary magazine, MODERN TIMES REVIEW, that took over when DOX was stopped by its publisher EDN (European Documentary Network), is out. It was in the festival bags at DOK Leipzig and it will be…
Not all films can go to the competitive sections, of course not, so festivals arrange strands like Panorama and Masters, at IDFA both are there, with 32 titles in the first and 29 in the latter, where also older films…
… at the upcoming IDFA with the title ”Shifting Perspectives: The Arab World” with a clear intention: ”IDFA offers a counterbalance to Western stereotypes that ignore the complexity of the Arabic-speaking world and keep ‘the Arab’ at arm’s length, as…
… like many other festivals have done holding up a sign saying ”Free Oleg Sentsov”, the Ukrainian filmmaker who was arrested by the Russian authorities in March 2014 in Crimea and sentenced to 20 years in jail on suspicion of…
Photo of a happy man, Lithuanian Arunas Matelis, on stage in Minsk at the Listapad Minsk International Film Festival. As I wrote some days ago the selection for the main documentary competition was very strong – – so also…
Wednesday IDFA, International Documentary Film Festival in Amsterdam, starts. And I am going there for five nights. Due to being part of the IDFA Academy, this great initiative of the festival, where young filmmakers get the chance to meet each…
”Vladimir Meciar was the first Minister of Interior post Velvet revolution of 1989 and the threetime re-elected Prime Minister of Slovakia. He was an undeniably charismatic politician „ loved by the nation“ and his profound influence on the contemporary political…
I was there a couple of times, in Minsk Belarus for the film festival, that has a well chosen documentary program with Irina Demyanova as the responsible. 12 films are competing in the documentary section. I am happy I am…
The jury for the long, international documentaries at DOK Leipzig chose Ana Dumitrescu’s ”Licu-a Romanian Story” as the winner of the 60th edition of the festival. I did not watch the film in Leipzig but did so tonight on a…
Antra Gaile from Mistrus Media in Riga asked me if I wanted to see and eventually comment on an almost final cut of the new film by Latvian master of documentary Ivars Seleckis, whose work I know so well and…
… took place at Westbad, a former venue for the citizens to go to swim. Now turned into one big room for concerts, conferences and the prize ceremony of the 60 year old festival. Tables were put up with wine…
The introduction of a ”Next Masters Competition” at DOKLeipzig is an excellent idea. I have seen some of the choices for this year and so far one stands out, the Ukrainian ”Delta” by Oleksandr Techynski. It lives up to the…
I have not (yet) been able to watch all films in the international competition for long documentaries – there are 12 – but I want to highlight two, which could deserve an award tonight: Experienced Aliona van der Horst has…
One of the many good things at the DOK Leipzig is the market, where you go with your 300 page catalogue to choose between 272 films from 66 countries! You have your code, you find a film, put on your…
Festival director of DOK Leipzig Leena Pasanen regrets the lack of female directors in the German competition for long documentaries. She wants to do something about it, read this from the opening of the festival monday night: “Women in film…
”Jeg har fulgt arbejdet i Danner i fem år. Filmen har taget tid, fordi der var meget store hensyn at tage til sikkerhed og etik. Hvornår er det for farligt for en kvinde at deltage i filmen? Kan hun selv…
I take the liberty to copy-paste an article from the Website of Audiovisual in the Mediterranean, which is powered by CMCA. The article, based on several sources, is from today: Having activated Article 155 of the Spanish Constitution on Saturday…
At the Jihlava Intl. FF they have a fine tradition that has been picked up by other festivals: to have a one man/woman jury for one of the competitive sections, the Opus Bonum. Legendary filmmaker from Latvia Laila Pakalnina was…
… og dagen sluttede med visningen af Ai WeiWeis ”Human Flow”. Efter det var lykkedes festivalledelsen (Antalya Film Festival 2017) at få fat i en kopi som ikke var skadet. Aflysningen den første dag rejste en mængde spekulation om censur…
For the fourth time the Antalya Film Forum took place. I was here last year as well and can say that the always smiling and positive Zeynep Atakan and her young female team has established an event that has grown…
First the bigger numbers from the press release of Eurimages… The Board of Management of the Council of Europe’s Eurimages Fund agreed to support 22 fiction, 1 animation and 7 documentaries at a meeting in Skopje, for a total amount…
The pitching of 6 Turkish documentary projects took place wednesday mid-day with a good audience and two competent jury members Sevdije Kastrati from Kosovo and Dennis Wheatley from the UK. Slightly different from what we are used to in European…
For the second time I am at the Antalya Film Forum in Turkey that is the industry event connected to the festival that celebrates its 54th edition. Last year I was in a documentary jury that gave awards to two…
”Wonderful Losers” was the wonderful winner in the documentary competition at the international film festival in Warsaw. Here is what I found on the website of the festival, after the award ceremony last night: DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION Jury: Volia Chajkouskaya –…
… in documentary filmmaking, at Malmö Högskola (Malmö University), ceremony tomorrow. Bravo! A very well deserved appreciation of their work as documentarians with films that have gone all over the world: Fredrik Gertten with debate creating films like ”Bikes vs.…
In the 1970’es my friend Kjell Væring and I went to see Luchino Visconti’s ”Ludwig” about King Ludwig II of Bavaria, 235 mins.(!). A masterpiece that we watched in a big cinema on Champs Élysées in Paris. We wrote about…
A month ago I was teaching at the film school department of the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre in Vilnius. The first morning of the week I asked the students to write down 3 words that comes to their…
Yes, political films, films on political issues, film history. DOK Leipzig offers at its 60th edition 24 short and longer documentaries under the title ”commanders, chairmen, general secretaries”. Which refers to an event at the festival. Catalogue text by Ralph…
Leena Pasanen, director of DOK Leipzig, wrote this to me yesterday: Dear Tue, bad news from Poland indeed. This is the text i had written for our catalogue to introduce our Polish special programme. Had no idea at that time,…
… and has put together a special program, ”a declaration of Love to Polish docs”, for the festival. Readers of this site will know that Polish documentaries are highly valued through reports from the Krakow festival, lots of positive reviews…
… has existed since 1993 and offers a quality program, of course with a focus on what happens in current Romanian documentary but also with an international scope – the festival takes place October 16 to 22 in nice Sibiu.…
… takes place October 24 till October 29, DOKLeipzig starts October 30 and runs until November 5, 10 days later it is IDFA in Amsterdam. It is rather crowded with important documentary festivals within a month, one can say, I…
I had high expectations to the new film by Elvira Niewiera and Piotr Rosolowski. I liked their ”Domino Effect”, link to the review below, and I have followed ”The Prince and the Dybbuk” through a read of the treatment and…
… ”The Beast is Still Alive” by Bulgarian Mina Mileva and Vesela Kazakova as the best International Documentary of the 5th Aegean Docs in Greece, that was held October 1-6, in Mytilene on the island of Lesbos. It is a…
The M7 in Belgrade stands for the Magnificent7 Festival – 7 feature duration European documentaries. The festival has launched 13 editions, number 14 is coming up January 31st till February 6th 2018. But before that the tireless director couple of…