There he stands, the Prince Waszyński, in his palazzo, smoking a cigarette. An elegant man. Like a character in a film by Luchino Visconti. Did they ever meet the two in Rome, where the Prince passed his last years? After the more than turbulent life he had lived. His story is what Polish Elvira Niewiera and Piotr Rosolowski unfolds in “The Prince and the Dybbuk”, that is the opening film for the 14th edition of the festival in its new venue, the Kombank Hall in central Belgrade.

And this is for sure, like all 7 films, a film that deserves the big screen. It is Cinema to be enjoyed because of its elegant narrative structure, its use of archive, the editing, the music, the dignity with which the directors treat the Prince.

Do we go for themes, when the selection for the festival takes place? No, we go for the Cinematic quality and originality, that our audience expect – and I say it again, the best audience in Europe is the one in Belgrade. Nevertheless, having done the selection this year, we discover that three of the films put the focus on children.

Oh, I would hope that teachers all over could see and learn from “Miss Kiet’s Children”, with the

amazing Kiet Engels, whose way of taking care of the refugee children is an example to follow. She has a teacher’s skills and she cares. Which is obvious in the superb piece of observational humanistic Cinema performed by Petra and Peter Lataster.

Likewise with “The Distant Barking of Dogs” by Simon Lereng Wilmont, who in several films has shown his ability to get close to and get the best out of children. In this case 10 year old Oleg and his cousin Yarik. It is a film with many layers from a war-torn area in Ukraine, and it has to be said with grandmother Alexandra in the centre of the story. A film about Childhood, about Fear, about Survival, about Love. Made with love. And cinematic skills on how to build a story, compose the images and put them together with a soundtrack that stresses the atmosphere of the scenes, without killing them.

Children play likewise a role in the Swedish “Giants and the Morning After”, where the lovely mayor of the small community Ydre welcome the newborn children with a gift to the parents, hoping they will stay and make more babies. Malla Grapengiesser, Per Bifrost and Alexander Rynéus stand behind the film with an old friend of the festival Finnish Mervi Junkkonen as the editor. It has a tone of humour, it has a universal theme (the depopulation of rural communities) and a cinematic language that adds mysterious connections to the surrounding nature.

Can we live without art? Of course not. The festival’s ambition is to be a tribute to the art of documentary Cinema and to bring in tributes to other art forms. We are very happy to have the latest film of Thomas Riedelsheimer in the program. His “Leaning into the Wind” with the extraordinary Andy Goldsworthy is about nature and how to explore and interpret it as Goldsworthy does, and as Riedelsheimer does so well including the artists he used for the “Touch the Sound”, the percussionist Evelyn Glennie and the composer Fred Frith.

Staying with landscapes depicted as paintings put together in a totally different way that we are used to is “Sleep has her House” by Scott Barley, who himself characterizes the film like this “through long static takes, the film develops a contemplative, hypnotic experience, akin to paintings that move, mixing live action and still photography (shot on iPhone) and hand-drawn images”. Wow, looking forward to see it on a big screen!

The closing film is “Entrepreneur” by Virpi Suutari, film director and professor of art. It is funny, it is about Love, it has magnificent music composed by Sanna Salmenkallio. It is like her previous M7 film, “Garden Lovers” about ordinary people, with an extraordinary Cinematic language.

http://www.magnificent7festival.org/en/index.php

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Syrian director was not at the closing ceremony of DocsBarcelona Sunday night so I did not have the chance to thank him for three meetings we had during the festival: Two times talks with him and the audience after the screening of his masterpiece ”Of Fathers and Sons” and a 90 minutes seminar, where he had chosen 7 clips from the film to make us get closer into what he experienced, when that scene was shot, what choices he had to take during the 300 days he spent with the father and his children, first of all Osama and Ayman.

There were standing ovations after one of the two screenings of the film and after both I had to – as moderator – to raise my hand for “stop” to have time for the questions. I admire filmmakers like Talal Derki, who with respect for the audience take their time, festival after festival, to give an insight to – in this case – what it means to be filming in a war zone. The 7 clips were carefully chosen and there was a lot to talk about at each one. Film talk.

It makes you proud as a programmer, when you feel that the choice of a film is appreciated as well as having the filmmaker present to meet the audience. This was the case with Talal Derki again four years after he was in Barcelona with “Return to Homs”. He did not win this time, but he won the respect of the audience and he took us “behind the scenes” to a place we can not and do not want to go.

