Documenting the Revolution/ 1

The cph:dox festival deserves credit for (also) putting a focus on the changes in the Arab world. With the support of IMS (International Media Support, Danish state supported organisation), no less than a dozen screenings and debates, entitled ”Free Radical”, were on the agenda of the festival, with many invited guests from the countries involved. I attended a handful of them as well as a very well visited seminar held by Danish newspaper Politiken, also a supporter of cph:dox, under the headline ”The Arab Spring and the new Media”, referring to the role of social media like Facebook and Twitter during the revolutions. This meeting included a panel of experts, university people of Arab origin living outside the region, plus Danish professor Jakob Skovgaard-Petersen who made a fine introduction to Syria and the website activity going on – the main source for information from a country closed for foreign press, many times linked on this site under ”The Syrian Revolution“.

I mention this because of the clear distinction in terminology and access between that – academic – panel and the bloggers, activists and filmmakers who took part in the festival. No, I am not saying that one is better than the other, only that you feel so strongly the difference between an inside and an outside look on the current affairs. Jon Alterman from Washington thought that the social media’s impact was quite overestimated, television’s role had been crucial for the changes in Tunisia and Egypt, Skovgaard-Petersen did not have the word ”revolution” on his power point presentation, he talked about ”the uprising” etc.

Orwa Nyrabia, however, Syrian film producer and co-organiser of the Dox Box festival, that has been running for four years in Damascus, unlikely of course to happen next year, did not hesitate to call the uprising ”a revolution”, and gave the audience a good intro to the situation in his country on two meeting occasions. One in connection with the screening of ”Life in a Syrian Village” by late master Omar Amiralay, and another when one of the dox:lab films were to be screened. Danish performance artist Lillibeth Cuenca was meant to be joined by her co-director, Syrian filmmaker Nidal Hassan, who did not arrive to Copenhagen as he was arrested in Damascus when he was about to get his travel documents cleared. The work-in-progress of the two was screened – it was less than promising from a film quality point of view. Nyrabia took the floor and informed with a lot of humour and sarchasm that there is nothing new in Syrian filmmakers being put into prison by the regime, that Nidal Hassan and others are grown up people, who know about the risk they are taking saying what they are saying against Assad and his dictatorship. There is no reason to feel guilty, he said to the Danish performer and others from the festival organisation, keep on inviting us so we can come and tell you what we know and see. Said Nyrabia, a very good friend, who I keep on naming ”the first minister of culture” in a new and free Syria!

The best session, however, was called ”Documenting the Revolution”. Clips, photos, film quoted were shown and the panelists helped each other to give a broad picture to the audience. In the panel were documentary filmmaker Elyes Baccar (Tunisia) (PHOTO from his Rouge Parole), journalist.

Thameur Mekki (Tunisia), film director and activist Lara Baladi (Egypt), and photographer and blogger Maggie Osama (Egypt). The two hour meeting started with the images from Cairo January 28, ”the Day of Anger”, where the police was attacking the people with guns and water canons on the bridge over the Nile. Enormously touching material that also shows praying people in the middle of the demonstration, with the crowd slowly winning the battle – at a certain moment the police tanks turn around and the walk to Tahir Square starts. These YouTube clips will get the same status as the man in front of the tank on Tiananmenh Square in Beijing in 1989. Go to YouTube.. 

The Tunisian filmmaker Elyes Baccar gave us the story of the Tunisian revolution that started with the self-immolation of Mohammed Bouazizi in Sidi-Bouzid, an event that was filmed and uploaded on the internet by his cousin Ali, later to be broadcast on al Jazeera, link to the YouTube version.. 

It sparked the revolution, uprisings in other cities of the country began, putting an end to the dictatorship of Ben Ali, who stepped down January 14, a month after the incident in Sidi-Bouzid. In the beginning, the director said, I was not a director, but a citizen, but gradually I felt that I had to film ”to feel that it was real”. He did and the very good result was shown at the festival in Copenhagen, ”Rouge Parole”, see review below.

Documenting the Revolution… as it was said in the panel, we have to go further than the news ”that is taking all humanity away”. We have ”to bring back basic things”, give a name to this person who is not just a number, said Elyes Baccar.

