DocsBarcelona 2021

… has been running for some days and goes on until May 30 in a hybrid version: online and with screenings in cinemas. I was not there last year and the same goes for this year, alas. At the 24th edition. I will for sure do everything to be there next year for the 25th celebration of an event that I have been part of from the very beginning. It has been a true pleasure to be part of the industry sessions for the first many many years, and now also as Head of the Programming committee. This year is my last year in this position, I leave with pleasure the chair to Pol Roig, a true film lover and connaisseur, who these days are busy introducing films and directors – as well as leading Q&A’s. Go to https://docsbarcelona.com/ and see the selection we did for this year. 

Anyway, if not in Barcelona, you can take part actively from your home, which I have done introducing seventeen (17) 45 mins conversations between filmmakers with rough cuts of their films asking for feedback. We called it “artistic consultancies” = talk about content and structure and storytelling. Far from the usual pitching. I asked directors, producers and consultants to comment, they did, they were very well prepared for these private meetings as were the filmmakers of course and it is my impression that the latter left with inspiration, encouraged to work on for the next cut. Face to Face. From South America to Europe, from Mexico to Ukraine, from Costa Rica to Georgia, from Copenhagen to NY, from Italy to Switzerland… As a technical analphabet I am now a fan of zoom, it worked so well also because of my partner in crime at DocsBarcelona, Neus Perez. Thank you for your warm professionalism!

https://docsbarcelona.com/

Krakow opens wirh „Polański, Horowitz..

The opening ceremony of the Krakow Festival and the international premiere of the film “Polański, Horowitz. Hometown” by Mateusz Kudła and Anna Kokoszka-Romer will be held on the 30th of May at 8 p.m. at the cinema Kino Kijów. The film is a colourful story about childhoods, friendship, the common Jewish fate of the protagonists and, most of all, about Krakow – a place that, despite the passage of time and many changes, remains their home.

For the opening of the festival, we try and select spectacular films, as well as such which constitute a kind of common denominator for the festival programme. In the film “Polański, Horowitz. Hometown” there are many threads that are particularly dear to us — emotions, humour, nostalgia and Krakow as the witness of the events, but also as the setting of the film, explains Krzysztof Gierat, the director of the Krakow Film Festival…

 

The film with the participation of the Golden Palm and Academy Award winner, the director Roman Polański and his friend, world-famous photographer Ryszard Horowitz, will be presented in the Polish competition of this year’s Festival. After several dozen years, the protagonists finally manage to meet in their home city. They wander around Krakow following the footsteps of their wartime experiences. They wander the streets of Kazimierz and the former ghetto, visit the homes where they spent their boyhood, remember those who are no longer there, but also those who survived the Holocaust. 

Roman Polański recalls to this day that three-year-old Ryszard was fussy and did not want to drink his birthday chocolate, miraculously obtained by his parents in the reality of the occupation, Mateusz Kudła, director and producer of the film, tells an anecdote.

They visit familiar places, sharing their most personal childhood and youth memories that shaped future artists. Their return to Krakow evokes in them the feelings for which they were not prepared. The protagonists also return to the traumatic moments from their childhood, reveals Anna Kokoszka-Romer, producer and director of the film.

The documentary film became famous last year when the Yad Vashem Institute in Jerusalem awarded the title of “Righteous Among the Nations” to the family who hid Polański in a village near Wadowice during the war. The director gave testimony after meeting their grandson, whom the filmmakers found.

Ryszard Horowitz also owes his life to the Righteous Among the Nations — Oskar Schindler, whose story was made famous by Steven Spielberg in the Academy Award-winning film “Schindler’s List”. A German factory owner saved over a thousand Jews from the Holocaust, including the future photographer and his sister Bronisława “Niusia” Horowitz-Karakulska, whom we will also see in the film. However, the future photographer did not escape deportation to a German concentration camp. Ryszard, a few years old at the time, was one of the youngest prisoners to survive the hell of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

The producer of the film “Polański, Horowitz. Hometown” is KRK FILM, the production of the film is supported by the Fund for the Support of Creativity of ZaiKS, the Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany in Krakow and the WFDiF. KRK FILM, Znane Studio and Soundprove are responsible for the post-production.

https://www.krakowfilmfestival.pl/en/

Nordisk Ministerråd: No support for NP in 2022

NP – Nordisk Panorama, held annually, has for the last 30 years been the key venue for promoting and launching Nordic short and documentary films. This reduction equals a 60% cut in NP’s operating budget, which in turn will mean drastic cuts for the film sector at a time when the pandemic has devastated the film industry.

