Marek Šulík: Ms.President

Access… is what Slovak director and cameraman Marek Šulík was given to film Zuzana Čaputová during the five years she was president of Slovakia, from 2019 till 2024. An access – with limitations of course – that included Šulík was present, when Čaputová was with advisers discussing/preparing the huge amount of speeches and official duties a president has in a country that – as neighbouring Hungary – is full of right-wing orientated political parties, escalating after the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Zuzana Čaputová is seen on her trip to Kyiv, talking to the parliament, meeting Zelenskyj and on a tour to watch the consequences of Russian bombings. Back home in Bratislava she is met with Russian orientated demonstrations.

Otherwise Čaputová walks to press conferences, holds speeches, have one-to-one conversations, asks questions to the group of people, who works for her in the Palace, talks emotionally about her family at the same time as she continues to say that she wants to protect her daughters from the public spotlight that – as the film shows – becomes more and more nasty, her being called “an agent”, “a bitch”, “an American whore” receiving death threats and so on. Writing this the day before the American election takes place – we know it, we have heard it, we hear it.

She is welcoming the Pope in sequences that are quite emotional as her father is near death, the Pope knows about that and you see him comforting her. But tears roll from her eyes. And through the whole film you get the impression of a woman – I want to stay “a quality mother” as she says in the beginning of the film – who wants the best for her country and its population and who shows positive human tolerance, for instance at a sequence that deals with the killing of two LGBT people, that gathered huge demonstrations.

At the end of the film a woman approaches Čaputová thanking her for her way of being an open and caring President, asking her to go for another term. Later she says that she does not have the strength and Šulík brings a wonderful shot of her with the daughters.

Access… like Pavel Koutecký had when he filmed Vaclav Havel for 14 years for “Citizen Havel” that was finished by Mira Janek… gave us another great film, that won the Opus Bonum at the Jihlava FF the other day.

Slovakia/Czech Republic, 2024, 110 mins.

 

Verzio DocLab Budapest

The public pitch of the 6 selected projects of the 9th Verzió DocLab workshop and pitch platform! Verzió DocLab is the only workshop and pitch platform dedicated to nurturing new voices in Hungarian documentary filmmaking and supporting filmmakers of the region and Europe. Directors, producers and editors will pitch their film projects. The creative teams will also present the scenes they have worked on with the guidance of the DocLab mentors to an industry panel and audience. The evening will be moderated by factual storytelling expert and strategist Jesper Jack (DK) and Péter Becz (HU), director and producer, creative director of Verzió DocLab. Verzió DocLab mentors are Flóra Erdélyi, editor (HU), Anna Kis, director and editor (HU) and Jesper Jack.

PITCHING FILMS AND CREATORS:

The freeSZFE Film (working title) / Hungary – representing the FreeSZFE Film Collective: Asia Dér, director and Dávid Kántor, editor

Bee In My Mouth / Hungary, Germany – Balázs Imre Lóránd, director and producer

Hide Me In The Light / Ukraine – Markiian Miroshnychenko, director; Nata Onysh, editor and Oleksandr Krasenko, producer

lluminated Geology / Spain – Pere Puigbert, director, cinematographer and editor; David Gimbernat, producer and Pol Roig, Second Camera Unit

Moving Sisters / Greece – Christos Stefanou, director; Eugenia Papageorgiou, editor and Michalis Kastanidis, producer

My Dear Vira / Ukraine – Maryna Brodovska, director and Olga Chernyk, co-director and producer

Details of the Projects

DOK Leipzig 2024 Awards

Copy Paste of the press release tonight from the festival:

“La Jetée, the Fifth Shot” by Dominique Cabrera Triumphs with the Golden Dove at DOK Lepzig’s International Competition Documentary Film 

Long animated film “Pelikan Blue” receives Golden Dove | Long film “Tarantism Revisited” wins the German Competition | Audience jury honours “Once upon a Time in a Forest”

The award winners of the 67th edition of DOK Leipzig have been announced. Seven Golden Doves, two Silver Doves, and various Partnership Awards were presented during two ceremonies at the Schaubühne Lindenfels in Leipzig on Saturday. 