The Egyptian panelists added that we have to ”document before we forget”. Maggie Osama showed some of her strong photographs from Tahrir Square, and Lara Baladi informed about the group ”Tahrir Cinema” that was formed during the days of revolution. But now we see a counter-revolution, she said and reminded us about the massacre three weeks ago. ”The revolution is on the edge of being hi-jacked”, she said, ”it is a revolution in making, a work-in-progress”. Remember also that after the revolution there are still 12.000 people in prison.

The role of the media – we have to keep an eye on the development, said the Tunisians. We have now 101 political parties in the country and 60% of the television coverage in connection with the election was pro the islamists, said journalist Thameur Mekki, who also spoke about the complex role of the broadcaster al Jazeera in the region. Yes, they were promoting the islamists, but they were also the first that said yes to broadcast from Tunisia in December 2011 when it all started.

www.cphdox.dk

Documenting the Revolution/ 2

Two films at cph:dox dealt with the revolution in Egypt and Tunisia: Omar Shargawi and Karim El Hakim’s “1/2 Revolution” and Elyes Baccar’s “Rouge Parole”. The latter about Tunisia, the first shot in Egypt.

“1/2 Revolution” (PHOTO) was made by coincidence. You dare say! The filmmaker Omar Shargawi went to Egypt to make a feature about street children in Cairo, when he and his friends found themselves in the middle of, and taking part in what became world history: the downfall of a dictator and his suppressing regime in a huge Arab country. The quality of this film lies with the fact that the Palestinian/Danish director succeeds to personalize the story. He and his friends lived in the centre of Cairo, close to the Tahir Square. From their windows they could follow the violent clashes between police and demonstrators, from hour to hour, in a flat where there was also a baby stumbling around among grown-ups like the director himself, who have family outside he country and who of course worry about what could happen to their dear ones.

It does indeed gives the situation another perspective, and the film a tension different from the youtube uploaded clip documentations from the fights in the streets. At the same as Shargawi and his friends film in the streets. The dramatic situation is conveyed with passion and a sense of presence, and goes from documenting to documentary interpretation and personal drama. You fully understand why the group had to leave Cairo after 11 days, 7 days before Mubarak steps down.

The Tunisian film “Rouge Parole” also intends to be more than a news report on what happened in the country. And it reaches that goal in a way where you

feel both informed and emotionally involved. The director does not only stay at the Kasbah Square in the capital, he goes to other cities, first of all to Sidi Bouzid, where Bouazizi set fire to himself, an act that played a crucial role in the protests and revolution that followed. The director catches the atmosphere of anger, to say the least, against the regime of Ben Ali and the enthusiasm, when it collapses. And he puts in a lyrical frame and pauses for reflection. Yet he does also include the discussions between the revolutionaries, who do not necessarily agree on all among themselves. Of course a film that will – when time comes, with a distance – be put on a list that also includes Humphrey Jennings “Listen to Britain” from WW2, or other patriotic films like Juris Podnieks Latvian “Homeland” from the time of liberation from the Soviet empire. Am I giving the film too much credit, I don’t think so… It is very well made and quite impressive in its kaleidoskopic form.

½ Revolution (Denmark, 2011, 72 mins.). Directors: Omar Shargawi & Karim El Hakim.

Rouge Parole (Switzerland, Tunisia, 2011, 97 min.). 
Director: Elyes Baccar.

Targeting: Bin Laden

Jeg har det med filmen, som jeg har det med ordet drejebog, som jo betyder to ting på dansk. Naturligvis er en drejebog en plan for en film, men det er i nutidssprog også en plan for en hvilken som helst anden kompliceret handling eller aktion. Targeting: Bin Laden vil som film overbevise mig om, at dens manuskript simpelthen er CIA’s og admiralens manuskript for ”Red Teams” opsporing og likvidering af Osama Bin Laden. Og det lykkedes i første omgang. Jeg iagttog det tvivlende til vantro: er dette direct cinema, er dette optagelser fra kameraer i The Navy’s SEAL Teams hjelme, er det Bin Laden, der står der øverst på trappen i nattøj? Og som filmen skred frem accepterede jeg det hele. Den er faktisk ret spændende. Som underholdning er den temmelig spændende. Og jeg var jo underholdt. Og forført.