“I am a storyteller”, he said to me. Indeed, and a brave one. Many scenes will stay in my mind – like the one where the father talks warmly about his son Osama at the same time as he, as a sniper, is shooting to kill, while the director sitting next to him looks exhausted and frustrated at the whole situation.

The film and it’s director is now at the Krakow Film Festival, I have changed position to be a journalist for this site, and have given it highest points as you can see at the link below.

www.docsbarcelona.com

http://www.krakowfilmfestival.pl/en/58th-kff/festival-newspaper/

Sunday morning I took a walk in the Eixample of Barcelona, where my home has been since the beginning of the festival. Lots of parents were in the street with their kids. Happy moments for boys and girls to be out in the good weather to play, have an ice cream, have fun, make friends…

In the cinemas of DocsBarcelona the reality was different for the children. I will never forget the two boys from “Of Fathers and Sons” by Talal Derki, Osama (Photo) and Ayman, the first one to be sent to a sharia camp by his father, the latter staying at home to take care of the smaller siblings and the father, who had lost his foot at a mine explosion, and who is the one, who decides on the future of Osama to be a jihadist warrior. It’s pretty hard to watch Osama, this soft boy, having his childhood spoilt by religious fanatism.

Another child who lives in a war zone is Oleg in “The Distant Barking of Dogs” by Simon Lereng Wilmont, a film that takes place in the Eastern part of Ukraine. Oleg lives there with his grandmother, a relationship that is described with sensitivity. How to live in the neighborhood of bombs exploding, how to cope with the scars it gives a child when he grows older?

And what about Syrian Zeid, who lives with his father and brothers in Spain in the fine film “Hayati” by Liliana Torres and Sofi Escudé. In a materialistic way, he does not suffer, but his mother stays in Turkey and he communicates with her via skype…

Other children are very much present in “Miss Kiet’s Children” by Petra and Peter Lasaster, where Miss Kiet is teaching refugee children language and how to adapt to live in the Netherlands. My hero here is the little Haya, who struggles with her new situation in a way that you get tears in your eyes.

www.docsbarcelona.com

It’s one of those documentaries that makes you smile through the whole film, Ouaga Girls by Swedish Theresa Traore Dahlberg. It was shown yesterday at DocsBarcelona at the Aribau Club cinema followed by a Q&A with the French coproducer Estelle Robin You, who is also involved in the production of “Dolphin Man” by Lefteris Charitos, that plays in the competitive Panorama section of the festival here in Barcelona.

The smile… because of the life energy of the girls from Burkina Faso, who study to become auto mechanics in a male society and enjoy the company of their sisters in the school, where they learn, are introduced to adult life and where they have fun, and share the good and the bad experiences they have and have had in their lives. They all come from a tough social background, which is conveyed to the viewer in tense interview situations with a psychologist. A brilliant cinematic solution where the action – the slate of joyful, lively scenes from the auto workshop and from the classroom and from parties and concerts in the city – is stopped to give close-ups and time for reflection.

Estelle Robin-You told us that the film has been running in cinemas in France – and Sweden of course – that the music score is composed by the father of the director Seydou Richard Traoré – that French editor Alexandra Strauss was called for to help finalising the film; Strauss who has edited “I’m not Your Negro” and has worked for master Roy Andersson.

How can we get a women empowering film like this shown in rural areas, a woman in the audience asked. There must be Ngo’s, who can use the film. Of course.   

http://momentofilm.se/films/ouaga-girls/

www.docsbarcelona.com

Aribau Club Cinemas in Barcelona. Two cinema halls, one bigger than the other. The home of DocsBarcelona for four days, yesterday the first where I had the privilege to introduce and moderate three films in the competitive Panorama section. With Pol Roig as responsible for the running of the screenings.

First Polish “Over the Limit” by Marta Prus (http://www.filmkommentaren.dk/blog/blogpost/4091/) with half an hour talk afterwards, where the young director told, how she found her characters, how she got permission to shoot, how she filmed for one year and edited for one year, how she wanted the film to look like a feature film, how she as director had to make production decisions as well and of course many words about the trio of women in the film, Margarita the gymnast and the two coaches Irina and Amina.

Second Syrian “Of Fathers and Sons” by Talal Derki (http://www.filmkommentaren.dk/blog/blogpost/4094/) the director who was back in Barcelona, where he was in 2014 with “Return to Homs”, that got the first prize at the festival. I asked him how it was to be “playing the role of a war photographer”, an observer, who comes into this mad world of jihadism and refrains from discussing the issues being brought up by the militant father. He explained his relationship to Osama, one of the sons, Ayman, being the other. The reception of the film, measured by the applause, was considerable, an understatement…

Third Greek “The Dolphin Man” by Lefteris Charitos, a film about the legendary Jacques Mayol, his life, his record breaking diving down to 100 meters, his glamorous life with many women in his life, and yet his loneliness, told through archive material, interviews with his daughter and son and amazing underwater camerawork by Stelios Apostolopoulos, in a film that is multilayered and dealing with philosophical and existential questions. Charitos answered all kind of questions from the audience, including those about his suicide in his house on the island of Elba.

