Georg Zeller: A Second Birthday
I am biased. I have known about this film to be done for years. I was a teacher at the Zelig film school in Bolzano, when Georg worked there, he showed me material that was very interesting, and I met…
Filmkommentaren.dk
A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
Filmkommentaren.dk
A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
Articles/Reviews ENGLISH
Read MoreGeorg Zeller: A Second Birthday
Swedish Documentaries in Krakow
And the festival in Krakow has decided to put focus on Sweden at the upcoming festival. Here is a clip from the press release of today, with a photo of Polish-Swedish Jerzy Sladkowski taken last week, when he presented his…
Dragon of Dragons to Marcel Łoziński
My first reaction to the press release sent out by the Krakow Film Festival was… why not before? But I will not use it against the fine people of a festival that I have always loved a lot and intends…
AmDocs Honours Joe Berlinger and Creates NSDN
… which stands for North South Doc Network, more about that below. The festival that runs from April 30-March 4 opens with the premiere of director Joe Berlinger’s latest film ”Tony Robbins: I am not Your Guru” and includes three…
Tue Steen Müller: Lithuanian Docs
LITHUANIAN DOCS – collected posts by Tue Steen Müller on Lithuanian documentaries, directors, photographers and producers Lituania is a Baltic country, the most southern, and the most exciting when it comes to documentaries. They are mostly short and based…
IDA: Getting Real
Simon Kilmurry – previously at the POV, now in his new position as executive director of the IDA (International Documentary Association) – asked me to write about the upcoming conference of the association, ”Getting Real”, that has the headline ”Art.…
Magnificent7 Belgrade/Final Report
I am back in Copenhagen after another unforgettable version of the Magnificent7 Festival, number 12 it was and of course there is reason for the organizers to be proud of what they have achieved with a festival of 7 films,…
Staron’s on Brothers
Wojciech and Malgorzata Staron were in the vip room yesterday after the screening of their masterpiece ”Brothers” that was shown in the big hall of the Sava Center in Belgrade at the Magnificent7 festival. Almost 1000 viewers attended and I…
Jerzy Sladkowski on his film Don Juan
Jerzy Sladkowski’s ”Don Juan” was shown here in Belgrade the other night and his Q&A meeting with the audience in the vip room of the Sava Center lasted for more an hour in a packed room, where many were sitting…
Cosima Spender: Palio
Taken from the site of the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade () this text is written by festival directors Svetlana and Zoran Popovic about the film to be shown tonight at the Sava Center in Belgrade: For centuries, one of the…
Wojciech Staroń: Brothers
Taken from the site of the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade () this text is written by festival directors Svetlana and Zoran Popovic about the film to be shown tonight at the Sava Center in Belgrade: From the very first moment…
Sylvain Biegeleisen
I just said goodbye to him, the director of ”Twilight of a Life”, who has played an important role in this 12th edition of the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade. He came with his film about which I wrote – before…
Jerzy Śladkowski: Don Juan
Taken from the site of the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade () this text is written by festival directors Svetlana and Zoran Popovic about the film to be shown tonight at the Sava Center in Belgrade: This year’s winner of Europe’s…
Magnificent7 Belgrade/ Report 3
They got up from their chairs but did not leave right away, they stayed to honour the filmmaker, whose ”Mallory” had just ended. Helena Třeštíková received standing ovations for her film at the screening at the Sava Center, where it…
Jakob Brossman: Lampedusa in Winter
Taken from the site of the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade () this text is written by festival directors Svetlana and Zoran Popovic about the film to be shown tonight at the Sava Center in Belgrade: Is there anything emptier than…
Magnificent7 Belgrade/ Report 2
Last night. Look at the photo – Sylvain Biegeleisen, director of ”Twilight of a Life”, is on stage with festival director Zoran Popovic in Belgrade before the screening of his film at the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade. Biegeleisen is about…
Helena Třeštíková: Mallory