Men så kommer eftertanken. Ét er at jeg faktisk godt kan lide historiske rekonstruktioner, som BBC underholdning for eksempel, noget andet er, at jeg da plejer at efterlyse eftertanke og tvivl og tøven i ægte dokumentariske historiske rekonstruktioner. Nå, der er da alle tre elementer i Targeting: Bin Laden. Men de er vel at mærke omhyggeligt anbragt inden i filmens selvforståelse af at være selve denne komplicerede og farefulde operation ind i et Pakistan med forstår man ikke-informerede myndigheder. De er præsidentens og hans mænds eftertanke, tvivl og tøven med hensyn til de rent militære og tekniske risici, naturligt placeret som plotpunkter. Og der er kun dette ene lag i filmen.

Eftertanken, tvivlen og tankens langsomhed hører hjemme i en anden slags dokumentarfilm, disse film med fortællevinklen anbragt et sikkert sted i nærheden af autor og lagt ned i værket som en voksende uro af noget, som blander sig udefra, måske fra tilskuerens sind, her kunne det være moralske og juridiske overvejelser, der, som det er tilfældet sker i  Morris’ The Fog of War, lyttes frem af McNamara i den berømte spejlkonstruktion. I The History Channels værk er det naturligvis slet ikke sådan. Det er selvfølgelig en omhyggeligt efterrationaliseret og dramatiseret påstand om, at de to drejebøger, admiralens og historiekanalens er konkruente. Det her er selvfølgelig en propagandafilm. En rigtig veldrejet en af slagsen.

The History Channel: Targeting: Bin Laden. USA 2011, 88 min. Sendt i DR2 Dokumania (Operation bin Laden – minut for minut) på hvis hjemmeside den kan ses nogen tid endnu. Filmen kan købes på Amazon og streames elller downloades mange steder på nettet. Den historiske operation, hvis internationale lovlighed er anfægtet fra mange sider, får et udfoldet og interessant forsvar i en kort juridisk opsats af to lærere ved amerikanske militærakademier, Shane Reeves og Jerymy Marsch: ”Bin Laden and Awlaki: Lawful Targets”, i Harvard International Review 26. oktober 2011.

cph:dox Awards

Awards were given at the cph:dox festival in Copenhagen and juries motivated their choices, this is the press release from the festival:

In the main competition, DOX:AWARD, Ben Rivers’ ‘Two Years at Sea’ was awarded for its convincing depiction of the euphoric feeling of being immersed in an elemental environment. “An enigmatic work that emanates from another place and time and justifies its own existence,” the jury said.

The DANISH:DOX AWARD went to Christian Sønderby Jepsen’s warm and humorous family drama ‘The Will’. The jury said: “A potential freak show turns into an emphatic social commentary and a touching story of neglect – going beyond mere exploitation and the current, somewhat fashionable white trash romanticism, presenting real humans of flesh and blood, with whom you laugh and cry as they try to make their family work.”

Furthermore, Omar Shargawi’s ‘½ Revolution’ (PHOTO) received a special mention from the jury. Especially emphasized was the immediacy and presence of the film. “The circumstances might have been unpredictable, but the film feels as concise and well-structured as any scripted film by a director who has had time and money to do his homework,” the jury further said.

The NEW:VISION AWARD that aims at promoting the experimental documentary in the field between documentary and art was given to Philippe Grandrieux’s ‘It May Be That Beauty Has Strengthened Our Resolve – Masao Adachi’ about the Japanese filmmaker Masao Adachi. The jury highlighted the film’s interweaving of Adachi’s aesthetic concerns with the social and political histories he lived through. “Rather than a typical director/subject relationship, this is a collaboration between both directors, where authorship moves back and forth,” the jury’s motivation said.

Additionally, René Frölke’s film ‘Führing’ received a special mention for its depiction of the absurd play between art and politics.

The NORDIC:DOX AWARD jury viewed fifteen films which, according to the jury, “all offer an impressive look into the rich spectrum of Scandinavian documentary filmmaking”. This year’s prize was given to Thomas Østbye’s ‘Imagining Emanuel’ – an elegant and powerful film that reframes current

discussion around identity, race and place,” the jury said. They added: “Through a poetic and formally innovative structure, the film takes the experience of one man, caught between the burdens of history, certainty and representation and creates a quietly powerful and engaged critique of the politics of migration and the image itself.”

For its creative storytelling and objective tone, Anca Damian received this year’s AMNESTY AWARD for the animation film ‘Crulic – the Path Beyond’ about the Romanian Claudiu Crulic who is unjustly accused of theft and dies after going on hunger strike in a Polish prison. The jury said: “The film represents a tragic, real story of human injustice told through an extraordinary imaginative and creative animation. The animated reality together with the objective tone of the narration creates an untraditional storytelling. This allows the viewer to identify with the character without feeling imposed.”

