Sundance Documentary Film Program
OSI stands for Open Society Institute, that was founded by George Soros and has – among many other things – been very important for the documentary sector all over the world. In the mid 90’es and up till 2002 a…
Filmkommentaren.dk
A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
Filmkommentaren.dk
A film blog by Allan Berg Nielsen & Tue Steen Müller
Film History
Read MoreSundance Documentary Film Program
Vilnius Diary 5
Screening day of Lithuanian documentaries for eventual recommendation for DOKLeipzig. 5 films to watch since my visit one year ago. Public funding for film is minimal in Lithuania at this moment. So competition is strong among the established filmmakers and…
Hubert Sauper: Darwin’s Nightmare
This brief intro comes because a documentary neo-classic is broadcast on Danish television tonight, on DR2 in prime time (8.40pm). It has been in Danish cinemas, it is available from the DFI, and if you have already seen it, take…
Ex Oriente 4 Directing
Stan Neumann visited the workshop and showed his 2004 production for Arte France, ”Language does not Lie”, a film based on the diaries of Victor Klemperer, who survived Das dritte Reich and whose diaries were not published before the mid…
Ex Oriente 3 Directing
Italian director Alessandro Rossetto came to Hotel Biograf to show his 1999 documentary Bibione Bye Bye One, which is a wonderful b/w 75 minutes long journey into an area and a culture that the director knows from his childhood, 100…
Capturing Reality 2
The NFB (National Film Board of Canada) production on the art of documentary, featuring 33 directors from 13 countries, are being used for debates among filmmakers and with the audience. Here is a quote from a Realscreen article illustrating the…
Capturing Reality
33 filmmakers, 13 countries, 1 passion: The art of documentary. This is the way that NFB, National Film Board of Canada, launches its interview-film that includes great filmmakers like Maysles, Kim Longinotto, Werner Herzog (photo), Molly Dineen, Heddy Honigmann and…
Sunny Side of the Doc… 20 Years!
Of course it needs to be celebrated, the 20 years of Sunny Side of the Doc, now in la Rochelle for a couple of years, before in Marseilles with a prologue in Lyon. Lots of memories for someone like me…
Doclisboa 2009
Readers of filmkommentaren.dk will know that I consider the international documentary festival in the capital of Portugal as one of the leading when it comes to quality in selection and side programme policy. The programme for 2009, the festival takes…
Herz Frank on Documentaries
Latvian Herz Frank, a master in the history of documentary, with works like “Ten Minutes Older”, “There were Seven Simeons”, “The Song of Songs” and “Flashback”: In front of me on my work table is the central fragment from Raphael’s…
Det Danske Institut i Damaskus opretter filmotek
Rundt omkring i den store verden sidder der nogle kulturelle ildsjæle og bygger små læhegn omkring det hul, hjemlige politiske ildsjæle gør deres bedste for at begrave kulturen i.En af disse sidder på Det Danske Institut i Damaskus (foto), han…
Cinephilia!
Film History – The Finnish film critic and historian Peter von Bagh is the artistic director of this exciting week in June: Il Cinema Ritrovato, the festival sponsored by the Mostra Internazionale del Cinema Libero and the Cineteca del Comune…
The Factual and the Fictive
The Documentary Film Centre at the University of Westminster in London arranges in May 5 screenings and filmmaking discussions under the headline: The Factual and the Fictive: A series of screenings/talks exploring hybrid fiction/documentary film-making. One session is dedicated to…
International Film Guide 2009
472 pages. Full of illustrations – still from films, photos from award ceremonies at festivals all over the world, the 45th edition of the International Film Guide is available. With ”Directors of the Year”, a ”World Survey”, info/reports/highlights country by…
Best of Britain
The Danish Film House in Copenhagen and its excellent Cinemateket puts a focus on British documentary through 8 programmes in the month of May. There is a selection of the classics from the 30’es (Night Mail, Listen to Britain, O…
30 Years Older
Lars Gehrmann, film student at Zelig in Bolzano, has, on his blog, made the following reference from a new short film “Immersion”, produced by the New York Times, to a documentary classic: 1978 Latvian film maker Herz Frank did a…
Jacques Tati does not smoke any longer
Look at that photo. Something is wrong. Yes, it is our beloved Jacques Tati on his Solex, as we remember him as M. Hulot. But he has something strange in his mouth. Not the usual pipe but one of those…
Nicolas Philibert: La ville Louvre
Produced 20 years ago, this masterpiece of Nicolas Philibert is as fresh as on the day of release. It is a fascinating look at what happens behind the scene at the magnificent museum in Paris. At the end of the…
Wim Wenders: Der Himmel über Berlin 5
Bruno Ganz og Otto Sander kommer som disse frakkeklædte engle usynlige ind til de mange læsende (Rilkes scene fra “Malte Laurids Brigges Optegnelser”) på Staatsbibliothek. De kan, da de er engle, ikke kun høre tanker, men også, hvad der læses,…
Wim Wenders: Der Himmel über Berlin 4
Vi havde Berlinaften på Nordisk Designhøjskole i aftes. Eleverne rejser i dag på studierejse til byen, og hele dagen i går gik med forberedelser. Der var foredrag om Berlins historie og topografi og om aftenen kørte de “Der Himmel über…
Read All About It!
