Orlando von Einsiedel: Virunga

Svetlana and Zoran Popovic, directors of the Magnificent7 Festival in Belgrade presents the Oscar-nominated ”Virunga” that will be screened January 31 at the festival. The text also includes words from the director:

Depicting the best and the worst in human nature, Orlando von Einsiedel’s devastating documentary “Virunga” wrenches a startlingly lucid narrative from a sickening web of bribery, corruption and violence.

The setting is the magnificent — and protected — Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo, home to many of the world’s last mountain gorillas and the region’s best hope for economic stability. In a country already weakened by a tumultuously bloody history, that hope became even more fragile with the 2010 discovery of oil beneath Lake Edward and the arrival of a British petroleum company, SOCO International. As multiple forces collided for control of the park — including a powerful rebel group seeking a percentage of oil profits — Orlando von Einsiedel and his crew members found themselves caught in a literal war between conservation and exploitation.

Using hidden cameras and the invaluable assistance of the fearless French journalist Mélanie Gouby, the director and the experienced editor, Masahiro Hirakubo, combine extraordinary footage of rebel tanks and clandestine palm-greasing with lush panoramas of serene wildlife. This is the film about true heroes: the gentle ranger who would die to protect the orphaned gorillas in his care; the park’s soft-spoken Belgian warden, whose astonishing courage calms everyone around him; a section chief trying to gather evidence of illegal oil company activities.

Director’s Word: “Virunga” became a film about the cycle of violence and foreign interference that’s beleaguered Congo for the past 150 years and a film about arguably the most important conservation battle happening in the world at the moment. That said, I do believe that “Virunga” is still the ultimately uplifting and inspiring story I originally set out to make, charting how the dedication and integrity of a few African heroes can challenge powerful business interests and seemingly bottomless human greed. If Virunga National Park – Africa’s oldest national park and home to the world’s last mountain gorillas – falls in the face of shadowy business interests, we are effectively saying that nowhere on our planet is off limits to human greed. It’s for this simple reason that all of us have to make sure Virunga is protected.

Great Britain, 2014, 92 mins.

virungamovie.com

Marshall Curry: Point and Shoot

En instruktør, som interesserer arrangørerne af Academy Award og Sundance og publikum ved Tribeca gennem otte år, hvis seneste film, “Point and Shoot” var åbningsfilm netop på Tribeca 2014, skal selvfølgelig interessere mig, selv om Dokumanias synopsis burde skræmme mig langt væk. Redaktionens valg at vise filmen har min hele anerkendelse, og jeg skal nok se med på DR2 tirsdag aften klokken 20:45, men af andre nysgerrige årsager. Imidlertid, redaktøren skriver denne snopsis i nyhedsbrevet:

“Matt Van Dyke levede et småkedeligt og isoleret liv i sine forældres kælder i Baltimore. For at sætte gang i sit liv kastede han som 29-årig sig ud i det han mente ville være den ultimative manddomsprøve: at indspille sin helt egen rejseeventyrsfilm. Eventyret gennem Nordafrika og Mellemøsten tager dog en uventet drejning i Libyen, da Matt for første gang i sit liv får nogle tætte venner. Da oprøret så småt bryder ud i landet i begyndelsen af 2011, slutter Matt sig til sine nye kammerater i kampen mod diktatoren Gadaffi. Med et våben i den ene hånd og et kamera i den anden kæmpede og filmede Matt krigen, indtil han blev taget til fange af Gaddafis styrker og holdt i isolation i seks måneder. Det lykkedes Matt Van Dyke at flygte fra fængslet i slutningen af august 2011, to måneder før Gaddafis død.”

Jeg fornemmer, at redaktøren lige forstærker teksten med dette afsnit sat ind: ”Dokumania: ’Skyd for at dræbe!’ (den danske titel, sic transit… tænker jeg) er spækket med vilde og unikke optagelser fra Matt Van Dykes rejse. Under hele turen er han nemlig meget bevidst om at holde kameraet kørende, og bruger endda lang tid på at opstille skud, for at få de flotteste optagelser til sin film.” Og understreger med slutbemærkningen: ” Du kan se de vilde optagelser fra den intense dokumentarfilm på tirsdag kl. 20.45 på DR2! Rigtig god fornøjelse!” Og jeg svarer for mig selv: tusind tak, det skal jeg nok.

