CPH:DOX Recommendations
I went through the film list of CPH:DOX to find gems I have seen and can recommend that you give a chance. In alphabetical order listing also which category they are in if that helps you. More information on the website of the festival https://cphdox.dk
80 Angry Journalists András Földes & Anna Kis Urgent Matters Journalism matters (sorry!) more than ever in a world of fake news and the unmentionable in the White House.
Amilcar Miguel Eek Backstory A subjective, intimate portrait of the African revolutionary Cabral. Pure poetry.
Below the Clouds Gianfranco Rosi / Highlights Rosi is a brilliant auteur, I saw the film in Paris on a big screen… Napoli, people, Pompeii, he has a special handwriting.
Christiania Karl Friis Forchhammer DOX:Award As Christiania is our neighbour four months per year, we go there often from our allotment garden. The film has it all, maybe too much and yet I miss a stronger focus on the beautiful houses that many inhabitants have built… that I always show when foreigners come to visit.
Double Trouble Emilia Śniegoska Highlights (PHOTO) These two ladies living in a Polish minority village in Romania. Warm, full of humour.
Holy Destructors Aistė Žegulytė Artists & Auteurs Aisté is a huge talent and “Her film is innovative, to say the least; it is attractive and fascinating, surprising in its narrative, serious and full of humour, and full of admiration for the Lithuanian conservators, who are in the film, doing their holy work restoring the skeletons of important noble people and altar pieces, to be shining like never before.” Quote from my review in fimkommentaren.dk
Kabul Between Prayers Aboozar Amini Urgent Matters First prize in Warsaw at Watchdocs. We – in the jury – stated: “This film invites the viewer to a world rarely seen from the inside. With precision, care and without judgment, it shows the human faces of ideology and regime not usually associated with sensitivity or ambiguity. This is a movie that carefully composes each frame, and tells both what is in front of our eyes and what is left out. We have been transported to an unknown, sinister world in a subtle and moving way. The movie maker is completely in control of his material and shows outstanding cinematic talent in every frame and scene.”
Silent Flood Dmytro Sukholytkyy-Sobchuk Highlights A scenery at a river, hard to grasp because of a dense fog that slowly is lifting, accompanied by old voices off screen telling stories from the past. Stories about bridges that took people from shore to shore but were bombed and destroyed during two wars. The first and the second WW. And never built up again. An amazing opening of a film, that is the filmmaker’s prologue to a film, like one rich painting turned into a film. I felt like I was in a museum going closer and closer to a painting to discover… from my review of the film at filmkommentaren.
The Cord Nolwenn Hervé DOX Award A first-time female filmmaker, who lived many years in Latin America, it was shot in Venezuela. I wrote to the producer “It’s an impressive film. Because of Carolina. What a woman. And what she does! Compassion and practical help. I think the rhythm is fine, there is a nervous flow of energy in the editing that corresponds to her.” And CPH:DOX says “Drawing strength from a violent past, Carolina relentlessly preserves the vital cord between pregnant women and their babies.”