A piece of promotion for a serious and competent publishing house with an excellent newsletter with links to events (conferences like the one below about Pasolini and Fassbinder, and festivals) and first of all info on new books on the…
Fassbinder and Pasolini
A conference called ”Pasolini and Fassbinder: the European legacy between Utopia and nihilism” is to be held at Cardiff University, April 25-26. The interesting programme is to be found via the link below. Here is an excerpt from the introductory…
Hommage to Lithuanian Documentaries
The ECCOS (European Cultural Capital On Screen) organised by Belgian Associate Directors has this year a focus on Lithuanian documentaries to celebrate that Vilnius is Cultural Capital of Europe. In connection with the filmfestival Open Doek in Antwerp a masterclass…
Sergey Dvortsevoy in Nyon
If you happen to be around Nyon in Switzerland on tuesday April 28, you should go and meet one of the few real stars in documentary cinema, Russian director Sergey Dvortsevoy. He has been invited to Visions du Réel and…
Andrej Tarkovskij: Spejlet
Tue Steen Müller fortalte os under sin workshop i Randers, 7BEST om Audrius Stonys “The Bell”, som betog os alle ved sin ro, dybde og skønhed, at instruktøren “kan sin Tarkovskij forfra og bagfra”. Det får vi nu lejlighed til…
National Film Board 1939-2009
For 70 years, the National Film Board of Canada has been breaking ground in socially-engaged documentary, auteur animation, alternative drama and more! This is how the NFB/ONF (Office National du Film du Canada) modestly, in small letters, celebrates itself on…
Cinéma du Réel 10
Pier Paolo Pasolini og Chris Marker, ja, de gamle meget forskellige mestre var med. Havde hver en sag med. Pasolini en lille og en mindre og Marker en lille bitte. Vægtige på hver sin måde alle tre… Pasolinis rejsefilm fra 1963…
Joris Ivens Retrospective
The very active news service provided by Cinéma du Réel informs about an upcoming retrospective series of Joris Ivens at the Cinémathèque française (51 rue de Bercy, 75012 Paris) from March 5th to April 5th. The text goes like this:…
Maximilian Schell: Marlene
I’ve been photographed enough, she answers, when Maximilian Schell asks her, why she does not want to appear visually in his documentary. Indeed she had and it does not matter as Schell makes a point out of this, organises a…
Sundance Film Festival 2009
Starting today the film festival for independent film, running in Park City, Utah, goes on until January 25. The website tells it all – films, panel discussions, and the documentary sections are growing in strength, as is the Sundance Institute…
Kosmorama 242
Tidsskriftets nye nummer med artikler, der med Morten Hartz Kaplers “AFR” i front kredser omkring den evige problemstilling, fakta og/eller fiktion, udkommer i dag. I aften 18:15 er der stort arrangement med visning af Haskell Wexlers “Medium Cool” fra 1968, som…
Cinemateket: Tegnedrengene mm.