USA 2014, 82 min.

Controversial Catalan Documentary Raises Debate

This morning Joan Gonzalez, director of DocsBarcelona, sent me this message from his iPhone conveying hope for what documentaries can do in Catalonia:

“Last 24 hours has been very explosive in doc terms. Yesterday the documentary “Ciutat Morta” (corruption, police, Barcelona) (shown at DocsBarcelona 2014) was at the center of debate in the networks. Yesterday it was broadcast on channel 33 (the second channel of TV3, Catalan public television). Today the network is full of comments after a result in audience of 19% = 569.000 viewers to become program number1 in all channels in Catalonia. Very, very historical if you remember that Channel 33 has an average of 4% of audience.”

Here is what I wrote in May 2014: “Ciutat Morta” by Xavier Artigas and Xapo Ortega has changed my view on Barcelona as this nice and friendly city full of beauty and football… The film is a shocking cinematic documentation on police brutality and corruption, young people being tortured and put in jail for no reason – and a moving interpretation of the tragedy of a young poet. Here is the synopsis from the catalogue:

”June 2013, 800 people illegally occupy an old movie theater in Barcelona in order to screen a documentary. They rename the old building after a girl who committed suicide in 2011: Cinema Patricia Heras. Who was that girl? Why did she kill herself and what does the city have to do with it? That’s exactly what the squatting action is about: letting everyone know the truth about one of the worse corruption cases in Barcelona, the dead city.”

http://www.docsbarcelona.com/en/

Oeke Hoogendijk: The New Rijksmuseum – The Film

Svetlana and Zoran Popovic, directors of the Magnificent7 Festival in Belgrade presents ”The New Rijksmuseum” that will be screened January 30 as the opening film of the festival. The text also includes words from the director:

In 2003, the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, the most important museum in all of the Netherlands, closed for a major renovation. The plan was to reopen in 2008, but what was to take five years took 10, with a budget that just kept on growing. Filmmaker Oeke Hoogendijk was able to follow this exciting, difficult and sometimes painfully funny process with the camera from behind closed museum doors. In beautiful images supported by powerful music, she captured the building as it was stripped to a bleak carcass, and as it gradually retrieved the old grandeur of yesteryear.

We watch from up close as various curators prepare the layout of their new rooms with tremendous passion and dedication. We follow the caretaker, who looks at the building as if it were his child and protects it against intruders, and the architects who constantly have to adjust their designs. And we follow the museum directors who must deal with financial setbacks, bureaucracy and squabbles – not to mention the activist cyclists. In the end, 400 hours of material was edited down to a single film that takes the viewer to the apotheosis: the reopening in 2013.

This exiting epic documentary took the award for Best Dutch Documentary in 2014 at the IDFA in Amsterdam, after the premiere at festivals and cinemas in USA. In the beginning of December it went in theatres across the Netherlands.

Director’s Word: What should have been a movie about the pride of Holland turned into nothing short of a Shakespearian drama, with failing project managers, cornered ministers and officials, quibbling contractors and foreign contract parties who were appalled to see how the slow decision-making process frustrated the renovations and eventually brought them to a complete halt. It was as if a great weight was pulling the project down and no progress could be made. In 2008, when the management announced that the museum would be closed for another five years, I too realized that I was to spend another five years behind the walls of the Rijksmuseum and witness five more fascinating years of struggle.