In the series SOUND&VISION AWARD, the jury awarded ‘Grandma Lo-fi: the Basement Tapes of Sigridur Nielsdottir’ by Kristín Björk Kristjánsdóttir, Orri Jónsson and Ingibjörg Birgisdóttir. The film is a portrait of an Icelandic lady who, despite her old age, cannot help but make music and does so with both passion and soul. The jury said: “A quirky film about an unlikely subject. Charming and innovative, the film reveals the pure joy of raw creativity.”

The DOC ALLIANCE AWARD – the price awarded to the best of the five documentaries that can be streamed for free at DAFilm.com and ibyen.dk/cphdox on November 13th and 14th – was awarded to Eva Mulvad’s ‘The Good Life’. “The director’s negotiation and rapport with her subjects has led to that degree of seamless observation where we sometimes forget there is a camera there at all. These confessionals, silent moments of despair and bitter bouts of vitriol, seem to be played out for us directly, as confidantes,” the jury said.

http://www.cphdox.dk/d/a2.lasso?d=2009502&l=25&e=1

Cph:dox – 5 gratis film på 2 døgn

A good offer to Danish citizens with a computer and a wish to watch films from cph:dox. I switch to Danish language:

Dagbladet Politiken skriver, i forkortet citat: Den niende udgave af den danske dokumentarfilmfestival er i gang, og politiken.dk har allieret sig med festivalen og streamingtjenesten Doc Alliance for at kunne tilbyde politiken.dk’s læsere fem stærke dokumentarfilm ganske gratis.

Filmene vil kunne streames fra ibyen.dk/cphdox fra 12. november klokken 00.00 til 13. november klokken 23.59.” Link til streamingen

Filmene er “Marrijas Own” (Zeljka Sukova), “Grande Hotel” (Lotte Stoops, jeg har set den, kan stærkt anbefales), “Accidentes Gloriosos” (Manuel Andrizzi & Marcus Lindeen), “Bombay Beach” (Boaz Yakin & Alma Har’el, FOTO, positivt anmeldt af Kim Skotte I Politiken) og “Nowhere Near Tomorrow” (Johanna Teichmann).

Cph:dox foregår kun I København – dansk centralistisk kulturpolitik! – derfor er et sådant initiativ naturligvis velkomment.

http://www.cphdox.dk/d/f.lasso

http://dafilms.com/

Pedro Urano & Joana Traub Csekö: Hu Enigma

I like it when a film slowly seems to get a hold of itself before your very eyes.  Like it’s getting smarter as it goes along. That’s how I felt watching this depiction of a huge hospital complex in Rio de Janeiro which has half of the building functioning and the other half lying almost in ruins.

The film is sort of clumsy to begin with. We follow a patient being pushed in a bed in the working part of the hospital and we see graphic pictures of the ruin. Then we follow a gastroscopy of the woman which – as something of a banality – is intercut with handheld shots from the cellar of the hospital with pibes, rubble and rats. Ok, one thinks, we get it: The hospital itself is also a patient.

But slowly the film opens up. Pictures of the building play a huge part throughout but we also see and hear people from various institutions talking either directly to us from behind a desk or walking around in the quite amazing construction. It can be the hospital director, an engineer, an architect – even a patient – all people who have genuine interest or feelings for the whole monstrosity. HU refers to its status as a University Hospital and it was part of the modernist, architect movement in 1950’s. But it was built way too big, and the unused part of the building is referred to as the “lame leg” and is just that: A dead counterpart to the “good leg”.

Split screen and camera movements are used with various effect and luck, but I get the feeling that it all seems to work better and better as the films progresses. Also, wonderful little stories appear like the one with a woman carrying an empty plant pot and who needs help to get out of a door. She wants to get one of the ferns growing wildly in the ruin right outside. It’s told from a distance and is just a beautiful documentary scene with reminiscence of Jacques Tati.

The graphic pictures are accompanied by industrial sounding “music” which also seem a bit trite to begin with but it all prove to be worthwhile in the end. For us and for the filmmakers in a way I won’t reveal here. I’m built up to amazement and content in a strangely satisfying way.

http://cphdox.dk/d/film.lasso?ser=1638&s=

Fia-Stina Sandlund: She’s Blonde Like Me

CPH:DOX on a November afternoon. I am watching a filmmaker’s film about her filmmaking and herself. Afterwards, I watch the filmmaker telling us about her film about herself and her filmmaking. I’m always interested in the creative process so I’m all eyes and ears.