Hvilken brilliant idé – og det manglede bare! Cinemateket viser i januar Tegnedrengene’s to mesterværker ”Eventyret om den vidunderlige kartoffel” (1984) og ”Eventyret om den vidunderlige musik” (1990). Det gøres i forbindelse med serien af animerede dokumentarfilm, og det er…
Agnes Varda: Les Plages d’Agnès
From le monde 16.12.08, a clip from the review of Jean-Luc Douin, for our French reading readers, about a film that previously was praised briefly by my colleague Allan Berg: ”Toute mémoire est en désordre, toute sensation difficile à capturer,…
Sight and Sound: The Best of 2008
The highly estimated film magazine Sight & Sound has made its hit list for 2008, to be published in the January 09 issue. Winner is Steve McQueen’s Hunger. This is a clip from what the editor Steve James wrote about…
Volha Nikalaichyk: Khash
An envelope arrived with a dvd. Posted in Lithuania by Volha Nikalaichyk, a woman from Belarus, producer of documentary films, and many times a participant in workshops in Eastern Europe, outside her own country, where I also met her once,…
Andrej Tarkovskij: Solaris
“… Wie grossartig dagegen etwa Antonionis Schauspielerarbeit in seinem Film “L’Avventura” oder jene von Orson Welles in “Citizen Kane”. Bei ihnen kommt einfach das Gefühl auf, einmalig überzeugende Figuren vor sich zu haben. Doch das ist einequalitativ ganz andere, filmspezifische…
Docpoint Celebrates Documentary Legends
The British Dochouse at the Riverside Studios in London does a lot for the creation of a documentary culture in the UK… but is apparently not only promoting films within the UK but also outside. I found this very interesting…
Warhol in Berlin
It is still fascinating and entertaining to watch Andy Warhol exhibitions: ”If you want to know all about AW, just look at the surface of my paintings and films and me, and there I am. There´s nothing behind it”. Sounds…
Andrej Tarkovskij: Offeret
“…Die Gegenfigur Adelaides ist die demütig-bescheidene, stets schüchtern und unsicher wirkende Maria, die im Haus Alexanders ihren Dienst als Zugehfrau versieht. Zwischen ihr und dem Hausherrn scheint zunächst keine Annäherung möglich – wie sollte sie auch? Dann aber kommt es…
EFA – Sergey Dvortsevoy, Documentary
Sergey Dvortsevoy thinks it is important to reflect on WHY you make documentaries, well film in general. He started late as a filmmaker, he made ”Paradise”, ”Bread Day”, ”Highway”, ”In the Dark” and now ”Tulpan”, the latter a film with…
Jørgen Leth: Portrætfilmene 2
Hvad er det, som holder disse skildringer sammen under den overskrift (portrætfilm), dette mærkelige ord, som bruges (efter min mening misbruges) af filmfolk i dette land. Ustandseligt. Handler de alle om personligheder? Om personlige kvaliteter? Om store præstationer? Tilsyneladende er…
Cinemateket: Den etnografiske dokumentar
Der er mulighed for søde gensyn og nyopdagelser i Cinematekets december-program. Under overskriften ”Den etnografiske dokumentar” er der Basil Wright (”Song of Ceylon”), flere gange Jean Rouch, inklusiv foredrag om ham, den fremragende Vietnamfilm af Trinh T. Minh-ha fra 1989…
Jørgen Vestergaard: At være sig selv
Utrættelige Jørgen Vestergaard har lavet en film om ”Kirsten Kjær og hendes museum” i Langvad ved Frøstrup. Den varer 33 minutter og lader kunstnerens nevø, Harald Fuglsang (billede), fortælle historien om en farverig og kontroversiel personlighed, hvis mange portrætmalerier kan…
Geyerhalter: Too Many Cheap tv Documentaries
This year’s Top 10 at the coming IDFA festival in Amsterdam is put together by Austrian filmmaker Nikolaus Geyrhalter. He has chosen films that have impressed him and that have played a role in his own development. Here is a…
Terence Davies: Of time and the City/on Narration
I can´t help thinking about this new film by Terence Davies, a masterpiece, I wrote about it a couple of weeks ago. October 28 the Guardian had an excellent interview with him. A constant flow of wise words on filmmaking.…
Scottish Film Institute: Latest News
I promoted the possibility of watching short documentaries from the Bridging the Gap series a couple of weeks ago. This very active documentary institute in Scotland also publishes a newsletter that you can subscribe to for free, see site below.…
Frederick Wiseman on Festival Tour
Lucky you who have yet to discover the work of Frederick Wiseman. Lucky us who again get the chance to watch them on the big screen. A quote from the site of Wiseman’s Zipporah company: “… his cameras have observed…
Cahiers du Cinema
The world’s most famous film magazine, a piece of film history in itself, founded by André Bazin, influenced directly or indirectly by Francois Truffaut, Eric Rohmer, Claude Chabrol, Jean-Luc Godard and other nouvelle vague people, is in danger again. The…
BFI: Documentary Film History
The BFI (British Film Institute) celebrates its 75th birthday by publishing a collection of dvd’s including one of documentaries from the golden period 1930-1950. What a discovery for those who dont know about it, and what a revisit for us,…
Jørgen Leth: Udenrigskorrespondenten
Jeg mener ikke, jeg har set filmen siden den var ny. 25 år er gået. Og man spørger naturligvis: holder den? Og jeg svarer lige med det samme efter at have set DVD-versionen: Om den holder! Omsider en ligetil og…