A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
A press release came in: ”In collaboration with its organizer, Institute of documentary film, Film, we have prepared a selection of the best works that have gone through this prestigious workshop throughout its history of 15 years! Nine critically acclaimed…
For those of our visitors, who don’t read Danish: I have written two reviews, with top scores, in Danish language as this could push Danes go to the cinema. ”Den anden side” by Pernille Rose Grønkjær about and with standup…
It’s not every day that a documentary takes it all as did ”Bobbi Jene” by Elvira Lind at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York. Three awards given yesterday to the film produced by Julie Leerskov and Sare Stockmann. The…
Grandmother is old and fragile, she can not live on her own. Her daughter with four children, 3 boys, the oldest 6-8 years old I guess, and a baby girl, moves in, to help; into a flat that has little…
Director Laura Cini was at DocsBarcelona 2016 at a rough cut screening in front of a selected panel with me as the moderator. She has now finished the film, sent it to me, asking my opinion as she experiences rejections…
There are a handful of documentaries in ”La Sélection officielle 2017” at the 70th edition of the Cannes Festival, May 17-28. No surprise that films by Agnès Varda, Raymond Depardon, Claude Lanzmann and Eugene Jarecki are listed, and no surprise…
So there they are the films selected for the 20th edition of DocsBarcelona. Listed in alphabetical order or in sections or according to screening hours and venue, it starts May 18 and ends May 28, with an extension of some…
I had high expectations. I had seen and admired the director’s ”Constantin and Elena” from 2008. I had seen Andrei Dascalescu pitching the project at East Doc Platform in 2016, I wrote these words on this site: ”(Planeta Petrila was)…
A press release came in from one of the oldest documentary film festivals, in Krakow, that celebrates its 57th edition BUT with a young competition on music documentaries, the fifth edition of this novelty. A quote of a quote: “As…
This is a copy-paste of the press release from Copenhagen Architecture Festival, that is indeed very active when it comes to the inclusion of the film medium: Denmark’s largest architecture festival Copenhagen Architecture Festival opens its fourth edition Wednesday, April…
With its fifth edition the organisers of this still very young Tbilisi Georgian festival, director Archil Khetagouri and coordinator Ileana Stanculescu, took the decision to move the event from October to May 11-16. Argumentation: Too much happens in October. And…
I was a jury member of the first DOKer festival in 2015 and am very happy to see that the filmmakers behind the event are able to continue their pioneer work of bringing films from around the world to the…
Luckily I live in a country where subtitling of films is the rule – no dubbing as in German or France, where as an example European cultural channel Arte is the big sinner in the language killing discipline. In Denmark…
I have met Shorena Tevzadze and producer Nikoloz Gogochuri several times at workshops in Georgia, where this fine film was developed. Their dedication to the theme and their love towards the characters of the film was always there; watching the…
The IDF (Institute of Documentary Film) has published a very informative, well made interview with Polish director Pawel Lozinski, who was at the EastDoc Platform in Prague, where he had a double role: to show his film ”You Don’t Know…
This is a clip from an interview with Slovak Robert Kirchhoff, whose ”A Hole in the Head” was reviewed on this site: Cineuropa: In your previous documentary, Normalization, you investigated a sensitive issue, and you are now pursuing another difficult theme,…
It feels unfinished, sketchy this personal film by Syrian Yaser Kassab. It is one long reflection and interpretation of, as the director has formulated it in the catalogue of Cinéma du Réel, “loss and grief”. Far from mainstream. In dark…
It’s a handmade cinema, Roman Bondarchuk said, after our pleasant tour to Lviv Film Center, where we visited the rooftop sunday morning. Saturday night a party had been held and Mr. Mykhailo, responsible for the running of the place, was…
Do you remember the film by Kostomarov called Together, Roman Bondarchuk asked me on the Virmanska Street, when we sunday were walking around in sunny Lviv in Western Ukraine. The couple in the film, Ludmila and Vladimir Loboda, were sitting…
A press release came out last night: The 14th International documentary films about human rights festival has ended in Kyiv. The awards ceremony was held in the Cinema House. The closing ceremony began with a gesture of solidarity with Ukrainian…
What kind of world do we leave for our children? A banal and pathetic question maybe. But it came to my mind this morning, when I attended the Warscape pitching in Kiev at the Docu/Pro section of Docudays. 6 projects…
… which is of course a simplification but I was thinking of it several times during the days here in Kiev, where the Docudays goes on, one of those many festivals, less known, compared to IDFA, CPH:DOX, DOKLeipzig and Hotdocs…
LOTTE MIK-MEYER: RETURN OF A PRESIDENT The Danish filmmaker Lotte Mik-Meyer has made a documentary about a very important and interesting subject and a region that certainly could need our attention. Return of a President is about the fight for…
It was one of those lovely moments, where a huge audience had come to celebrate the premiere of a film, ”Dixie Land”, that was 7 years on its way – for many reasons, one of them being that the director…
… and runs until March 31. I am happy to be here participating at the Docu/Pro, the industrial platform of a festival that celebrates its 14th edition this year. The platform includes talks from knowledgeable people like Brigid O’Shea from…
