Göran Hugo Olsson: Reframing Documentary. A Talk at Nordisk Panorama

90 minutes at the Nordisk Panorama yesterday afternoon. With a great filmmaker, Swedish Göran Hugo Olsson, who together with Cecilia Lidin gave the audience an excellent introduction to his working method, and who characterised himself as a documentarian of existing footage and was very well prepared taking – with charm and humor – the audience through 10 points related to the definition of what is a documentary.

He started with a photo of himself and David Aronowitsch from 1989. They were in Lodz, Poland, after – if I got it right or is it a joke – having been offered to make a new version of Bergman’s “Tystnaden”… They found out that they did not like Bergman, “I was much more into Godard”. They stayed in Poland searching for Romas to make a film about the Roma holocaust researching in that and many other Eastern European countries. Olsson jumped to the current situation, where his Israel-Palestine on Swedish TV 1958–1989 had its world premiere a couple of weeks ago at the Venice Film Festival. “I am very sad”, he said referring to the war in the region, and in Ukraine and in Syria. One can only agree. Looking so much fwd. to seeing the film.

The documentary process is not a genre, Olsson said, it is a method, and brilliantly he exemplified how he worked, especially with the film “Concerning Violence”, based on Frantz Fanon’s book “The Wretched of the Earth” and on archival footage from numerous Swedish sources. I have not been filming for 15 years, Olsson said, and showed us a photo of small pieces of paper in different colors, with text transcripts from Fanon’s book, texts that were to read by Lauryn Hill, American rapper and singer. He told that Hill had problems in finding the right rythm when recording, she was too fast. She argued that we can as in a record studio make one more take, but we can’t do that in a film or with a book, viewers and readers go for “one take”, Olsson said, words to that effect. Anyway – we are many who have it the same way – to have the texts in front of him and not in his head…

Going back to “Documentary” he argued, and so right he is, that documentaries are expensive – the funders don’t get it that if you are filming a character you have to stay close to him/her before, during and after the shooting, for two years as an example.

I have to catch up to watch more of Olsson’s films but in my mind stands clearly “The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975” based on material shot by Swedish journalists in the 1960’es and 1970’es. I think I have seen it 3 times, also because Olsson – as he stressed at the seminar – is so dedicated to make the audience understand where and when we are. He is often using chaptering. I learned a lot from watching this film.

Olsson: Audience… I actually dreamed of working for television. I still do but they don´t want me. “They” have the audience. On the other hand that’s also wat he has, when you see that his films have had broadcast all over the world.

Olsson ended his talk, excellently structured by Cecilia Lidin, by stressing with capital letters film is COLLABORATION. His company Story – go their website – is an important and big production company and many of Olsson’s films can be rented for small money using the website.

Ivars Seleckis 90 Years Old

Dear Ivars. Paldies for your extraordinary life-long documentary work and congratulations on this birthday! If anyone, you have introduced me to your country, its history and culture and its citizens, in all ages. Much appreciated that you with “To Be Continued” number one and now two (together with Armands Začs) have included the children… With warmth and passion and great skills. Poetry!

I have been thinking about the many many occasions, where we have met. On Bornholm in the 1990és for the Baltic Film & TV Festival. You were there year after year with films. And in your country when you took my wife and me for a trip to the countryside drinking champagne at a lake together with Romualds Pipars! And when we visited the location of “Crossroad Street” together with scriptwriter Tālivaldis Margēvičs and said hello to Horseradish Peter and his wife from the film. Of course this is one of your masterpieces that you continued 10 and 20 years later. Latvian history writing.

I am looking at your filmography and see that you were cameraman for your Poetic School of Baltic Documentaries colleagues Uldis Brauns, Herz Frank and Aivars Freimanis, all of them like you protagonists in the film “Bridges of Time” by Audrius Stonys and Kristine Briede. Kristine and Uldis Cekulis invited me to take part in a research trip for that film. It was a wonderful experience and exhausting for me as you have always been in a much better shape than me (I am13 years younger); it was simply difficult to follow you around. It was on this occasion that we were photographed together in a photo booth. Uldis “commemorated” this at the Baltic Sea Docs this year!

And we were abroad together at ZagrebDox, where we both were awarded by festival director Nenad Puhovski. You for “To Be Continued”, me for having been at the festival, when it started. Lelda Ozola was with you and the three of us had a fine time together, including (my idea) that we should watch a football match together. We did and your documentary curiosity unfolded completely. You “read” the game as if you had been a connaisseur for ages.

