Michael Laudrup

I know it is rather subtle but I have to express my boyish entusiasm after a football match tonite where Michael Laudrup, the best football player Denmark has ever had, made his underdog team, Getafe from Madrid play 1-1 in Munich against the Bayern Munich, one of the richest teams in Europe. As a coach Laudrup inspired his team to play the elegant football, that he played himself for Barcelona and Real Madrid: Remember that the ball never gets tired! Everyone expected Bayern to “kill” Getafe but it turned out differently.

Subtle, because there is a link to the documentary “Michael Laudrup” that Jørgen Leth directed in 1993. In that film Leth and his cinematographer Dan Holmberg set out to describe the artistic qualities of Laudrup, a diplomat outside the pitch, and one of those few players, who were able to “read” the play as noone else.

And now as a coach, he is able to convey his football philosophy to a young team performing in front of around 60000 spectators. Bravo!

This film will be part of the Jørgen Leth Collection under portraits, to be released in November 2008, read more about the box series at www.dfi.dk/shop

Still: Jørgen Leth: Michael Laudrup, 1993.

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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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