Anita Reher, Director, stated, “We provide the stepping-stone, that lets Nordic filmmakers reach beyond their borders to the world. Filmmakers needed our support in the best of times. Now, as they face endless challenges, the Council’s decision will have a dramatic impact on the industry’s most important gathering in our region.” 

Demand is running higher than ever for participation in what the Nordisk Film & TV Fond’s recently released distribution report determined is a “key industry event” in the Nordic Region, the Nordisk Panorama Pitching Forum, which presents new Nordic film projects to financiers. That demand will only grow as the audiovisual industry struggles to get back on its feet again. Most of the companies Nordisk Panorama supports are independent enterprises that rely heavily on Nordic co-financing to realize their films.

Nordisk Panorama’s primary objective is to encourage collaboration and the production of high-quality short and documentary films in the Nordic countries. It was also created to let new voices and new generations of filmmakers enter the film industry. NP’s framework enables independent filmmakers to promote their films and receive funding from public sources in the Nordic region and from the industry at large. NP gathers the resources – creative talent, industry networks, and international financiers from broadcasting, film institutes, streaming platforms, and private foundations – that let Nordic filmmakers succeed on the world stage.

The visual storytellers Nordisk Panorama serves are the ambassadors of Nordic culture for our region and around the world. Nordisk Panorama has enabled Nordic filmmakers to maintain an outsized presence in the global film industry. Documentaries are also at the forefront of raising awareness about critical issues and encouraging public dialogue.

CPH:DOX 2021

Don’t Just Watch. Listen

Since 2003, it has been

the mission of CPH:DOX to reflect

the complexity of our world.

That hasn’t changed

but the world is changing

in unexpected ways.

Reality is being reshaped

Facts are being rejected

We are losing our sense of shared reality.

This makes it more important

than ever to listen.

To each other

To experts

To artists

To those rarely heard.

Documentaries make a difference

Because they invite us to do just that.

They transcend borders,

Offer new viewpoints, inspire change.

This year, CPH :DOX is inviting

a wide range of voices to our festival

We are welcoming a new team of

young co-curators along with

filmmakers, artists, scientists,

and experts from all over the world.

We pass the mike and invite you

To be part of the conversation.

This year, don’t just watch. Listen

Camilla Nielsson: President

”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”. Said Camilla Nielsson to me in an interview back in November 2014, published in a Danish Film Institute magazine on the occasion of her film’s showing af IDFA that year. I refer to ”Democrats” that we followed quite intensely on this site on its road to festivals – and awards – around the world.

Love for characters, I was happy to meet again Paul Mangwana and Douglas Mwonzora, the protagonists of ”Democrats”, in Nielsson’s new film ”President”. Their job in ”Democrats” was to create a constitution – Mangwana on behalf of ZANU-PF, Mwonzora for MDC-T. Two very different characters and temperaments I got to like thanks to filmmaker Nielsson and her cameraman Henrik Bohn Ipsen. In ”President” they are side characters, Mangwana furious in a long scene, where the members of ZEC (Zimbabwe Electoral Commission) is questioned on their impartiality by the opposition party MDC-T, and the elegant cool Mwonzora being present in several scenes as one of the sympathetic strategists working hard to win the presidency for Nelson Chamisa.

 

 

Camilla Nielsson succeeds to make Chamisa and his people interesting to follow. With a clear structure and very much based on the “reading” of faces – the film is full of lovely close-ups – that cameraman Ipsen gives us. Example: We study Chamisa in cars taking him to meetings with the people at the election campaign; sometimes you sense he is nervous, sometimes he is happy with people’s warm reception of him, sometimes he is reflecting or is in sadness like when he has met the family of one of the six, who were killed by soldiers confronting MDC supporters with water cannons and bullets. There is a rhythm in this, the dramaturgy of the film plays constantly with emotional contrasts. Jeppe Bødskov is the editor, great work.

