Magnificent7 There is an Audience…

… indeed there is, at the new venue of Magnificent7 festival in Belgrade at a new time of the year, in June, where it previously was in January/February. The cinema Kombank Hall, before it was Dom Sindikata, totally renovated, has an atmosphere of openness, you feel welcomed, and sitting with around 1000 spectators watching a documentary on a big screen… what else can you ask for being part of a festival that is in its 14 edition and has always attracted the clever Belgrade audience. The image and the sound, no complaints from my side and the reception of festival director Zoran Popovic (Photo), when he goes on stage to introduce the film and the director/filmmaker present is second to none. The audience adores him!

There are still two of the seven films to be screened: Scott Barley’s “Sleep Has Her House” and Virpi Suutari’s “Entrepreneur”. Barley is here as is Sanna Salmenkallio, the composer of the Finnish film. Two extraordinary films to be enjoyed by the Belgrade audience inside – outside the cinema the temperature has luckily dropped from the 32 degrees yesterday.

More reports will follow but let me give you a quote brought to Belgrade by Georgian Stefan Tolz, artist Andy Goldsworthy about filmmaker Thomas Riedelsheimer: “Why are Thomas’ films so special?”, “I think it’s the fact that he does very little directing or asking me to anything in particular. He’s a hunter like I am. He’s always waiting for opportunities to occur”.

http://www.magnificent7festival.org

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Tue Steen Müller
Tue Steen Müller

Müller, Tue Steen
Documentary Consultant and Critic, DENMARK

Worked with documentary films for more than 20 years at the Danish Film Board, as press officer, festival representative and film consultant/commissioner. Co-founder of Balticum Film and TV Festival, Filmkontakt Nord, Documentary of the EU and EDN (European Documentary Network).
Awards: 2004 the Danish Roos Prize for his contribution to the Danish and European documentary culture. 2006 an award for promoting Portuguese documentaries. 2014 he received the EDN Award “for an outstanding contribution to the development of the European documentary culture”. 2016 The Cross of the Knight of the Order for Merits to Lithuania. 2019 a Big Stamp at the 15th edition of ZagrebDox. 2021 receipt of the highest state decoration, Order of the Three Stars, Fourth Class, for the significant contribution to the development and promotion of Latvian documentary cinema outside Latvia. In 2022 he received an honorary award at DocsBarcelona’s 25th edition having served as organizer and programmer since the start of the festival.
From 1996 until 2005 he was the first director of EDN (European Documentary Network). From 2006 a freelance consultant and teacher in workshops like Ex Oriente, DocsBarcelona, Archidoc, Documentary Campus, Storydoc, Baltic Sea Forum, Black Sea DocStories, Caucadoc, CinéDOC Tbilisi, Docudays Kiev, Dealing With the Past Sarajevo FF as well as programme consultant for the festivals Magnificent7 in Belgrade, DOCSBarcelona, Verzio Budapest, Message2Man in St. Petersburg and DOKLeipzig. Teaches at the Zelig Documentary School in Bolzano Italy.

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