The Netherlands 2014, 130 mins.

facebook.com/thenewrijksmuseum

Werner Herzog: Dicta

Mens jeg fortumlet tænker videre over alt det, som skete i mig ved at lytte til de to dages samtale mellem Joshua Oppenheimer og Werner Herzog på Den danske Filmskole for en uge siden, hjælper kollega Tue Steen Müller mig ved at hitte dette blogindlæg fra kottke.org frem. Det kan for mig lige nu fungere som en slags huskeliste (for Herzog vendte ofte tilbage til et eller andet dictum, som han kalder disse sætninger) og dermed mulighed for videre overvejelse for en vigtig del af Herzogs bidrag disse dage. Resten står så tilbage som opgave. Og dertil kommer selvfølgelig især at få orden i tankerne om det, Joshua Oppenheimer sagde. Men altså indtil videre denne blogpost af Jason Kottke (14.januar 2015):

”Paul Cronin’s book of conversations with filmmaker Werner Herzog called ”Werner Herzog – A Guide for the Perplexed”(2014). On the back cover of the book, Herzog offers a list of advice for filmmakers that doubles as general purpose life advice.

1. Always take the initiative.

2. There is nothing wrong with spending a night in jail if it means getting the shot you need.

3. Send out all your dogs and one might return with prey.

4. Never wallow in your troubles; despair must be kept private and brief.

5. Learn to live with your mistakes.

6. Expand your knowledge and understanding of music and literature, old and modern.

7. That roll of unexposed celluloid you have in your hand might be the last in existence, so do something impressive with it.

8. There is never an excuse not to finish a film.

9. Carry bolt cutters everywhere.

10. Thwart institutional cowardice.

11. Ask for forgiveness, not permission.

12. Take your fate into your own hands.

13. Learn to read the inner essence of a landscape.

14. Ignite the fire within and explore unknown territory.

15. Walk straight ahead, never detour.

16. Manoeuvre and mislead, but always deliver.

17. Don’t be fearful of rejection.

18. Develop your own voice.

19. Day one is the point of no return.

20. A badge of honor is to fail a film theory class.

21. Chance is the lifeblood of cinema.

22. Guerrilla tactics are best.

23. Take revenge if need be.

24. Get used to the bear behind you.”

Bloggeren Jason Kottke tilføjer: “I bet this is some of the stuff you learn at Herzog’s Rogue Film School: The Rogue Film School is not for the faint-hearted; it is for those who have travelled on foot, who have worked as bouncers in sex clubs or as wardens in a lunatic asylum, for those who are willing to learn about lockpicking or forging shooting permits in countries not favoring their projects. In short: for those who have a sense of poetry. For those who are pilgrims. For those who can tell a story to four year old children and hold their attention. For those who have a fire burning within. For those who have a dream.” 

Og jeg får lyst til at tilføje, at mine forældres og læreres formaninger og opdragelse ikke altid er moralisme; som regel er det hårdt tilkæmpede personlige erfaringer derude fra virkeligheden. Det er sådan jeg lytter til Herzog, helt ærligt.

Magnificent7 Festival Belgrade 2015

The 11th edition of the Magnificent7 Festival for European feature length documentaries takes off January 30 and continues until February 5. As in previous years filmkommentaren publishes the introduction to the 7 films written by Svetlana and Zoran Popovic. That will start tomorrow. Here follows my introduction to the programme – as member of the selection group together with the Popovic couple:

Can we live without art? Of course not, we do hope that Magnificent7 2015 proves the value of watching film art that gives us something to think about, experiences, joy, maybe sorrow or anger, maybe make us act for change, feel love… the same as wanted Rembrandt and Vermeer and Hals in their time. The three and all the other great artists have for more than a decade been waiting to get a new home as we can see in “The New Rijksmuseum” by Oeke Hoogendijk, a brilliant interpretation of the meeting between art professionals and citizens of Amsterdam, including politicians.

“Messi”… is it good, can we get it? A film about the Argentinian, whose artistic football performances the world has enjoyed. The answer to both questions were affirmative and after a check of an eventual audience interest, the film by Álex de la Iglesia was included in the programme. We hope to see parents take their teenage kids to see their idol on the big screen. A new festival audience!

Another innovation in this year programme is “Virunga” by English Orlando von Einsiedel (executive producer Leonardo DiCaprio!), an activist film that in a powerful language and with brave people on screen makes the appeal to protect the Congolese Virunga National Park.

“You’ve got to have Love for your characters and do everything you can to give them confidence in the job you’ve been assigned…”,says Camilla Nielsson, the director of “Democrats”, a beautifully told observational story from Zimbabwe, where the director sensationally got access to follow two charismatic men, who got the job to put together a new constitution.

