A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
At a moment where European documentary film festivals are gathering documentarians and a local audience in big crowds to present huge numbers of film (DOK Leipzig, cph:dox, Jihlava, DocLisboa, idfa etc.) it is wonderful to see that other smaller, but…
Tonight the awards of the 54th DOK Leipzig festival were announced. A new record total of 74,500 euros (!) in prize money was granted to a total of 17 awards. The total prize list follows below. The three international competition…
In the train for Copenhagen after 5 days at the 54th International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film. I had my currywurst mit scharfe sauce a while ago and am ready for the train ride home via Hamburg. Gives…
Festival directors must have visions and points of view. DOK Leipzig festival director Claas Danielsen has. The following is taken from the press release of the festival after the opening of the festival: Claas Danielsen held a very personal speech,…
Please surprise me, give me time for reflections, to smile, laugh, cry, tell me something I did not know in beforehand – or show me something that I have not seen before, or make some unpredictable montage of location connections…
This is where our civilisation has brought us! Is my first thought after this heartbreaking documentation from a rich country in the middle of Europe, Switzerland. A documentary that without doubt will get award(s) at the DOK Leipzig. Deservedly. It…
Subtitle: ”Reda and her 3 daughters”, a very well told human story from the crowded Cairo, about women who earn their money as belly dancers in more or less obscure locations for entertainment, dominated by and set up for men.…
Above I write about films that impressed me mostly, but there were others that deserve mention for the good or for the bad. So here comes some name dropping. Finnish Anu Kuivalainen’s ”Aranda” about people and research on board the…
Obvious to make a series of films from the Arab countries – Arabien as the organisers called it, and it sounds much nicer in German. I saw a couple of them, ”Tahrir 2011”, ”I am in the Square” and ”No…
The industry part of DOK Leipzig introduced a session with three works in progress. I was asked to be one of the commentators of the first film to be presented, which was with Czech Helena Trestikova as the director, well-known…
It is impossible – with a short text – to introduce the programme of the Copenhagen International Documentary Film Festival. It is overwhelming to sit with the newspaper catalogue in your hands, putting small X’es for what you want to…
A couple of months ago filmkommentaren posted three texts about the prestigious Japanese film festival (link 1, link 2, link 3). One text started like this: ”Facing reality, what is to be done?” is the headline of the introductory text of the…
It’s European doc festival time and documentarians like Koen Suidgeest (see below) will go to Leipzig in Germany, Jihlava in Czech Republic, DocLisboa in Portugal and idfa in Amsterdam – maybe asking themselves “what am I doing here” OR “great…
… a good question, put by Koen Suidgeest, who has been extremely busy in the promotion of his important humanistic documentary, “Karla’s Arrival”, that right now also is launched through a kickstarter campaign to collect money to get the film…
This international renowned film by Swiss Antoine Cattin and Pavel Kostomarov reaches Danish Television (DR/TV) on tuesday October 11 as part of the strand Dokumania and under the Danish title, ”Den russiske mor”. The film was at the Magnificent7 European…
From the press release of IDFA today: The 24th International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) will open on November 16 in Pathé Tuschinski with The Ambassador by Danish filmmaker and journalist Mads Brügger Cortzen. In this documentary, Brügger Cortzen exposes…
The small film festival with the fine programme of international documentaries ends today sunday October 2. The awards for the Baltic Documentary Competition were given out last night. 12 films were in the programme, three received awards – diplomas and…
After the award ceremony of the 8th Vilnius Documentary Film Festival , a new Lithuanian documentary had its premiere in Vilnius. ”The Field of Magic” has been on its way for years and premieres in a version that is full…
They know how to remember and honour their artists in Lithuania, including the documentary filmmakers, I was reminded again today at the Vilnius Documentary Film Festival. Talking to directors Giedre Beinoriute and Audrius Stonys, they told me that a film…
Sunny and peaceful Vilnius hosts for the 8th time a documentary festival, full of fine international documentaries, as well as a competitive Baltic section with 12 films. I am here for the latter to be a juror together with filmmaker…
It was the fifth edition of DOC Meeting Argentina that took place this last week. A workshop for pitch preparation of 24 projects was arranged September 19-21, the pitching forum took place the two following days, September 22 & 23,…
In the ”conferencias”, three broadcasters in a row: History Channel Latin America, ORF Austria, ZDF Three different profiles. And three different ways of presentation. Miguel Brailovsky from History Channel Latin America used power point as the presentation tool, when he…
Stories, stories, stories… a pitching forum like this in Argentina is in a way one long learning process for someone from the North, who has some, but still a pretty limited knowledge about Latin American history, art and culture, religion,…
The most applauded film projects were connected to blindness. The young director Argimiro Wanadi Siso Saldivia (what a name!) from Venezuela presented ”The Labyrinth of the Possible”, which seems to become a strong documentary about the charismatic Sonia Soberats, a…
A film festival is threatened, Punto de Vista in Spain, an important fest for the artistic documentary. A petition has been established, see below. And here are some texts taken from the website of the prestigious festival: The International Documentary…