Character-wise, with more charisma I find with Nkululeko Sibanda, who is the spokesperson of Chamisa, passionate and it´s almost heartbreaking to see his reaction, when he discovers he has been fooled to let the police bring MDC staff into a van “for protection”. “Did I make a mistake?”. And you find other personalities as the man with the hat, who says that this is “not an election, it’s a selection”. Or, the images of Justice Chigumba, chair of ZEC, when she sits in the court room like a sfinx attending the post-election court case by MDC against the same ZEC, accused of fraud and manipulation… Stone-face and yet a couple of times with flickering eyes. Advocate Mbofu is proceeding for MDC, we viewers have followed the MDC collecting evidence like “how come the voting results are identical in 16 cases”!!!

Not to forget the press conference given by Mugabe, where he indirectly declares his support for Emmerson Mnangagwa, who is now the president of Zimbabwe. He answers with humour as he sits there, an old weak man, a statesman, could not help like him at that moment…

In another interview Camilla Nielsson has said that she prefers character to story. That’s where her huge talent comes forward again as it did in “Democrats”, the talent as a true vérité filmmaker, who brings us “the feeling of being there” as Leacock said. In scenes that are full of energy. Far away from journalism and yet, Nielsson and Ipsen are covering the presidential election of Zimbabwe with nuances, one-sided?, well no doubt where the sympathy is – with those who want democracy, change change change as Chamisa declares again and again in the mass gatherings where the people show their palms – but the two were at the inauguration of Mnangagwa. The film ends with him looking at us viewers. What’s next? Yes what’s next with the film, can it/will it be shown in Zimbabwe. It took time for “Democrats”, “Camilla Nielsson against Zimbabwe”!

Photo: Henrik Bohn Ipsen, from the film.

Baltic Sea Docs 2021 announces call for projects

Baltic Sea Forum for Documentaries (BSD) is the most important documentary training and pitching event in the Baltic countries, taking place in Riga, Latvia. The 25th edition is scheduled to take place in a hybrid form from 1 – 12 September 2021, with the industry events held mostly online. The call for projects is open now and will close on 11 June. 

BSD is looking for applications from independent production companies from the wider Baltic Sea region countries (Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden), Eastern Europe and Caucasus region, and from other countries if the documentary subject relates to the region. The main focus of the BSD is on full-length creative documentary projects, but cross-media applications are also welcome to apply. The international selection committee will select 18 projects to be pitched for the international broadcasters, sales agents, film funds and other industry representatives. 

 

 

Participation at BSD is free of charge. The selection results will be announced by 12 July.

Guidelines and application form is accessible on BSD website.

Every year BSD gathers around 150 film professionals from the Baltic Sea region, Eastern Europe, and Caucasus. Participation in the preparatory workshops, pitching sessions and seminars is an opportunity for filmmakers to find funding for the production of their projects and to ensure that their films reach a wide audience across Europe and beyond. 2021 marks 25th edition of the BSD, and it will be reflected in various activities of this year’s program. 

To name just a few of the films presented in recent editions of the BSD – The Jump (2020, directed by Giedrė ickytė, 2020, Lithuania/Latvia/France, Best Documentary Feature award at Warsaw IFF), My Favorite War (2020, directed by Ilze Burkovska Jacobsen, 2020, Norway/Latvia, Feature Film Contrechamp Award and the Prix du Jury Senscritique at Annecy IA, This Rain Will Never Stop (2020, directed by Alina Gorlova, Ukraine/Germany/Latvia/Qatar, Award for Best First Appearance at IDFA). 

BSD is organised by the National Film Centre of Latvia, with financial support from the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Latvia and Riga City Council. In parallel to the industry activities, BSD is presenting a film program of recent documentaries, which will be screened online and in cinemas (if the epidemiological regulations will allow it).