In the International Competition Documentary Film, the Golden Dove Long Film went to Dominique Cabrera for “La Jetée, the Fifth Shot” (Le Cinquième plan de La Jetée | France). The festival had also dedicated a homage to the director this year. In the award-winning film, Cabrera’s cousin recognises himself in Chris Marker’s classic short film “La Jetée” (1962), prompting an exploration of the family’s history.

“With precision and a light touch, the filmmaker takes us on an intimate journey …, revealing new layers of meaning and emotion behind an enigmatic image of a boy and his family,” the jury said in its statement. The 10,000-euro Golden Dove is sponsored by Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk. The award was presented by Jana Brandt, the director of the MDR Programme Directorate Halle.

The 3,000-euro Golden Dove Short Film went to celebrated British experimental filmmaker John Smith for “Being John Smith” (UK), a wry look at how having one of the most generic names in the English language has affected his life and career. The jury was impressed by Smith’s “willingness to share doubts and vulnerability” and “questions about what makes up our identity”.

The films that have earned Golden Doves in the International Competition Documentary Film qualify for nomination for the annual Academy Awards®, provided they meet the Academy’s standards.

The Silver Dove Long Film, sponsored by 3sat and awarded to the best feature-length documentary film by an up-and-coming director, went to Pierre Michel Jean for “Twice Into Oblivion” (L‘oubli tue deux fois | France, Haiti, Dominican Republic). The film deals with was known as the Parsley Massacre of 1937, which ended the lives of 20,000 Haitians living in the Dominican Republic. “By pursuing two distinctly compelling modes – testimonials from elderly survivors as well as improvisational performances by the young inheritors of these unhealed wounds – the film shows the persistence of the past, and the need to reckon with it in order for us to find a way forward,” the jury stated in praise of the film. Johannes Dicke, the head of programming at 3sat, presented the 6,000-euro award to the filmmaker.

The 1,500-euro Silver Dove Short Film, sponsored by the independent Saxon State Media Agency (SLM) and awarded to the best short documentary by an up-and-coming director, went to “What Goes Up”(Saudi Arabia, USA) by Samar Al Summary. In this film, the artist trampolines at a military airfield in Arizona – rebelling not only against gravity, but also against the patriarchy. The jury remarked: “Beginning with her own impossible return, the filmmaker invents a language to unearth the stories of others who left their own fragile traces in the landscape.” The award was presented by Thomas Neie from the SLM’s Media Council.

The winners of the International Competition Documentary Film were selected by Maria Bonsanti, Sylvaine Dampierre, Mark Edwards, Eric Hynes, and Avi Mograbi.

In the International Competition Animated Film, the 3,000-euro Golden Dove Long Film went to László Csáki for “Pelikan Blue” (Kék Pelikan | Hungary), about three broke friends in Hungary who forge train tickets to travel to the West after the fall of communism. “While we do not condone forging your way towards your dreams, we absolutely appreciated the manner in which the story was told, the visual language and, above all, the effortless personal and historical honesty it embraced,” the jury said.

The Golden Dove Short Film, which includes 1,500 euros, sponsored by the German Institute for Animated Film e. V. (DIAF), went to Anu-Laura Tuttelberg for “On Weary Wings Go By” (Linnud läinud | Estonia, Lithuania). In the film, a miniature girl made of delicate porcelain observes the onset of winter. “The boundary between the characters and the real environment gradually dissolves into an ambivalent world full of wonder and visual poetry, in which nature itself seems to be the protagonist,” the jury said. Dr. Volker Petzold (Chairman of the DIAF) addressed the audience at the award ceremony.

The film that earns the Golden Dove Short Film qualifies for nomination for the annual Academy Awards®, provided it meets the Academy’s standards.

Jury members Merlin Flügel, Isabel Herguera, and Nosipho van den Bragt gave a Special Mention to Heinrich Sabl for “Memory Hotel” (Germany, France).