2 days of Forum at the CPH:DOX March 22-23. I was there to check out what is happening with the ”creative and visually strong film projects”, that the CPH:FORUM ”financing and co-production event” is set up to help. Are great…
…of the festivals many sections are – in an edited and shortened Danish version of the press release of the festival of tonight: DOX:AWARD:’De sidste mænd i Aleppo’ (“Last Men in Aleppo”), instrueret af Feras Fayyad samt debuterende co-instruktør Steen…
… was one of the around 30 projects pitched at the CPH:FORUM that took place wednesday and thursday this week. Director Danish/Swedish Maria Bäck, producer Anna-Maria Kantarius. Who did a strong presentation of a project that in CPH:DOX terminology is…
As the /2 says I have written about Kachkin’s film from Perm before – in August 2016 – where he told me that the film – the most obvious place to show it – was rejected by the local Flahertiana…
ANITA MATHAL HOPLAND & JENS LENGERKE: ON THE EDGE OF FREEDOM/ PÅ KANTEN AF FRIHED I heard myself saying “don’t do it, stop” several times, alone in front of the screen, when the young Russians and Ukrainians were climbing unfinished…
90 minutes with Kirsten Johnson thursday morning 23rd of March at Cinemateket, that’s a good time investment. I can guarantee that knowing Kirsten’s knowledge and commitment, and having attended her classes and Q&A sessions several times. Of course it is…
ERIK LIESHOUT a.o.: TO STAY ALIVE – A METHOD If you are a fan of either Michel Houellebecq or Iggy Pop or both: read no further and go and see this film immediately. For those of us who is something…
PIERRE BISMUTH: WHERE IS ROCKY II? Since he saw an old BBC documentary from 1980 about American pop artist Ed Ruscha, the director has seemingly had an obsession to find the topic of that doc; a piece of artificial rock that…
LARS FELDBALLE PETERSEN: THE PRESIDENT FROM THE NORTH/ PRÆSIDENTEN FRA NORDVEST It’s a Dane writing this review. Important to say as the main character of this film, Ahmed Dualeh, is Danish, well he is born in Somalia but has been…
LARS FELDBALLE PETERSEN: THE UNFORGIVEN 1992. Celebici in Bosnia-Hercegovina. A prison camp for Serbs. Esad Landzo, 19 years old was a guard. He killed and tortured, he was one of the worst, say survivors who remember what ”Zenga”, his nickname,…
ASKOLD KUROV: THE TRIAL … with the subtitle ”The State of Russia vs Oleg Sentsov”, a film that premiered at the Berlinale, now to be shown at CPH:DOX and at DocuDays in Kiev on the 25th of March with the…
First day of the 2017 CPH:DOX. I went to the new festival centre, Charlottenborg, got my accreditation, ran into always energetic Frank Piasecki Poulsen, who ordered me to go up to see the impressive colourful so-called social cinema, where the…
The 19th Thessaloniki Documentary Festival were giving out awards a couple of days ago. The Danish production ”Dream Empire” by David Borenstein got the main prize, the Golden Alexander, with a Special Jury Award for the amazing ”Machines” by Rahul…
FERAS FAYYAD: LAST MEN IN ALEPPO The tone is set in the opening, this story is of a universal scope. It is a film about life in a world of death and violence, of humanity surviving endless destruction. Last Men…
As usual the Prague-based festival delivers precise and informative press releases. Here is the one about the winners… The juries of the 19th annual One World International Human Rights Documentary Film Festival granted seven awards to films that were screened…
Saturday morning I attended the pitching of 18 projects and an award ceremony, including 9 awards – they will be announced on the site and/or the Facebook page of the organizing IDF, Institute of Documentary Film. As usual with a…
Of course it was a scoop for the organisers, IDF (Institute of Documentary Film), to have an editor capacity like American Joe Bini as a tutor and to have him deliver a masterclass like he did yesterday at the Cervantes…
Elena Subira, colleague from DocsBarcelona, asked worried to my health after wednesday night’s football miracle, where Barcelona beat Paris 6-1 after having lost the first match 4-0. Heart attack…? No, but close to, amazing, 3 Barca goals in the dying…
LEA GLOB & METTE CARLA ALBRECHTSEN: VENUS My colleague at the DocsBarcelona festival, who is also a visual artist, Martina Rogers, 28 years old, has written this review of “Venus”: REVIEW BY MARTINA ROGERS I enjoyed Venus (great title…
The first names of the filmmaking couple are Petr and Corinne. Maung Aung Pwint is according to a text at the beginning of the film the ”most famous living dissident poet” in Burma He was imprisoned several times for his…
… and many others. But very happy to see that the juries in Zagreb agreed so much with filmkommentaren.dk in its praising of the films by Salomé Jashi, Ognjen Glavonic and Jon Bang Carlsen. If you click on ”The Dazzling…
IDF stands for Institute of Documentary Film, is based in Prague with this slogan: We support the emerging stars from Central and Eastern Europe. Link below, but let me sum up what this impressive film institution is doing: training (Ex…
It’s spring, 1st of March, from where I sit in Copenhagen it’s cloudy and windy but milder. I have the window open. It’s spring and the CPH:DOX festival announced its program at noon today. The festival has moved to March…
It’s very easy if you want to see what will be shown at the festival. Go to the website, link below, and you will see the many sections arranged by the programmers. The classical ones are there like Dox:Award, New:Vision…
”Industry”, that is what CPH:DOX, and all the other big festivals call – quoted from the site – ”the various activities offer professional development, networking, and business opportunities to filmmakers and industry professionals at all levels of experience”. So when…