The word Love is literally in the title of Finnish Virpi Suutari’s “Garden Lovers”, a film that constantly surprises you with wonderful characters, you laugh, you smile and you are reminded that Love needs to be nursed as the plants in our gardens.

Indeed it does, as does our understanding of human beings, who think and act different than most of us. Portuguese Jorge Pelicano invites us to a hospital with his “Suddenly My Thoughts Halt”, that with humour and original storytelling introduces an actor, who tries to understand and to interpret insanity, helped by the intelligent patients.

French Claudine Bories and Patrice Chagnard are back at Magnificent7 with “Rules of the Game”, a new social, yes, why not call it “documentary love story”, because that is the feeling that lies deeply in their story about youngsters, who are put in a pretty hopeless training scheme but manage to keep their integrity and own personality.

To the wonderful Belgrade audience: Welcome! 

NB! The facebook page of the festival has for a long time brought not only news for the upcoming festival but has also given a fine flashback to films shown at previous editions of the festivals, including trailers from the films.

https://www.facebook.com/magnificent7festival?fref=nf

http://www.magnificent7festival.org/home.html

Heilbuth og Goetz: Snowdens store flugt

Kvinden på dette still hedder Sarah Harrison. Hun var uden afbrydelse modig lige ved siden af Snowden under hele flugten, sad ved siden af ham i det flere gange dramatisk forsinkede fly fra Hongkong til Moskva. En flue var sluppet ind i kabinen, inden dørene blev lukket, og på et tidspunkt blev den specielt interesseret i Snowden, som nervøs, som han var, efterhånden irriteredes. Med et snuptag i én lynhurtig bevægelse fangede og dræbte Sarah Harrison fluen. ”Du er virkelig en Ninja”, udbrød Snowden med et smil, fortæller John Goetz og Hans Leyendecker i en stor og grundig og velskreven artikel i Süddeutsche Zeitung 10./11. januar i år på baggrund af omfattende og nye interviews med blandt andre, men selvfølgelig vigtigst, de to:

”Er fragt sie: ’Warum hast du alles riskiert, um mir zu helfen?’ Sie antwortet: ’Du wolltest doch Hilfe haben.’ Er: ’Ich habe doch nicht erwartet, dass Wikileaks eine Ninja schicken würde, um mich rauszuholen.’ Beide lachen. Ein paar Minuten später sumt eine Fliege an Harrison vorbei, und sie fängt sie einfach so aus der Luft. ’Du bist wirklich eine Ninja’, ruft er. Scherzen als Ventil.”

Jeg så tv-dokumentaren i forgårs, og jeg havde glædet mig meget, for jeg havde jo læst John Goetzs artikel, hvor han omhyggeligt fortæller hele historien og i sin og Heilbuths tv-dokumentar, ”Jagd auf Snowden”, som filmen hedder på tysk, stiller interviews med alle dramaets hovedpersoner i udsigt: Edward Snowden, Sarah Harrison, Julian Assange, Wikileakschefen og Michael Hayden, den tidligere NSA-chef. Med hensyn til selve handlingsgangen var der således for mig intet nyt, men der var jo disse interviews. Der var mødet med disse mennesker.

Åh, hvor blev jeg skuffet over behandlingen af dette enestående materiale. Det var klippet i stumper og stykker og bliver i filmen næsten kun brugt som replikker i forbindelse med en speak, som polstret med for mig at se helt uinteressante dækbilleder har omdannet hændelsesforløbet til et forsøg på en dokumentarisk thriller, som jeg fra foromtalen som sagt kendte såvel plotpunkter til som slutning på. Jeg har nu kun muligheden at se filmen igen og igen (jeg har anbragt et link nedenfor) og selv i hovedet stykke stumperne sammen til de lange uforstyrrede filmscener, som denne vældige research- og optagelsesindsats og resultatet, interview-skildringerne af disse ganske særlige medvirkende og vidner  fortjener.