In the German Competition Documentary Film, the Golden Dove Long Film went to “Tarantism Revisited” (Germany, Switzerland) by Anja Dreschke. The directors investigate the phenomenon of “tarantism”, which made numerous women in southern Italy in the 1950s dance uncontrollably, supposedly from the bite of a poisonous spider. “The myth repeats itself, always the same and always different, in the bodies that rebel against the poison of a patriarchal order by dancing or face the toxic legacy of exploitative land use. Between archival research and re-enactment, sound and text compositions, gender and genre, this film develops an idiosyncratic language, resistant in the best sense of the word,” commended the jury. This 10,000-euro award is donated by Doris Apell-Kölmel and Michael Kölmel.

The Golden Dove Short Film, which includes 1,500 euros, went to Leonard Volkmer for “The King of Spain” (Der König von Spanien | Germany), in which the director’s search for his own past takes him from Berlin darkrooms to clubs in the Spanish capital and into the archives of a provincial psychiatric ward. Jury members Tilman König, Katrin Mundt, and Susanne Sachsse noted that the film “confides personal matters in us and makes them cinematically tangible – not as illustration, but as a daring venture.”

The Golden Dove in the Audience Competition was presented to the documentary film “Once upon a Time in a Forest” )Photo) (Havumetsän lapset | Finland) by Virpi Suutari. In this film, an environmentalist takes on the Finnish forestry industry. “Despite the urgency of climate change, the film takes the time to immerse itself in the magic of nature. The intimate portrait of the protagonists has touched and inspired us deeply,” emphasised jury members Linda Dombrowski, Maria Gallo, Sophie Görlipp, Maria Weiße, and Anna Wulffert. The 3,000-euro award is granted pro rata by the Leipziger Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Filmkunst e. V.

Tomasz Wolski: A Year in the Life of a Country

Tomasz Wolski was a child when Jaruzelski introduced Martial Law in December 1981. I am from 1947 so I followed from a neighboring country what happened. From a distance. With Jaruzelski as the bad guy and Lech Walesa the good one, who stood behind

and was arrested several times, also during the martial law, of course. But that it can be interpreted and shown as Wolski does in his new film, I had no idea before watching another great archive-based documentary by a director, whose – a couple of them (“1970” and “An Ordinary Country”) – films have been mentioned/reviewed on this site; and praised for their strong narration and focus on the consequences of politics on the life of ordinary citizens. There are several sequences, where Poles express their point of views that it was a good decision to install the martial law in a situation, where the country was close to have a civil war – and you see – Wolski is a master in finding footage that are absurd and funny without pointing fingers at those involved… for instance a sequence where people stand in queues to buy chicks to secure – at a later stage – good deliveries of eggs. A scoop also it is that he has the television speech footage of the General in uniform, who is interrupted to make another take, far from the edited version that came to Danish television as I remember it. BUT BUT – and here Wolski shows his editing skills and extraordinary use of Jazzy music, fantastic choice – the last part of the film demonstrates the escalation of violence from the side of the military and the police with tanks and water cannons and gas sprayed into the eyes of the demonstrators, many being beaten up. Total brutality as we have seen it before and after, now in the streets of Tbilisi in Georgia. Let me give the floor to the director:

“Martial law is one of the most traumatic events in Polish history. To this day, it divides Poles over whether the Soviet Union would have intervened to quell the rising revolutionary sentiments. It managed to halt transformations, silence Solidarity for a few years, and allowed the communists to retain power. In A Year in the Life of the Country, I examine the 12 months of martial law, a period that, from today’s perspective, can seem both amusing and terrifying. I observed how people tried to function during that time and how we were already divided.”

Great film!

Poland, 2024, 85 mins. Awarded in Krakow, playing in Jihlava and Leipzig right now.