The filmmaker, Fia-Stina Sandlund, surely wants to confuse us, though. In this film, she is taking her lead character to the famous art Biennale in Venice to make a performance which will serve not only as a performance but also as an audition and a step towards making a rendition of Swedish playwright August Strindberg’s “Miss Julie”. We quickly meet Alexandra Dahlström as the protagonist and from then on she rarely leaves the frame until the last 15 minutes or so. The filmmaker (Sandlund) is ever present on the soundtrack since large portions of the film consists of the two blonde girls talking about their project which only is revealed sporadically. Sandlund is sometimes seen on the edge of the frame, and we get the feeling that they both are serious artists; Dahlström is dedicated, a bit sulky at times, maybe even troubled. We also get the feeling that she could easily play Julie. Or Sandlund. Maybe she does the latter already? I know, it sounds confusing, but it’s really not. Not yet, at least.

As a viewer one looks for things to get involved with and in this case they throw us some small intellectual goodies about Strindberg and his play “Miss Julie” and it’s clear that Strindberg fascinates the protagonist(s) with his ambiguous view on women. I, more predictably, notice how much Dahlström looks like Scarlett Johansen from certain angles. Dahlström IS a sight for sore eyes – and you may know her from “Fuckin’ Åmål” – but I sometimes just want to poke her (and Sandlund) in the eye. The film is namely shot less delightfully and my fascination and my irritation struggle to get the upper hand. The film is both bold and boring, arguably too long but surely original and not without humour.

The moment in the film which the women have prepared for comes: the performance with Dahlström playing Sandlund. But the weather pulls their legs; the electricity goes away and the performance is aborted. At least in the film. And then a true avant-garde moment appears: A woman – whom we have never seen before – coughs. Violently. Now I’m confused. The woman turns out to be some kind of clairvoyant and she’s having a séance to get some other hitherto unseen women closer to Strindberg. I forget that I want to cast Dahlström for almost anything but I don’t forget Sandlund’s project. Kudos to that.

The film is the first in a trilogy where the third supposedly will be a version of “Miss Julie” with Dahlström as Julie, since she passed the “audition”. This Sandlund tells us afterwards on this November afternoon. Film number two, “She’s Staging It”, will be a depiction of a theatre workshop in New York were they will be working on saving Julie from the suicide she presumably commits after curtains in “Miss Julie”.  I’m somewhat disturbed by the fact that I want to see both.

Fia-Stina Sandlund: She’s Blonde Like Me, Sverige, 2011. 89 min.

The Syrian Revolution/ 9

Text taken from Facebook, announced publicly in Copenhagen yesterday at the cph:dox festival by film producer and festival director Orwa Nyrabia from Damascus:

Syrian filmmaker Nidal Hassan disappeared in Damascus on Thursday 3-11-2011, no information about him has come to light since that day.

 Nidal was born in 1-9-1973, he studied Film Direction in Armenia and made several films one of which, SALTY SKIN, won a notable Russian prize. He has other films like FLINT MOUNTAIN and an unfinished film on his coastal city Tartous, THE POOR CHALLENGE GUINNESS.
 Note that he was previously detained at what is known as the “Intellectuals’ demonstration” in Damascus.

Nidal Hassan was on his way to the festival in Copenhagen.

At the same meeting Orwa Nyrabia announced that Syrian filmmaker Ali Sheikh Khoder, who was arrested by an unknown security division in Douma, Damascus, September 30 2011, had been released. One out, one in!

Link to the Facebook page

Greek Festival Opening in Moment of Crisis

The 52nd edition of the Thessaloniki International Film Festival has started and runs until the 13th of November. In a newsletter issued by the festival, under the headline “a modest ceremony raised the curtain of the festival”, the festival director had some opinions, which are important to share:

In his opening speech, TIFF director Dimitris Eipides did not fail to refer to the crucial times Greece is going through: “I am certain that there are some people in the audience wondering what is the use of having festivals and festivities when the country is sinking”, he said, adding that the answer to this question is that if Greece is to have a chance of revival, the country needs citizens who are mature, outward-looking, innovative, bold, with a vision and a plan.