Colleague Allan Berg wrote a review of “Mallory” when it was shown at CPH:DOX, here is how festival directors Svetlana and Zoran Popovic introduces the film that will be shown at Magnificent7 tonight, taken from : The most recent documentary…
Magnificent7 Belgrade/ Report 1
12. Festival Evropskog Dugometraznog Dokumentarnog Filma… the Serbian language version for 12th European Feature Documentary Film Festival that started last night with the screening of German Kral’s ”Our Last Tango” – click on www.filmkommentaren.dk and watch the photo to see…
Sylvain Biegeleisen: Twilight of a Life
Taken from the site of the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade () this text is written by festival directors Svetlana and Zoran Popovic about the film to be shown tonight at the Sava Center in Belgrade: A refined documentary pearl, woven…
German Kral: Our Last Tango
Taken from the site of the Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade () this text is written by festival directors Svetlana and Zoran Popovic about the opening film, Friday January 29: Buenos Aires nights echo with the sounds of the bandoneon, with…
DAFilms Portal Celebrates 10 Years
… and you will, as one of the presents from this excellent ”online documentary cinema” vod, be able to watch 5 films for free, three of them by directors Peter Liechti, Viktor Kossakovsky and Sergei Loznitsa… until January 31. More…
Mark Cousins: Dear John (Grierson)
I love Mark Cousins, his passion for film and his constant pointing at the fact that film history is so much more than American and French and British. That goes for documentary as well. Read this text of his and…
ARTE Europe – a New Initiative
… that you can only welcome because it brings – for free – some arte programmes, including documentaries, to you with English subtitles (or Spanish), not to all regions but to many. Not bad at all even if you have…
Iikka Vehkalahti: A Good Documentary is
Thanks to our own archive at www.filmkommentaren.dk I am able to bring forward clever words from Iikka Vehkalahti, who – it has been announced – is to receive an award at the upcoming Hot Docs Festival in Toronto. Here they…
Flaherty Seminar 2016
The 62nd Robert Flaherty Film Seminar… an institution, have only heard good about it, and not only from my former EDN colleague Anita Reher, who is head of the Flaherty, has something in common with the Danish folk high school…
Tabitha Jackson – Interview
A couple of days ago the trade magazine Indiewire brought an interview (by Chris O’Falt) with Tabitha Jackson, the director of the Sundance Documentary Film Program. Jackson who, when she was working for Channel4 in England, was a very much…
Avi Mograbi in Berlin Forum
Israeli Avi Mograbi is one of the most remarkable “auteurs” of our time. If you want to know more you are welcome to check posts made on this site on his work – since 2008, more than 30 that includes…
Sylvain Biegeleisen – Interview
A true artist, presented in the interview as ”film director and producer, writer, painter and video artist, photographer and musician, group moderator and singer…”. Sylvain Biegeleisen is interviewed by EDN, that does monthly conversations with members, this one being very…
Miroslav Janek – Interview
As a follow-up on our ”collected posts” on Czech documentary maker Miroslav Janek here are some quotes from an interview made a month ago by Doc Alliance, below is a link to the whole interview, absolutely to be recommended. Janek…
12th Magnificent Seven in Belgrade
… with the long subtitle ”European Feature Documentary Film Festival” starts on January 29 and goes on until February 4… Time for a small warm-up to this yearly celebration of the documentary film on the screen in the Sava Center…
Oscar, Robert and Bodil
The nominations are announced for the Academy Awards (Oscar), the Danish Film Academy Awards (Robert) and the Danish Film Critics Award (Bodil). In the feature documentary categories it goes like this: Oscar ”Amy” (Asif Kapadia and James Gay-Rees), ”Cartel Land”…
A New Dynasty – Created in China
If in Aarhus, second largest city in Denmark with a very active cultural life, don’t miss the art museum Aros that has always interesting exhibitions and a fine collection of new Danish artists like Per Kirkeby, recently portrayed in a…
Baltic Frames Aarhus
The Baltic documentary festival in Aarhus, in the wonderful art house cinema Øst for Paradis (”East of Eden”) took off saturday with a full house screening of the classic ”Ten Minutes Older” by Herz Frank and Lithuanian Giedre Zickyte’s ”Master…