And and… the opening of the symposium where we participants climbed to the top of Elizabeth Church in Riga to celebrate the opening with a glass of champagne. By the way thanks for introducing me to different kind of Latvian Schnaps, you had always a small bottle in your pocket.

Last time we met was at the reception after the opening of the film screenings of the Baltic Sea Docs. You were there, had a glass or two and were surrounded by your many admirers, including me. You showed us a photo of yourself as a young man. Beautiful. And you had some comments to the cinematography of the opening Georgian film, kind and generous remarks. As so often Lelda was next to us translating when needed.

A day after I met Davis Simanis jr. who said that you were the last of a generation of classical observational humanistic documentarians. He was worried, who will take over. I hope he is not right, and I am sure that you are already working on your next film. It’s in your blood!

Happy Birthday to a master!

Virpi Suutari: Once Upon a Time in the Forest

One of the most important European authors, one of the pioneers of modern documentary, Virpi Suutari creates a film in her own unique style, creating scenes in which we perceive reality as dreamlike and surreal. But this time she contrasts it with directly captured scenes of events of dynamic actions of young dedicated fighters for nature conservation.

Finnish forests, together with Swedish ones, are the lungs of Europe. Now the ominous shadow of over-logging due to newly proclaimed development and profit is looming over them. The celebrated director decides to join the young Finnish environmental activists who are fighting to protect beauty and life against the worrying ideas of politicians and reckless aspirations of corporations. She creates extremely poetic scenes of the forest where we meet the main characters, Minka and Ida, gentle and compassionate, uncompromising and combative! Together with a group of comrades, they reveal to us how to enjoy the touch of plants, encounter with birds, surrender to primal clean waters. Loud monstrous machines and huge trucks mercilessly invade those spaces of untouched nature, heralding devastation of immeasurable proportions. In exciting cinematic collisions of beauty and drama, this film raises some of the most important questions of the modern world – how to preserve nature and save the planet? Virpi Suutari devotedly follows her heroines who bravely, without hesitation, oppose ever-superior opponents and the police. The struggle continues again and again with activists aware that the fate of their generation will be determined by their commitment to nature. The film pulsates brilliantly with an exciting rhythm of alternating actions and constant reminders of the immeasurable values for which our heroines give up a simple and safe existence and raise their voices with concern and pride!

The exquisite work of a true master of documentary film-making as an important cinematic experience that alerts us and invites us to join in!

Finland 2024 
93 minutes 

Nicolas Philibert: Nénette

The film of one of the world’s most significant documentary filmmakers, Nicolas Philibert, screened at the Berlin Film Festival as a distinctive, masterfully made, auteur documentary. Nénette is a charming orangutan, an unusual and irresistible being. She is the oldest inhabitant of the oldest zoo in the world, located within Jardin des Plantes in Paris. Throughout her long life in captivity, she has been exposed to gazes and overwhelmed by comments and compliments of curious and exhilarated observers. To a majority of them, these are amusing moments in which they bond with a marvelous presence of exotic nature. Nicolas Philibert does not center his film around these short, dazzling moments; he rather focuses on the eternal, unchanging state of the captured star. This time, we do not leave Nénette, and we directly experience the permanence of her confinement. “Nénette is captured twofold — by the cage and by the camera.” Radically focused on the charming star, this documentary is for the author himself a metaphor for the voyeuristic nature of film. “I don’t like telling the audience what to think, I just like to reveal what’s in front of me,” says Philibert. Through the mastery of the exquisite cineaste, Nénette becomes the mirror in which we all see ourselves as spectators.

France, 2009 
70 minutes

Petr Lom: I am the River, the River is me

The Whanganui River in New Zealand is the first river in the world to be given the legal status of a person, a living and indivisible being. This happened in 2017 and confirmed the belief and philosophy of the Maoris who perceive nature as their ancestor, believing that it is our duty to take care of it while we are on Earth, and that further care is taken over by our descendants. It is inadmissible to treat nature as private property, nor to exploit it for gaining profit.

This film, which celebrates the Whanganui River and affirms its status, is shaped as a travelogue in which, a group of river guests sail canoes on a five-day indulgence in the pleasure of being carried by its currents and residing on its banks led by the river’s keeper, a Maori community leader. The film introduces us to the almost hypnotic water flows on which the canoes slide and the passengers, amazed by this adventure, sail in them. The camera reveals the beauty of wooded shores, of creatures from land and water, who move together with film heroes through the paradise preserved here. We enjoy the symphony of nature’s sounds, as well as the gathering of devotees who will be able to express their thoughts and wishes under the auspices of the great and powerful Wanganui, to talk about their dreams of preserving nature as an invaluable treasure of our planet.