For further information, please contact:

Zane Balčus

Project Manager 

Baltic Sea Forum for Documentaries

Phone + 371 26054287

E-mail: balticforum@nkc.gov.lv

balticseadocs.lv 

IDFF Artdocfest / Riga announces winners

With permission from FilmNewEurope and its Latvian correspondent Zane Balčus, we bring her article about:

Riga: International Documentary Film Festival Artdocfest / Riga run from 28 April to 3 May in Riga and outside the city. The main prize of the Artdocfest competition was awarded to the film Silent Voice, directed by Reka Valerik (a pseudonym of the director to conceal the identity of a filmmaker for the safety reasons). The film focuses on a young wrestler from Chechnya, who faces death threats due to his homosexuality and is forced to relocate to Brussels.

The main prize of the Baltic Focus competition was awarded to Restless Memories by Latvian director Elīna Lange-Ionatamishvili, who created a portrait of two children who live in the 2008 Georgia-Russia war refugee village.

As the cinemas in Latvia are still closed, the films of the programme were screened for a limited number of audiences consisting of one household in various venues (a farm, a film studio, a women’s prison, and others) followed by Q&A with film’s director. The rest of the screenings are planned to be held in August in cinemas. 

The festival has two competition sections – an Artdocfest competition (with 21 films) and Baltic Focus competition (films produced in or co-produced with Baltic countries, 10 films). The main award of the Baltic Focus competition is named Herz, honouring Latvian documentary filmmaker Hercs Franks (1926 – 2013).

The jury of the international competition gathered in Riga. The jury members were Russian film critic, editor of the film magazine Iskusstvo kino Anton Dolin, Latvian film critic, the director of the National Film Centre of Latvia Dita Rietuma, and journalist of music and politics Artemy Troitsky, who is currently based in Estonia. Baltic Focus competition jury worked remotely, and it was formed by documentary film consultant Tue Steen Müller (Denmark), director Alina Rudnitskaya (Russia), and associate professor of University of Cagliari Massimo Tria (Italy).

Full list of winners:

Artdocfest Competition

Grand prix

Silent Voice (France/ Belgium, 2020)

Directed by Reka Valerik

Best Director 

Viktor Kossakovsky for Gunda (Norway/ USA, 2020)

Special mention

The Earth is Blue as an Orange / Земля блакитна, ніби апельсин (Ukraine/ Lithuania)

Directed by Iryna Tsilyk 

Co-produced by Moonmakers

Baltic Focus Competition

Main Award

Restless Memories / Nemierīgās atmiņas (Latvia, 2020)

Directed by Elīna Lange-Ionatamishvili 

Produced by Mistrus Media

Co-produced by Latvian Academy of Culture

Best Director                           

Giedrė ickytė for The Jump / Šuolis (Lithuania/ Latvia/ France, 2020)

Produced by Moonmakers

Co-produced by VFS Films

Supported by the Lithuanian Film Centre, the National Film Centre of Latvia

Special mention

One Life / Vienas gyvenimas (Lithuania)

Directed by Marija Stonytė

Produced by Moonmakers

Supported by the Lithuanian Film Centre

Artdocfest was established in Russia in 2007. Since 2015 it was partnering with Riga International Film Festival as a non-competitive section of documentary films, but since 2018 it was running as an international documentary competition section within Riga IFF. The first single standing festival was planned to run in November/ December 2020, but was postponed to late April 2021 due to pandemic. Along the film screening, the festival also had a symposium dedicated to theoretical discussions on documentary cinema.

CPH:DOX – Forum/ 2

I knew it from visits to Kiev, the film project ”Expedition 49”, presented by director Alisa Kovalenko and producer Stéphane Siohan, with film and ArtdokFest festival director Vitalyi Mansky as ambassador recommending. But I had not seen the teaser they had produced especially for the CPH:DOX presentation. Absolutely great, 7 minutes of energy in images and a fine and personal voice-off by the director, motivating why she wants to make this adventurous documentary – adventurous as the five teenagers picked to go to the Himalayas with an old explorer are full of life and will, ”…in search of themselves, stuck in their bleeding little town, Zolote-4, Donbas, a shithole place shaken by the rumble of a lingering war with Russia and the haunting collapse of the coal mines…”. Very charming and dynamic presentation avoiding the usual pitch clichés of events like this: ”We are looking for funding blablabla”. Obvious that is, hope they will be succesful, the talent is, yes, obvious!