Jihlava FF: Support to Kovalenko, Turajlić and Kerekes

Strong move from Jihlava FF, copy paste from press release of today. Personal note – all three are for me important directors, who have in previous films shown their talent. And here comes what is to be expected:

110,000 EUR WAS DISTRIBUTED TO DOCUMENTARY PROJECTS FROM SLOVAKIA, UKRAINE/POLAND, AND SERBIA

The Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival and Czech entrepreneur Jan Barta joined forces to support outstanding auteur filmmaking from Central and Eastern Europe by launching the Ji.hlava / JB Films support scheme. The recipients of the support were announced on Wednesday, October 30 at during the Industry Days of the 28th edition of Ji.hlava IDFF.

Power, Elaine, directed and produced by Serbian director Mila Turajlić received a co-production support 40,000 EUR. In this memoir documentary, Elaine Mokhtefi revisits her days of radical activism tracing more than half a century of the rise and fall of progressive struggle. The estimated date of premiere is January 2025.

With Love, from the Frontline, directed by Ukrainian director Alisia Kovalenko (photo) and produced by Polish producer Katarzyna Kuczyńska (Emerging Producer 2023) received a co-production support 40,000 EUR. This personal project is based on the director’s private footages taken on the Ukrainian frontline from the early spring to summer of 2022. The film is expected to premiere in the first half of 2025.

Wishing on a Star directed and produced by Slovak director Peter Kerekes received a co-production support 30,000 EUR. Underneath the humorous mood, this documentary intends to be a tender and empathic investigation into a strong human need: looking for meaning in a cosmos filled with endless chaos. The film has already premiered at the Venice Film Festival and is screened at the Ji.hlava IDFF.

All revenues generated from the JI.HLAVA / JB FILMS co-production share will be reinvested into additional documentary film projects from Central and Eastern Europe in the future.

Olha Zhurba: Songs of Slow Burning Earth

I had big expectations after Olha Zhurba’s first long documentary “Outside” – https://filmkommentaren.dk/olha-zhurba-outside/ – and I was not disappointed. “Songs of Slow Burning Earth” is a film that will stay in Ukrainian documentary history. And internationally as a film that should be watched by everyone, who wants to experience the Ukrainian human consequences of a war in a neighboring country. It has the potential to reach a wide audience ALSO outside the festivals, where it tours now, will tour in the coming year(s) and will win awards because of its extraordinary sure cinematic style. Every little thing is thought of in a film that takes its viewers from the Russian full scale invasion till today. It is informative and emotional. And of course also containing footage that can go into the Ukrainian war archive to be used, when the war is over or before for the trials will come.

This first paragraph looks like a conclusion and it is in a way; knowing that many refrain from reading a whole review before watching, I hope it will make readers go to their festival to have the same experience I had – or disagree… The film will in November be shown at Verzio in Budapest and at IDFA in Amsterdam and probably at many other festivals.

The start: Landscape images and brief audio bits of people, who call “emergency services” with worried questions about explosions near their homes… ending with “is it war?”, answer “it looks like”. Cut to a railway station with people almost fighting to enter a train to get away; some go, some trains are cancelled; the loudspeaker voice calls for “show respect”, “do not spread panic” but anger is present and “let the children get in first”. Cut to a driver with tears in eyes, he comes from and/or goes to Mariupol. A desperate old woman: “I only have my bathrobe”, “my city is gone!” Displaced people around her try to comfort her, “but you have your family”… Emergency calls come in again. Olha Zhurba collects documentary moments with an enormous sensitivity, she is present with her eye and this viewer – a grandfather – suffers, whenever her camera has caught a child, like the one who sits on luggage at a station.

And yet comes a sequence from Mykolaiv from a bakery 18 km from the front line (through the film the distance to the front line). It reminds me of Humphrey Jenning’s film “Listen to Britain” from 1942, two years into that war, “never give up”. Followed by a scene with people queuing to get the bread and a close up of burned corn in a field. A clip from a school, “close your eyes what is your dream”, kids are asked before they run to the shelter.

The most touching 9 minutes long sequence is filmed from a car on the road. In the beginning you have no clue, what happens but then you understand, why people along the road kneel down, and it goes right to the heart. A coffin with a hero is brought home and more will come it is being said. And close to the front line a boy is “playing war” and he tells about the place that was Russian and now is liberated, “we lived 9 months with Russians here”.