Giedre Zickyte: Master and Tatyana
So, there it is, the film about the Lithuanian photographer Vitas Luckus (1943-1987), his life, his art and first of all his love story with muse and wife, Tatyana. (Screened at the cinema Øst For Paradis, Aarhus at the festival “Baltic Frames“)…
The Power of Documentaries…
on the Oscar Trail … is the headline of an interesting article in New York Times by Cara Buckley, January 6. It mentions the changed rules for documentaries and reflects a bit on the who could be the winner this…
Best Documentaries 2015 Introduction
Below you find my list of ”Best Documentaries 2015” as well as a list of ”Documentary Talents of 2015”. I could also – like the DOKLeipzig did – have called the latter ”Next Masters”. Anyway, here they are, in a…
Best Documentaries 2015
A Syrian Love Story, Sean McAllister Brothers, Wojciech Staron The Wolfpack, Crystal Moselle Listen to Me, Marlon, Stevan Riley Amy, Asif Kapadia Varicella, Viktor Kossakovsky The Event, Sergei Loznitsa Twilight of a Life,…
Documentary Talents 2015
The Gleaners, Ye Zuyi Lampedusa in Winter, Jakob Brossmann Elephant’s Dream, Kristof Bilsen When the Earth Seems to be Light, Salome Machaidze, Tamuna Karumidze & David Meskhi. Train to Adulthood, Klára Trencsényi Ukrainian Sheriffs, Roman…
Haskell Wexler 1922-2015/ 2
The IDA, International Documentary Association, pays tribute to Haskell Wexler: “In his rich and impactful career, Haskell Wexler inspired, mentored and befriended scores of filmmakers, who, spurred by not only his artistic verve but also his unwavering commitment to social…
Haskell Wexler 1922-2015
Legendary Haskell Wexler died yesterday, 93 years old. Long obituaries giving information on his impressive career are to be found in Hollywwod Reporter, Variety and Indiewire (links below), several FB friends salute his strong contribution to film history and social…
DocAlliance: From All of Us to All of You
Yes, this is how one the partners, CPH:DOX, of the very generous DocAlliance, ends the year with a Disney quote. And it IS a veeery good present that you should accept. The online platform – after a brilliant series of…
Bettina Perut & Iván Osnovikoff: Surire
It starts with a symphony in image and sound. Close up on the earth, the soil somewhere in the universe, focus on small bubbles that become bigger, take a different shape and tune, sounds that take different notes, suddenly it…
Machaidze, Karumidze & Meskhi: When the Earth…
Some facts: Full title: When the Earth Seems to be Light Full names of directors: Salome Machaidze, Tamuna Karumidze & David Meskhi. A Georgian/ German coproduction. Produced by Goslab & Jörg Langkau. Co-Produced by Zaza Rusadze, Zazarfilm. … and a…
Klára Trencsényi: Train to Adulthood
This film was awarded as the best in the ”Next Masters” section of the DOKLeipzig festival this autumn. Very well deserved as Klára Trencsényi already before (primarily with ”Bird’s Way”) has shown how masterful cinematography looks, when she is behind…
Herz Frank – Collected Posts on his Works
Always with a camera at hand, be it to catch a moment in life… THE JEWISH STREET (1992) by Allan Berg Nielsen The camera from high above shows me Riga. The city set in its landscape. I’m drawn…
Robert Frank – Collected Posts on his Works
… it becomes indirectly an adaption of Ginsberg’s poem. And at the same time it is a film about Frank’s doubts about filming this. It sounds wild and it is. It is radical and most unique. Avant-garde and uncompromising, not as…
Miroslav Janek – Collected Posts on his Works
Three persons in one room. Plus a film crew. Not a lot of space but the great Czech director and cameraman Mira Janek manages to move around to observe and catch the intense atmosphere of quite a unique family:…
Khaled Jarrar: Good Morning Occupation
This text is taken from the FB page of film director and visual artist, Palestinian Khaled Jarrar, whose documentary “Infiltrators” has been reviewed on this site, as well as his visual happenings. This scary, visually strong written report comes from…
Miroslav Janek
I have run into a slate of giving verbal flowers to documentarians, whose work I appreciate a lot and who are to be highlighted right now for one reason or the other. Earlier today it was Sérgio Tréfaut who visits…
Sérgio Tréfaut
The reason for this small homage to the Portuguese director, producer and promoter for the documentary film genre is that the Danish Cinematheque in Copenhagen shows a mini-series of the director’s work, starting this coming thursday with the masterpiece ”Alentejo,…