And of course I took a look at the pitch trailer of “Handheld”, which is a film about one of my heroes… read this text from the website of CPH:DOX: ”Pioneer of direct cinema, Albert Maysles redefined documentary film in practice and in meaning. With unfettered access to his entire filmography, personal archives, and never-before-seen footage, oldest daughter Rebekah will trace her father’s life.” It is especially the latter I look forward to see, the personal and not-seen-before as I am sure it will confirm the passion and curiosity of the Albert Maysles we have had the pleasure to meet in Denmark on several occasions. Old of age, young in spirit, I remember the tribute Jørgen Leth made to him at the European Film College in Denmark. Lovely, probably not filmed. In the clip there is a wonderful moment with Rolling Stones in the studio where bass guitarist Bill Wyman asks Maysles to leave… it’s disturbing to have you here!

CPH:DOX – Forum

In between watching films, mentoring for the CinéDoc Tbilisi, having the first corona vaccination and being tested in mouth and (luckily not so often) nose… I had the pleasure to check some of the pitches at the CPH:DOX Forum. More than 30 projects, well presented on the website with all necessary information, with an ”Ambassador” to recommend each project and with trailers that included presentations of what the producer/the filmmakers wanted in terms of financial and/or creative support. I have no idea of what happened at the individual meetings, hopefully good contacts were made. Chapeau for the Forum organisers, professionalism at highest level.

… and there he was again the forever young Jørgen Leth, together with talented Andreas Koefoed with an energetic and inviting teaser for their upcoming film on jazz, „Cold and Warm“. A quote from the description of the project, „Cold & Warm“ is like a grand catalogue of great musicians. For them, music is a way of being. Through images, music and words, we discover the art-form that keeps them alive. What does it mean to play? How does it feel to listen? As director Jørgen Leth poses existential questions to the musicians, long pauses occur. Because is it even possible to put the emotions of music into words?…“ Jørgen Leth praises the looseness of jazz and sees the film as a collection of notes. I was totally seduced.

… and Mads Brügger was there with „Double Trouble“ in his usual staged style and with a fascinating project, read this: „A feature length documentary about the secretive world of political decoys. The film explores how various dictators and strongmen have been using doubles as stand ins for themselves. The aim of the film is to find as many former real life political decoys as possible, and bring them all together for a lavish dinner at a luxury hotel, where they will be in character as their old masters.“

CPH:DOX – Skál

… which means Cheers in Faroese language and is the title of the film by Cecilie Debell & Maria Tórgarð

The CPH:DOX programme is launched. The festival runs from April 21 to May 12. The cinemas are scheduled to re-open in the beginning of May so the festival intends to be part of this (cross fingers…) festive celebration of watching (also) documentaries on a big screen. Otherwise the festival’s 177 films will be available (for those who are in Denmark) online as well as an enormous line-up of events. Check the website: https://cphdox.dk/film/

On this site – www.filmkommentaren.dk – we will follow the festival from now on with recommendations of films to be watched. It will be in English as many of the films will show up to be watched at other festivals around the world.

“Skál” is excellent, simply, full of poetic moments between two young people, who express themselves through music and poetry. The cinematography is including the landscape of the Faroe Islands in the lovely portrait of Dania and Trygvi, who you can read more about in this CPH:DOX text: 

”Dania is 21 years old and grew up in a Christian community in the Faroe Islands’ Bible belt. She has just moved to Tórshavn and is seeing Trygvi, a hip-hop artist and poet locally known as Silvurdrongur (Silver Kid). He comes from a secular family and writes poems and texts about the shadow sides of humanity. Dania herself sings in a Christian band but is fascinated by Trygvi’s courage to write brutally honest lyrics. As she tries to find her place in the world and understand herself, she starts to write more personal texts. Her writings develop into a collection of critical poems called ‘Skál’ (‘Cheers’), about the double life that she and other youths must live in the conservative Christian world. A world she does not want to abandon, but to change. Where do you draw your lines when you are young and Christian? Is it a sin to drink or dance? Is it a sin to have sex before marriage? Is it a sin to have a boyfriend who is not a Christian? And how long can you endure living between two worlds?”