Olha Zhurba has visited a medical centre where soldiers are treated, prosthesis are fixed, two new ones from knee down, training, they are being taken care of… What do you think is the future, what do you hope will be the future of Ukraine, (high?)school children are asked, and Zhurba cuts to a state school in Central Russia, where feet, you don’t see faces, are marching, one-two, one-two… And I look at the face of a boy, it could be any boy from anywhere, but he is a boy living in a country at war in a neighboring country, only 2000 km from where I live.

Watch this film: To use the title of a series by Latvian Juris Podnieks: Hello Do You Hear Us?

Ukraine, Denmark, Sweden, France, 2024, 95 min

Allan Berg om Jon Bang Carlsen

IT’S NOW OR NEVER OG HOW TO INVENT REALITY (1996)

Når Jon Bang Carlsen i It’s Now or Never lader de medvirkende i Vestirland spille løs, ikke deres egne liv, men digtede liv, ikke i deres egne huse, men i huse, han har fundet velegnede til den særlige stemning, han ønsker i sin film, kunne man hævde, det ikke længere er dokumentarfilm, han laver, men fiktion. Men egentlig er det lige meget, blot det er en enestående oplevelse. For så er alle midler tilladte, skrev juryen i sin begrundelse for at give ham grand prix på Dansk Film Festival i Odense (1996). ”Vi behøver ikke at klassificere et sådant værk som det ene eller det andet. Det er bare en glæde at tage imod med åbent sind”. Som Christian Braad Thomsen fortæller om Karen Blixen i sin film om hende: ”Hun digtede frejdigt om på sandheden for skabe sand digtning.”

Og Bang Carlsen har villet lave et sandt filmdigt om en fattig tilværelse omgivet af stor skønhed på den barske Atlanterhavskyst. Hovedpersonen Jimmy køber en ny ko. Den kan tydeligt ikke lide ham (eller filmholdet?) og vil kun nødtvunget ind i hans gård. Og sådan går det formodentlig også, da han omsider gennem en ægteskabsmægler får kontakt med en kvinde at gifte sig med. Filmen slutter netop som kontakten er etableret. Jimmy har stillet samme nøgterne krav til konen som til koen. Hun skal kunne malke, den give mælk.

Det er godt, at Bang Carlsen lavede How to Invent reality også, mens han var i Irland. Den samme historie for så vidt, men set fra kulissen med alle snorene, billedernes bagsider og skkuespillernes ventetider, så deres persona demaskeres. Og vi ser hvor tynd masken er, hvor vellignende.

Formen er jo set før, et dokumentarhold følger filmoptagelserne og portrætterer instruktøren. Her bliver det noget mere, meget mere. Bang Carlsen udvider værket med et selvportræt, fortæller løs om, hvad det var, han ville, hvordan han gjorde, og hvordan han syntes, det gik. Praktisk og i rask tempo. Det bliver til en hverdagstekst fuld af arbejdsdagens rigdom og filmisk teori. Og humor. En vældig tekst er den film, om det at lave et billede, et kunstværk.

Mange siger, at How to Invent Reality er en bedre film end It’s Now or Never. Jeg slutter mig til. Jeg ser også problemerne i It’s Now or Never. Synes, at filmen har opbrugt sin energi langt før slutningen, mener at hovedpersonen slet ikke er stærk og interessant nok til at bære så mange gentagne ture. Han synger titelmelodien mindst én gang for meget. Og jeg synes også, at den meget mindre villende journalfilm, som registrerer og diskuterer kunstværkets tilblivelse, har den charme, hvormed skitsen i gamle dage overgik udstillingsbilledet i intensitet. Men det er også sådan, at dette filmessay var meningsløst uden dokumentarfilmen, det diskuterer. Tilsammen er de film et forunderligt værk om nogle kantede mænd, som forsøger at nærme sig det eksistentielle og det poetiske. De er så forsigtige med deres grove hænder og ekstremt gearede motorik, at de nok ikke når at røre ved den kærlighedsfølelse, projektet gælder. Vi får næppe øje på følelsens fossil i deres bjerge af kroppe. Til gengæld bliver følelsen heller ikke kvalt i udpensling. Den er stadig den lyslevende længsel.

