Emir Kusturica: El Pepe, Una Vida Suprema

They are sitting outside the house of the former president of Uruguay José Pepe Mujica. Pepe and Kusturica. The film director lights his cohiba cigar, Pepe is preparing his mate, spitting out the first tasting, too strong it always is. No words are said, they look at each other, they take their time, smiles are on their faces – an excellent start of a film, where the film director expresses his admiration for the modest man, who after being one of the leaders of the Tuparamos guerilla group that robbed Banks, performed kidnapping and later also went into violence, including killings, was caught and kept 13 years in prison. After his release – after the fall of the military dictatorship – he went into politics and became president of the country 2010-2015. A very popular one as demonstrates the film. Kusturica followed the President on his last day on duty with huge crowds celebrating him – and after the change, in his active retirement where he initiates housing projects and gives money from his own salary to help poverty decrease.

The years in prison were good for me, it made me think, he says in the film,

that is built around Kusturica and Pepe in conversation, with archive material of his travelling the world as the president and clips from Costa-Gavras film “State of Siege”, the fiction serves as documentary archive material in this context.

Pepe is a charismatic old man with a warm heart. He talks about changing the culture, fighting capitalism, he is in love with nature, he cultivates flowers, he cooks and talks about his dog Manuela, and he rides his blue old VW Beatle. He loves life and connects this love to his “deep solitude” in jail that made him reflect on the values of life.

Not to forget the most important, his life with Lucía Topolansky, also an ex-tupamaro. The film end with a collage of photos of the two, sitting in a café listening and singing quietly along one of the many beautiful pieces of tango music that goes with the main character(s). Topolansky is now vice-president in the new government.

Kusturica is not interested in giving the audience a solid background in terms of what happened in Uruguay during the dictatorship, it comes in bits and pieces and through interviews with two of Pepe’s companeros,

Mauricio Rosencof and Eleuterio Fernández Huidobro, the latter also analysing current international politics with no good words to Putin and his involvement in Ukraine.

Contrary to the film he made on Maradona, Kusturica lets Pepe come to the viewer without too mush focus on himself, just sitting there with a cigar trying to look like Che Guevara. It’s all right and he deserves credit for this sketchy homage to a man you can only love.

The film had its premiere at the Venice Film Festival 2018.

Uruguay, Serbia, 2018, 74 mins.

 

 

Matthieu Rytz: Anote’s Ark

DOCS & TALKS 2019 / CINEMATEKET / FRE 01/02 16:45

… Men løsningen er alligevel så let at en femårig kan forstå det. Vi må stoppe udslippene. Det er sort-hvidt. For enten sætter vi gang i en kædereaktion som udløser hændelser, som udløser hændelser, som er ude af menneskets kontrol, eller også gør vi det ikke. (Greta Thunberg i SVT 18. jan. 2019)

 

GEOGRAFI

Det første jeg overvældet forstår når jeg ser Matthieu Rytz ’ film er staten Kiribatis’, dette øriges skrøbelighed. De indledende optagelser fra højt oppe viser mig det, en spinkel ørække i en lang sekvens. Udsagnet i disse billeder er filmens indhold, som helt enkelt former sig som en uddybning af dette indtryksfulde overblik. Matthieu Rytz vil med det samme gøre klart, hvad den her dokumentar handler om. Skrøbelig og usikker skønhed. Den lille spinkle udriggerbåd på det store hav, det blå sejl og det blå vand og den tynde langstrakte øgruppe to meter over havets overflade på toppen af undersøiske vulkankrateres kanter.

Our whole nation is only two metres above sea level, and the report shows that the difference between 1.5°C and 2°C of warming is several centimetres of sea level rise. Given that we are already feeling the impacts of rising water, every millimetre counts. (Anote Tong, The Guardian, 10 Oct 2018)

KLIMA

Det er en ellers meget lidt drømmende, men derimod yderst realistisk skildring af dette land, dette første offer for klimakatastrofen – sådan vil det komme til at se ud når denne smukke i sig selv afsides hvilende nation går til grunde. Det vil være endnu flere vilde storme der river alt i stykker og vældige vandmasser i gader og huse. Og her i det lave land er der ikke højder og bjerge at flygte til, lige på den anden side er vandet også, lagunens vandstand stiger også. Klimakatastrofen er ikke noget som kommer engang, klimakatastrofen er noget som er nu. Stormene og havstigningerne er der – men måske vil en begyndelse for nogle af os i biografen ikke mærkes, før hændelserne snart vokser endnu mere i antal og styrke. I dokumentarprogrammets redegørelse og i vores virkelighed uden for biografen.