Press release from DOK Leipzig: In its focus on the Arab world, DOK Leipzig features films from Tunisia and Egypt. The upheaval in the Arab world is far from over, yet the 54th DOK Leipzig will be presenting the first…
So, no more pitching sessions, the young distributor said to me during the Baltic Sea Forum for Documentaries in Riga? She had followed the Doc Discussion on this blog, and had read the many skeptical texts from filmmakers, who saw…
Documentary filmmakers from the Baltic countries, Russia, Poland, Norway and Sweden gather this week in Riga, Latvia. For the 15th time the Forum, that started on the Danish island of Bornholm, organises a meeting between those who have ideas for…
A text in Danish about the unique Copenhagen based documentary screening initiative ”MandagsDokumentar” where films, new and old, Danish and international, are screened, mostly with directors present and/or subjects to be discussed. Så er det tid til en ny sæson…
This autumn brings three new documentaries with music icons George Harrison, Neil Young and Paul McCartney, made by film icons Martin Scorcese, Jonathan Demme and Albert Maysles. ”George Harrison: Living in the Material World” is a two-part documentary by Martin…
Danish filmmaker Mikkel Stolt made the comment (in Danish) that he had seen “You’ve Been Trumped” at the wonderful Irish festival Guth Gafa International Film Festival. We asked him to write a text about the festival. Here it is: A…
”Facing reality, what is to be done?” is the headline of the introductory text of the site of the bi-annual, reputed documentary film festival in Yamagata, Japan. In March this year the earth quake in Japan followed by the Fukushima…
15 films take part in the international competition of the festival. There are (for Filmkommentaren readers) well known titles like Armadillo (Janus Metz), Nenette (Nicholas Philibert), Nostalgia for the Light (Patricio Guzman) and Position among the Stars (Leonard Helmrich) – …
… a question, as you can see on the YouTube clip, where Broomfield in his best shape, as an elegantly dressed British gentleman, shouts his question from the way back seat in a hall full of Palin supporters and hand-picked…
The Macedonian documentary festival, MakeDox, is on tour (2.8-11.8) and reports warmly from their stop in Vevchani, population 2500, during summer 3500-4000. Classical way of meeting an audience, here are some quotes from their newsletter: We set up the screen…
… is the name of one of the greatest auteurs in documentary history. A film has been made about him that will premiere at the Venice Film Festival (August 31 – September 10). Emanuele Vernillo (filmmaker and didactic tutor at…
Documentaries appear more and more on the programme schedule of big international film festivals. This summer the Moscow International Film Festival opened a competitive section for documentaries (reported on filmkommentaren.dk), below you can find the news about the premiere of…
Breaking news in the world of documentary films. The long awaited world premiere of Victor Kossakovsky’s Vivan la Antipodas! will take place at the 68th Venice Film Festival. The organisers announced friday that the film will be the second opening…
The film school (Kvadrat) and Magnificent7 film festival owners and managers, Svetlana and Zoran Popovic, offer a summer pleasure to Belgrade citizens and visitors. Starting from monday July 25, Megalopolisi na filmu, great films on cities are being screened within…
Documentary film projects from 11 countries, 21 of them, were developed during 5 days at the Ionian University in the city of Corfu. From morning till evening, July 11-15, the filmmakers, directors and producers, had meetings with invited tutors –…
Two key tutors were given the floor on the first day of the workshop. Danish Mikael Opstrup from EDN (European Documentary Network) introduced some presentation tricks to the participants before they were to communicate the content and form to their…
Stan Neumann inspired on the second morning at the Storydoc session in Corfu. The French editor and director, born in Czekoslovakia, had been given the task to urge the filmmakers to think about form and not only content. Form, he…
With Mediterranean projects in focus it was a natural programme choice to have a session on the situation for documentarians in the countries that have experienced or are experiencing changes that have been named ”revolution” or the ”Arab Uprising” or…
21 projects took part in the workshop in Corfu. I have previously written about the 4 selected Palestinian projects which were selected at the Storydoc prologue session in Ramallah, Palestine. The selected projects proved their quality as did the filmmakers…
The 15th edition of Documentary in Europe in Bardonecchia, Italy starts tomorrow. It includes training, project development, pitching to a panel of commissioning editors, matchmaking between directors, producers and distributors – and screenings. (By the way, the organisers are making…
In this text I can only speak for myself as one of three jurors at the first documentary competition at the 33st Moscow International Film festival stating that there was a clear agreement in the jury for the winner, Hell…
”I love my pistol”, says Sergeant Nathan Harris, the protagonist of the film about an American soldier, who gets seriously wounded in combat in Afghanistan, is taken back to the US and to his wife Ashley, who helps him recover;…
Quite a shocking film it is. Protagonist: A warlord who during the Liberia civil/tribal war ran around slaughtering anyone near him, yes naked he was, surrounding himself with child soldiers ”educated” through Rambo films, has now found God, preaching reconciliation,…
Archive material, interviews and commentaries, the film has a classical build up of a story about the chess genius, American Bobby Fischer (1943-2008), whose story is one of those written out of a reality that surpasses any Hollywood fiction script.…
Yesterday I was interviewed for Voice of Russia in a radio programme edited by Donna West and Julia Reysner. This is the written introduction followed by the link, if you should want to hear a Danish person speaking his best…