We also get to know the spiritual being of the Maori people through the music of composer Puoro Jerome, a two-time winner of the Grammy Award, an artist who has given concerts all over the world from Carnegie Hall to the Sydney Opera House, known for performing his compositions on traditional Maori instruments. On the banks of the Whanganui River, we also see him, surrendering to the nature that surrounds him, playing while composing the music for this film.

Fifteen years dedicated to the topics of human rights, and now to the rights of nature, producer Corinne van Egeraat and director Petr Lom, lead us to the end of the world with a film that they believe has the power to change us, “to expand our hearts and inspire us to embody our better selves.”

Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand 2023. 
89 minutes 

Claudia Tosi: Mr. Beau

Claudia Tosi shared her brilliant, engaging film “I Had a Dream” with the viewers of Magnificent Seven 2019, but at the same time she herself was inspired by the great Hedy Honigman’s film “Buddy”. So, from this festival she brought a new dream to Italy, a dream about an unusual journey, about discovering the ways to reach someone you love and who loves you unconditionally.

This is an unusual and unexpected story about the friendship between a golden retriever named Beau and his human friend Claudia. Claudia wonders if the tacitly acknowledged fact that a dog has to adapt to a human it lives with is actually an unfair misconception. She decides to ask herself questions – who is my dog, what does he want, what is his nature? In a moment of concern for Beau’s life, Claudia decides to do everything in her power to learn how to communicate better with him and how to understand his character, his personality and his needs. Together, they embark on a journey to achieve this goal through a series of different adventures – scientific experiments, various experiences in nature, meeting with dog trainers and practicing exciting “dog sports”. The extremely intertwined flows of the film gradually build an intense feeling of empathy with the main character. Through this unusual, uncertain, revealing process, with the camera as an accomplice to the events, Claudia gets to know Beau more and more, leading both herself and us viewers to more complex questions about the place of man in the animal world and the importance of replacing the desire to dominate with the need for understanding. Claudia Tosi, the author of the film, testifies about her experience as the protagonist – she reveals that our pets give us the ability to rediscover the child in us, perhaps the best and most harmless part of our nature.

A magnificently playful modern documentary introduces us to a game in which, the more we enjoy and have fun, the more we discover surprisingly deep and ennobling knowledge about the world and ourselves. 

Italy, Germany 2024 
83 minutes 

Magnificent7 Opening Night 2024

You only have your 20th birthday once and that is to be celebrated. Even on a Friday the 13th… The celebration of the 20th edition of the Magnificent7, the European Feature Documentary Film Festival, took place at the MTS Hall on that day and as you can see on the photo (taken by Ema Bednarz) there was a full house in the cinema hall with Zoran Popovic at the microphone welcoming the audience AND, one after the other, early supporters and contributors to the festival. I remember clearly the same people on stage in the Sava Centre 20 years ago. Nevena Djonlic who was head of the film department and opened the door for the two, Svetlana and Zoran Popovic. Sava Centre was the venue until 2018, now the festival has its home at mts Hall downtown, near the Parliament – the latter means that military parades have been performed the last couple of days, blocking traffic; luckily that was finished when the screenings were about to start. On stage also film director Sonja Blagojevic, producer and human rights activist Iva Plemic, cinematographer and still key organiser at the festival Jelena Stankovic, technical supervisor Nenad Popovic, key staff member Ema Teokarevic, responsible for the workshop Lea Vahrušev and on the far left Svetlana Popovic, who should have been in the front next to her husband. Two filmmakers were absent, Andrijana Stojkovic and Mila Turajlic.

After the screening of Polish Jakub Piątek’s “Pianoforte”, we all went to celebrate with champagne, cake and meze at a nice Greek restaurant nearby. Magnificent night!

Juha Suonpää: Lynx Man

This text is written by the festival directors of the Magnificent7, Svetlana and Zoran Popovic.

This is one of the films that deal with the burning issues of today. We are in the middle of a process of galloping disappearance of priceless and irreplaceable living species on the planet. This film conveys that knowledge in such an extraordinary way that it triggers in us the deepest degree of despair, but also the need to oppose this disappearance.