FISKERI

To fiskere, en mand og en kvinde røgter deres garn ude i havet. De står som de altid gør, som de al tid gjorde, i vand til brystet. Det er varmt nok, det er tropisk klima, det er på breddegraden 0. Vejret er det samme hver dag, solen bager, havet er azurblåt som spejl af himlen. Manden samler fangsten i en sin kurv mens han løsner dem af garnet. Kvinden tager mens hun tømmer sin del af nettet en af dem i munden og en i hver hånd og så vader hun hen til ham og lægger dem i kurven. De driller hinanden, de pjasker vand på hinden, de er glade. Som var de badegæster. Men de er på arbejde, de er fiskere, de hedder Sermary og Ato og er medvirkende i et visuelt antropologisk værk, og de står ude i havet som er en vældig del af deres land, en forudsætning for livet i deres lokale samfund, en af Kiribatis 35 øer som ligger lavt i havet fordelt i en række hen over Ækvator.

I en følgende scene sidder de to ved siden af hinanden på land og renser fiskene, det her er deres erhverv, så derefter kommer vel transporten til markedet og den fine lille udriggerbåd med det blå sejl er inde i billedet i dag som den har været det i måske hundrede år eller meget mere tænker jeg.

LANDBRUG

De er også landmænd, i en følgende scene klatres der i pakmer, der flækkes kokosnødder, der produceres kokosmel og kokosmælk men, forstår jeg, mindre og mindre…

Sea level rise is turning our freshwater resources salty, rendering the land unable to grow staple crops such as coconut and taro, and eating away our shoreline. (Anote Tong, ibid)

KULTUR

Jeg kigger på boligerne, på den ærværdigt sikre og beskedne arkitektur, denne selvfølgelige respekt for æstetikbogens kapitel 1 Om Stedets Ånd, som jeg læser i de fotografiske optagelser, som således også må være Matthieu Rytz’ udgangspunkt for sin politisk moralske pamflet: de er ved at miste deres venligt lave land, de smukke havhuse, de dejlige fiskerbåde med farvede segl…

We are being told that we may have to abandon our islands, the places where our ancestors have been buried, where our children have a home and an identity. (Anote Tong, ibid.)

PRÆSIDENTEN

Fiskeren i en senere scene er Anote, han står i havet som jo er en vældig del af hans land, hvis præsident han var. Nu dykker han ned og fanger fisk med de bare hænder, nu er han både fisker i t-shirt og shorts og international klimaaktivist i jakkesæt, hvid skjorte og slips. Han tabte seneste præsidentvalg og han fisker igen og vold mod havet. Han fascinerer mig med det samme for det er flot og prægnant hvad han siger, det ser jeg også i hans skriftsprog som fortsat statsmand og aktivist i en artikel han har skrevet i The Guardian, som jeg så lige nu og her bringer citater fra…

If this disastrous outcome comes to pass, my people will need a place of safety to move to. Rather than be regarded as “climate refugees” – a term that has no definition or status in the international legal system – I seek migration with dignity for my people. (Anote Tong, ibid.)

SYNOPSIS

What happens when your nation is swallowed by the sea? With the harsh realities of climate change looming, the low-lying Pacific nation Kiribati must find a new solution for the survival of its people. With sweeping cinematography, Anote’s Ark interweaves two poignant stories. Anote Tong, endearing president of the island, races to find options—advocating in international climate negotiations and even investigating building underwater cities. At the same time, warm and sharp-witted Sermary, a young mother of six, tackles every struggle with humour. She must decide whether to leave the only culture she knows on the island and migrate to a new life in New Zealand.

First-time filmmaker Matthieu Rytz sharply captures the next evolution in the shifting dynamics of climate change—one where borders, technology, and global treaties are urgent and can change daily life as we know it. This portrait of the Kiribati people exudes strength of character and grace as they confront the inevitable change they are facing head-on. (Docs & Talks, ed.)

Matthieu Rytz, 2018 / eng. tekst / 77 min. / 140 min. inkl. debate

EVENT

How do we mitigate the consequences of the climate changes that we will have to live with and adapt to? This will be discussed by PhD Lily Lindegaard, who has researched climate adaptation and climate mobility in Vietnam, and former Emergency Managing Director of the UN in the Pacific, Sune Gudnitz. The debate is in English.