“We need to be entertained, to receive stimuli, to understand the world around us. This is the only way we can change this world”, underlined Mr. Eipides, adding that, under this light, the films of the 52nd TIFF “provide audiences with the opportunity to exercise penetrating and substantial interventions, to reach novel explanations of the social, political and cultural developments unfolding in the world around us”. “Only by active intervention any work is meaningful”, he added. Mr. Eipides announced that the TIFF is moving forward with the establishment of the Thessaloniki Film Archive. “The Thessaloniki Film Archive is a life’s work. It will develop and broaden the city’s cinema culture, capitalizing on the energetic core of film enthusiasts who have been cultivated by the Festival throughout the years. This is a gift worthy of Thessaloniki, which is celebrating its centenary from liberation”, commented Mr. Eipides. Welcoming audiences to the 52nd TIFF, “one of the oldest film festivals in the world, esteemed by an international community of exacting viewers and professionals”, TIFF director said he was proud for an additional reason: for the fact that more than 50% of TIFF’s budget this year is funded by European funds (specifically, by the European Regional Development Fund), without burdening the country’s national budget.

newsletter@filmfestival.gr

Nelson Pereira: The Music According To Tom Jobim

The opening is splendid: Old b/w footage from the 50’s of an aircraft flying into Rio de Janeiro and an orchestral rendition of “Garota de Ipanema” on the soundtrack. I want to go to Rio and I want to see and enjoy this film. The camera is now on the ground and takes us downtown in a car and nothing can go wrong. Or so I thought.

The film has no talk at all but continues like an uncommented anthology with a line of numerous interpretations of the music of Antonio Carlos Jobim. The clips seem to be original and they last for between one and four minutes or so. That means that we rarely get more than a couple of verses and the Portuguese lyrics are sometimes subtitled and sometimes not. More irritatingly, it seems that the film now and again use “new” archive material which was not in the original TV or live performance footage. It’s mostly album covers or posters which the camera pans or tilts over or old stills where they couldn’t resist splitting the layers in that “modern 3D” fashion which is more annoying than meaningful. So as a film I must say it comes across very uneven at times, almost amateurish, and somewhat haphazardly put together. For instance, at one point there is a still of an album with Jobim’s name (again) and you can see that this particular album was arranged by band leader Nelson Riddle. It’s immediately followed by Nara Leão singing “Dindi” with just a guitar player!?

Turning to the music, there seem to be one principle: Two to four different interpretations of each number. That is highly interesting but also quite frustrating at times when a favourite of yours is limited to a mere minute. There might be a slight chronological order (but it doesn’t feel or look that way) and only sporadically is there displayed any development of Jobim’s work or how Brazilian and American jazz music started to affect each other. Sometimes Jobim is seen playing and sometimes he’s not and the film ends with some performances of his with choir and big bands from the late 80’s and early 90’s. On the director’s webpage I realize now that there is a TV program from 1984 listed with the same title, so I expect this to be a newly made version which supposedly had its world premiere at New York Film Festival in October this year.

But before I get all negative on this film about one of the best songwriters in the western world, I would like to point out some gems in the film because it is also a mere joy at times. There are nice recordings with Gal Costa and Adriana Colcanhotto but especially the Americans seem in a good shape with highlights including a virtuous minute and a half with Gary Burton playing “Chega de Saudade”, Sammy Davis Jr. scatting through “Desafinado”, Judy Garland singing “How Insensitive”, Erroll Garner and his trio really getting the right bossa nova feel in “The Girl from Ipanema” and Oscar Peterson playing one of my personal favourites, “Wave”. In these segments you can really hear the benefits of mixing the Latin and the North American musical tradition. However, I think my favourite piece is of Jobim and Elis Regina in a naked studio with a hanging microphone between them singing “Águas de Março” in a very Brazilian way. Here is the undeniable charm of his music which the film – as a film – unfortunately lacks. I don’t miss more info but I miss the film being able to link the emotional impact of the music with mere cinematic craftsmanship.

And then there might be a reader or two who asks how the film included the most famous and bestselling versions of Jobim’s music, namely the recordings with Stan Getz, João Gilberto and Jobim himself. I can only say: It was not in there! Go figure!

seen at

www.cphdox.dk

Nelson Pereira Dos Santos: The Music According To Tom Jobim, Brasilien, USA 2011, 88 min.