We identify with the main character Hanu, who lives on the edge of the forest and he is in a constant and uninterrupted relationship with its inhabitants. He is primarily associated with the endangered lynx, with whom he has developed deep inner connection during many years of observation and assistance. Thanks to the masterly designed interweaving of scenes of everyday reality and scenes captured by surveillance cameras, which Hanu disguised in the forest in order to follow the movements of animals, especially lynxes, during the day and the night, we are almost hypnotized, but also deeply moved. We are faced with what is not part of our experience, but is an important part of life unknown to us that is almost hidden from our consciousness in everyday life. The film is a great combination of completely different visual impressions from the familiar colour of reality, through specially emphasized colour images of flickering daytime scenes that highlight the unsurpassed beauty of lynxes and other inhabitants of the forest, to night shots of an active and disturbing, often endangered life on the alert. Eyes of lynxes and other creatures shine in the dark creating impressions which intensely wake up our senses.

This is a dramatic and exciting film testimony about Hanu’s intimate participation in the life of the lynxes, observing each of them as a person with its own name, recognizable character, but also doomed to an uncertain almost hopeless fate due to cruelty of the men hunters. Hanu’s person is almost fused with the being of the lynx, making him a unique lynx whisperer.

A stunning documentary film noir that creates exciting twists and surprises.

Finland, Estonia 2023 
80 minutes 

Anna Rubi: Your Life Without Me

A great work that was premiered at just ended festival in Sarajevo, where it had the honor to open the main competition programme for documentary films and where it was awarded with a special award for its exceptional values that highlight its most important dimension – fight for more humane world!

Intelligent, educated and empathetic people realized a long time ago that the wealth of the world is also in the existence of all beings that surround us. Many care about endangered pandas, Siberian tigers, and griffon vultures in our country. Foundations, states and governments readily participate in this care for all our small and large companions who cannot cope with the world that is becoming more and more cruel. But when it comes to people who cannot do the same as the majority, who are denied the ability to move and speak normally, and above all to live independently, they remain invisible to many. Unfortunately, also for some states and governments whose basic obligation is to take care of every citizen, especially the vulnerable. There is some concern when it comes to children, but when the children grow up, and those who take care of them are getting older and weaker, when help is needed the most, those who make decisions seems that they do not see that there are problems. This incredibly dramatic and exciting film tells about those often invisible wonderful people, who, surprisingly, still bring joy and warmth, about their most selfless protectors and representatives and the collision with the Kafkaesque state system of recklessness and absurdity. With the greatest respect and sincerity, we follow the touching and difficult everyday life, with immense admiration for the noble and dedicated advocates, mothers with stoic character and great human capacity for love and sacrifice, following the example of charismatic ancient heroines.

A film that takes us through numerous trials, enriches us and fills us with the power of love and spirit!

Hungary, Sweden 2024
72 minutes

Sissel Morell Dargis: Balomania

This text is written by Svetlana and Zoran Popovic, the Magnificent7 festival directors. The film will be screened tonight at MTS in Belgrade. If you also want to read my review of the film, click here https://filmkommentaren.dk/sissel-morell-dargis-balomania-anmeldelse/.

Brazil, favela labyrinths filled with secrets, huge paintings floating in the night sky! An intimate story and a personal fascination grow into a search and at the same time into a stunning defense and praise of an unrecognized art. This exciting, brilliant film became a global hit in a flash and amazed countless world festivals after its world premiere in Copenhagen.

A Danish girl enters favelas of São Paulo to discover real people behind the well-known legend of secret brotherhoods of persecuted and elusive urban heroes – the baloeiros! The film was shot for more than a decade, and the young Danish director undertook an uncertain and lengthy search to reach her protagonists and to gain their trust in the conditions of constant police threats and persecution. From the poor districts of the big Brazilian cities secretly, in specially organized expeditions, large, mysterious packages are taken to the nearby forests, to the hills and before our eyes they turn into huge floating objects lit by the flickering light of the fire, then in an instant they rise into the sky, leaving us breathless. Huge dream-like balloons sail across the vast expanse of the sky, testifying to everyone that baloeiros exist, that once again they defeated repression and the system! Completely mesmerized, without taking their eyes off the sky, another group of devotees chases balloons for kilometers – they are enthusiastic admirers, balloon hunters, who accept their prey as the greatest treasure far from the place where they took off. Many of them are dreaming of becoming baloeiros themselves. The Danish author, thanks to her dedication and openness to understand this phenomenon, allows us to witness an unusual rebellion. Ballons painted in the manner of a naive artistic expression carry icons of popular culture imbued with ancient tradition. They convey messages of the spirit of freedom and beauty of the oppressed souls, trapped by misery, bringing them joy and filling them with pride!

A magnificent cinematic adventure!

Denmark, Spain 2024. 
93 minutes