All three films had a good audience, the photo shows the line of people waiting to get in to watch “The Dolphin Man”.

And all three films have a second run.

www.docsbarcelona.com

It’s become an institution, the rough cut sessions of DocsBarcelona and I am proud to be the one, who has chosen the projects and the one playing the ball to the panelists, who sit in comfortable sofas in a living room-set-up watching and commenting. Panelists this year were – among others – veteran Jordi Ambros from TV3, Mandy Chang from BBC, Aleksandar Govedarica from sales agent company Syndicado, Yoshihiko Ichiya from NHK, Lelda Ozola from National Film Centre of Latvia, filmmaker Canan Turan living in Catalunya of Turkish origin… The sessions last 2 hours including the full rough cut, feedback and comments. 

The three projects selected this year were “Operation Globe” from Rolling Basis Films, director Ariadna Seuba Serra, “Pariah Dog” by Jesse Alk and “Colis Suspect” by Sofia Català and Rosa Pérez.

www.docsbarcelona.com

On the way back to Vilnius after two succesful screenings of “Wonderful Losers” at DocsBarcelona, Lithuanian Arunas and Alge Matelis met Joan Gonzalez, director of the festival who was happy to tell them that 210 students in Granollers, a city at 30 km from Barcelona, one of the 9 cities where people can see some of the docs of DocsBarcelona, had seen their film.

Likewise I was happy yesterday to attend the screening of Hendrick Dusollier’s “Last Days in Shibati” (Photo) with a full house at the CCCB Auditorium. As a selector for the Panorama and What the Doc! of the festival, I do not review films in these sections but great to experience that the reception from the audience was overwhelmingly positive. The film’s theme – the demolition of an old Chinese quarter to make space for a new China – is interesting as is the form and method the director has chosen; he comes back to the quarter, makes friends with a trio of people, and he comes the first time with almost no knowledge of the language, the second (6 months later) and third time (6 months later) it is better with the language and he is accompanied by local people, who speak the language. He just goes there to visit… and he knows what he is looking for. Authenticity in the situational sequences.

The same, achieving an authenticity, goes for “Hasta mañana, si Dios Quiere”, which will be shown later in the festival. The film – quote from the catalogue – is “A joyful story about how seventeen women live in a convent of Franciscan octogenarian sisters…” but where the film from China lives from improvisations, Ainara Vera, the director, has very carefully chosen a style, made an aesthetic choice, that makes the film beautiful to watch.

The Documentary genre has many faces! Hurrah for that!

www.docsbarcelona.com

… with the subtitle ”Barcelona in Two Acts” was premiered yesterday at the CCCB theatre in Barcelona within the DocsBarcelona festival. Full house for a film about the architectural gem of the city, the Pavilion set up by Mies van der Rohe and Lilly Reich in 1929 at the world exhibition to be removed 8 months later and reconstructed in 1986. A work that – quote from the synopsis – changed the History of architecture forever… its image was always alive in the minds of generations of architects around the world…

It’s not easy to make a film about architecture but I enjoyed and appreciated the cinematic solutions the two directors have chosen. They have thought about composition and framing, and there is a fine balance between the images and the information and interpretative comments from the many people from the world of architecture in Barcelona and in New York, where the archive of van der Rohe is at MOMA.

And the directors do not refrain from anecdotes and letting the speakers be passionate like the wonderful German architect Fritz Neumeyer, who on location expresses his love to the building. Also great to have Oriol Bohigas in picture, the man who was a driving force behind the reconstruction of the Pavilion, that stands there waiting to be visited by anyone, who is fond of beauty!

In the press material the directors write about the building that they have been filming for the last nine years for different purposes:

The Pavilion is a scenario of endless perspectives, lights and reflections, a living building that changes at every hour of the day and at any season of the year. Each time you record it, the Pavilion surprises you with a new reflection or a new visual composition, and you discover that fourth dimension that Mies created with the game of materials and perspectives. A universe where the composition of each frame easily becomes art within art because the Pavilion generates and multiplies beauty.

Catalunya, 2018, 58 mins.

http://www.miesonscene.com/