Danmark 1996, 45 min og 31 min.

Zeljko Mirkovic: Two Sport Documentaries

Serbian Zeljko Mirkovic introduces himself like this: “Dr. Zeljko Mirkovic is an award-winning film and TV director, educator, and lecturer with more than 20-years’ experience writing, producing, and directing diverse documentaries.  He is a creative and innovative developer of feature films, television series, documentaries, promotional films, media campaigns, and commercials. With a Ph.D. in Communications and Media Studies, Dr. Mirkovic has received over 110 international awards and produced two Oscars qualified documentaries. Dr. Zeljko Mirkovic is Associate Research Professor at the University of Connecticut.” 

It sounds very formal – Zeljko is not like that, when you know him, which I do and have done for more than 20 years, and I dare say that he has been diligent. His filmography is veeery long and impressive with a focus on stories from and portraits of Serbians, historically and now. If you search “Mirkovic” on this site you will see that I have posted several texts about films made by Zeljko and about the pleasure meeting him and his family, when in Belgrade. When he was young and a beginner he took part in workshops, that Paul Pauwels and I tutored in Belgrade, maybe he was the most committed mentee that we ever had, who took courses in English (and sent us a copy of his diploma!) to go international; now he is teaching at an American university!

As a sport interested person I wanted to see two of his new film portraits – Zeljko sent links to me: “Niki Pilić- The Legend” from 2024 and “Svetislav Pešic – More Than a Coach.” from 2015, both very interesting about coaches with an impressive international career. Charisma is an understatement to characterize them.

As a fan of everything connected to FCBarcelona, let me start with Svetislav Pešic, who was Barca’s basketball coach 2002-2004 and again 2018-2020, giving the club huge success especially in the first period. The film combines archive (a lot of important matches from his career), interviews with players who praise the coach for his professional and human skills, living for basketball, always on the road. That Zeljko cinematically uses in a perfect way, letting us see Pešic in and out of arenas with his rolling suitcase, and of course him on the sideline giving advices to his players. His son was a player and is now a manager in Bayern Munich, and what will the grandchild decide with whom there are fine scenes on the football pitch: football or basketball? Pešic is 75 years old and still active, he must have a record in coaching national and club teams!

Nikola Pilić is younger, 85 years old, and his sport is tennis. The film about him starts with a clip with Serbian superstar Novak Djokovic calling for “my tennis father” after a match. Pilić enters the arena and is hugged by Djokovic, who later on in the film reveals, how important it was for him to attend Sir Niko’s tennis academy, when he was a young lad.

Pilić became an important person in international tennis for different reasons. He made strong complaints about the conditions that were offered the players in Wimbledon, was banned by the Tennis Association from participation, colleagues supported him and the famous boycott of Wimbledon happened in 1973.

AND he became – as some of the interviewed players say – the best Davis Cup captain ever. “The only one who won the Davis Cup with three different countries” – Yugoslavia, Croatia and Germany. He is characterised as a master in tactics and was a master in diplomacy, when he had two stars, who did not like each other on his German team: Boris Becker and Michael Stich. He matched them and stood behind the gold medal to the two rivals playing together in double at the Olympics in Barcelona in 1992. In other words a player, a trainer and a coach of great importance as the film shows through match archives, interviews with Pilić and Stich and many many others.

Photo of Svetislav Pešic taken from Wikipedia.

Verzio Budapest Announces its Program

It´s the 21st Verzio Film Festival and it takes place in Budapest November 6-13. A festival with a selection of documentaries that are sectioned into competitions for national and international films as well as “Doc Future Competition”, where new talents (what about “old talents” by the way…) are to be found like “Balomania” by Sissel Morell Dargis and Ukrainian Olha Zhurba’s “Songs of Slow Burning Earth“. Impressive works!