Poul-Erik Heilbuth og John Goetz: “Snowdens store flugt” (”Jagd auf Snowden”), Danmark 2014, 58 min. Heilbuth har tidligere lavet “De faldne“(2010) og “Manden som løj verden i krig” (2010)

“Snowdens store flugt” kan ses her, vel nogle dage endnu:

http://www.dr.dk/tv/se/dr1-dokumentaren/dr1-dokumentaren-snowdons-store-flugt

Oscar Nominations for Documentaries

… and for the rest of course, but  let’s focus on the nominees in the documentary feauture, the first mentioned is/are directors, the names that follow are producers: The favourite unique document ”Citizen Four” (photo) (Laura Poitras (dir.), Mathilde Bonnefoy and Dirk Wilutzky), the nice and charming ”Finding Vivian Maier” (John Maloof and Charlie Siskel), the beautiful cinematic ”The Salt of the Earth” (Wim Wenders, Juliano Ribeiro Salgado and David Rosier), the powerful activist ”Virunga” (Orlando von Einsiedel and Joanna Natasegara) and one I have not seen, ”Last Days in Vietnam” (Rory Kennedy and Keven McAlester). The audience in Belgrade will have the chance to watch ”Virunga” during the Magnificent7 festival that starts in two weeks.

This came out today, discussions will follow, they already are, especially because the film by Steve James on late film critic Rogert Ebert, ”Life Itself” was not nominated. ”Citizen Four” Laura Poitras – according to Variety – said: “Steve James should have been on this list”. “I’m in shock” .“When his name wasn’t up there, I thought, ‘how is that possible?’ He’s a legend in our field with an incredible body of work. I assumed his film would be nominated, so it’s a bit of a heartbreak.”

For the short documentary nomination – I have only seen one – ”Joanna” by Aneta Kopacz. In October 2013 I wrote this: I watched the film – if you can put it like that – with pleasure and emotionally touched, to say the least, well what else can I say but BEAUTIFUL. As a film and as a hymn to Life and Love, whatever might happen… I cross my fingers for this film February 22nd.

http://oscar.go.com/nominees

Documentaries in Trieste

Trieste – the city of Claudio Magris – still miss a creative documentary on this magnificent author – hosts a fine festival that starts tomorrow January 16th and runs until January 22nd. The documentary programme has quality and is also daring taking off with Romanian ”The Second Game”, a full football game. Here is the description given by the director C. Porumboiu: “This film is a football match, a derby between two Bucharest teams, Steaua and Dinamo, which took place on the 3rd of December, 1988. My father was the referee. We re-watched the match together, some 25 years later.” Writing history in an original way!

This is one of the 12 documentaries in competition. Others are Croatian Tiha K. Gudac’s “Naked Island“, “Euromaidan. Rough Cuts” by the team behind the DocuDays festival in Kiev, “Velvet Terrorists” by Slovak trio Ostrochovsky, Pekarcik and Kerekes, Hanna Polak’s “Something Better to Come” and Alina Rudnitskaya’s “Victory Day”.

All fine films with an international appeal. On top of that there is a rough cut session for documentaries and a pitching event for new projects. It’s all very professional and competent. Take a look at

http://www.triestefilmfestival.it/?page_id=7657&lang=en

Chile Doc on DocAlliance

For those of us travelling to festivals like DOKLeipzig and idfa it has been obvious that something good is happening with documentaries in Chile. Good fims are made and delegations arrive to the festivals to launch films through the ChileDoc, whose executive director Flor Rubina is interviewed for the site of DocAlliance. She says that ”information is ”power”, we an amplify it”. Later on in the fine interview, she says that ”Something that we have definitely improved in the last decade is the cinematography of the films. Visual approach, sound design, and the search for new languages to tell stories are very important to our filmmakers. As I mentioned before, diversity and eclecticism are characteristic of current Chilean documentary production. As any filmmaker, Chilean directors are looking for ways to reach global audiences through small stories that connect them with issues that any human being cares about…”

BUT check it out for yourself on DocAlliance, eight films are free for all until January 18, including the great “The Last Station”. by Cristian Soto and Catalina Vergara.

ChiChiChi – LeLeLe!

http://dafilms.com/news/2015/1/12/ChileDoc_Interview

http://dafilms.com/event/196-chiledoc/