A quote from festival director Enikő Gyureskó “Our goal with Verzió is twofold, to celebrate films and their creators made creatively, intelligently and empathetically, and to come together as a community with their help and to let people know that we are not alone in our curiosity, sensitivity and desire to do something.“We want to provide a space for dialogue, an opportunity for a deeper understanding of important issues...”

I counted 66 films in the program divided into sections like “We are Here” and “We will not be Silent” that word-wise goes perfect with the lines of the festival director’s quote. A humanistic approach to the themes. At the same time as “documentary is an artistic film genre” is not forgotten. I see many films listed that have been written about/reviewed on this site: “1489” by Shoghakat Vardanyan, winner at IDFA, Slovenian Petra Seliškar’s “Body” is there of course, thoughtful “Dahomey” by Mati Diop, one of the most festival-wanted docs of his year, Danish Kristoffer Juel Poulsen and Christian Als will have their “Daughter of Genghis” in the international competition, The masterpiece “Intercepted” by Oksana Karpovych is one of several films from Ukraine, the multi-awarded “My Stolen Planet” by Iranian Farahnaz Sharifi is in the international competition as is Palestinian “No Other Land” by Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, probably one of the favourites as I guess it is for the European Film Awards, and the extraordinarily beautiful and touching “Queendom” (PHOTO) by Agniia Galdanova that is part of the “We are Here” section, that also includes the fascinating film on the Czech photographer Libuše Jarcovjáková by Klára Tasovská, “I’m not everything I want to be“.

Sorry for this title and name dropping but I wanted to illustrate the diversity in countries represented by pointing at films I have seen and written about and there are many more I am looking forward to see. I have been invited to be a juror for the Hungarian documentaries, will not mention the titles from that competition but leave the word to the festival intro:

“The Hungarian Competition was curated by Fanni Somlyai, Zsuzsa Debre, Asia Dér, Enikő Gyureskó, Péter Horányi and Szabolcs Szirony. The underfunding of Hungarian documentary production is one of the reasons why only six films were selected for this year’s Hungarian competition, but the selection of films that have not yet been screened in Hungary was also a consideration…

Hungarian films will again feature prominently in the program of the Verzió Documentary Film Festival. This year’s Hungarian Competition program will feature six new films that have won accolades internationally and will be making their debut at Verzió in Hungary. Stories will include rock climbers battling addiction, unusual childbearing and a road trip for people with special needs. You can meet the filmmakers after the screenings…”

See you there in Budapest.

IDFA 2024 International Competition: The Guest

Sometimes with the announcement of films for main documentary competitions you do not know the films or those who have made them as the festivals in some categories go for premieres, world or international. This is the case for IDFA that announced what is coming up, including the opening film where Danish produced “About a Hero” by Piotr Winiewicz is the opening film. Know nothing about this film, yet…

But I am happy to see that the Polish “The Guest” by Zvika Gregory Portnoy and Zuzanna Solakiewicz with Maria Krauss as the producer is in the competition program. The film was pitched at Baltic Sea Forum and I had the privilege to watch a RC long time ago. Saw a good film coming up… And there it is taken by Orwa Nyrabia and his selection committee. I congratulate the team, good friends – and filmmakers – from several fora in Riga. The IDFA synopsis of the film goes like this:

“In 2021, the border area between Poland and Belarus became a forbidden zone, three kilometers wide, where refugees found themselves brutally trapped. They had become the stakes in a political game: Belarus supposedly guaranteed free passage to the EU, but in Poland the refugees met with pushbacks, forcing them back across the border. Once in Belarus again, they were driven back towards Poland—a horrific stalemate in an inhospitable landscape of treacherous marshes.

Maciek lives with his family on the Polish side of the border. He has taken in an exhausted Syrian refugee, the 27-year-old Alhyder. After he has regained his strength, Alhyder faces the big question: what now? Where can he go without putting either himself or Maciek in danger?

The tension is palpable in this sensitive, sharply observant documentary. Without a hint of sensationalism, the camera reads the emotions on the faces of the silent Polish family members and their grateful guest. The situation is dire, and a solution remains out of reach. Yet, at the same time, the film is permeated by the warmth of human help and contact.”