LINKS

https://www.dfi.dk/cinemateket/biograf/filmserier/serie/docs-talks-2019(Program og billetter)

www.theguardian.com (Anote Tong)

SVT Skavlan talk show (Greta Thunberg)

https://www.radionz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/360980/kiribati-criticism-of-anote-s-ark-political-film-director (Matthieu Rytz)

www.kristeligt-dagblad/debatindlæg (Jens Morten Hansen)

Nicolas Philibert

Filmkommentaren has written much about Nicolas Philibert, French master of documentaries. (http://www.filmkommentaren.dk/blog/blogpost/1931/)

I missed his new film at IDFA, but I will catch up asap with a review. In the meantime I have enjoyed reading an interview with the director that came out today in Variety, link below. He talks about documentaries en general, cinema-documentaries and tv-documentaries in connection with his new film, “Each and Every Moment”. The headline of the interview, made by Ben Croll, is „A Director Driven to make a statement can not make Cinema“.

Here is a quote from the interview:

Do you feel like your filmmaking approach has changed over the years?

I’d like to say yes and no. Yes, because each film required a new approach and a method tailored to the world I was exploring. No, because my methods still have a few invariables. I try not to prepare or research much before I start shooting. I need to save my appetite and curiosity for the actual shoot. If I knew too much going in, I wouldn’t want to make the film. Shooting is a process of learning and discovery, of confronting an unknown world. And so I don’t make films from a perch of knowledge, but rather one of ignorance. I don’t try to tell my audience how to think or how to feel, because I don’t know much more than they do. And that’s never changed…

Variety, link

DocsBarcelona The War Room

Well, it was quite friendly but of course there were – and should be – discussions about which films should be taken for the DocsBarcelona 2019 edition in May. On the photo you see the selection group except for the man, who took the photo, Joan Gonzalez, Director of the festival and CEO and founder of Parallel 40. At the end of the table me, Head of Programming, from left Daniel Jariod, filmmaker and teacher, Martina Rogers, visual artist and involved in DocsBarcelona for many years, as is Pol Roig Turró, filmmaker and the most important person for this meeting having coordinated the process, giving the 3 days a good flow, and Diego Mas Trelles, Head of Industry, producer and director.

The process? All members of the group had watched films in beforehand and made their priorities. During the three days 15 films had to be selected for the Panorama section, 8 for the Latitud and 5 for the What the Doc, that is for more daring and innovative documentaries. All of them in competitive sections. On top of that some films were put for special screenings, often with a debate attached. In the coming weeks the staff of DocsBarcelona will contact those whose films have been taken.

A lot more about DocsBarcelona is to be found on

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

Nikolaus Geyrhalter: The Border Fence

This review is written by Georg Zeller, film director & cameraman, Bolzano Italy.

I start my review with a spoiler, the last scene of Nikolaus Geyrhalter’s newest documentary: A group of policemen opens a container full of rolls of wire fence. One of them steps in, everything ok. The officer smiles and says: „This is the famous border fence, we have to inspect it but we hope it will continue to lie here forever.“

In the end, the fence hasn’t been built.  And even policemen appreciate. Maybe because the numbers of people wanting to cross this border on their way to Germany or Sweden were much lower than expected. Maybe because even the politicians planning it, understood that a fence in this very point of Europe would be a strange, if not dangerous sign.

The film examines the atmosphere and reactions when in 2016/17 the idea of building a new fence along

the border of the Brenner came up, a mountain pass and important road and train connection between Austria and Italy, nowadays mainly a site of a huge outlet center attracting shoppers from both sides. This border is dividing also two parts of the region of Tyrol. The southern part of it was gained by Italy in the first World War. After that, a troubled history in the middle of two fascist states signed the first decades of this division until the idea of a united Europe losened it again since the 1990’s.

I had just finished film school in those years when I was sent as a cameraman for ORF to film the poles of the Brenner’s barriers been sawn off.  Heads of government of both countries and of both Tyrols applauded and spoke enthusiastically about their common future. As an inhabitant of this place – but with roots elsewhere – what I had regularly lived before that date, had finally become official: being a citizen of Europe.

These historical backgrounds may be the main reason why the people Geyrhalter talks to are very sceptical about a new „constructional measure“ (as the original title „Die bauliche Massnahme“ calls the fence in officialese), even those who are fearing those people walking with just a plastic bag along the freeway.

But the interviews (mostly in slow wide images and cuts on black as we are used from this author, but this time not hiding his leading of the talks) are also full of surprises. A lady who characterizes herself as being proud of her tiny mountain valley and its traditions, and after having expressed her fear that foreigners may completely undermine the religious identity of the place, is cooking lunch for the construction workers who are digging holes for a tunnel just outside her house. They are all of Senegalese origin… „We talk with hands and feet and respect each other“.

This is probably the main and important message of the film: When you personally meet the people („Let’s stop to call them migrants“ as one interviewee puts it), your fear may vanish. „Why should we fear someone who had to flee from war?“ says the organic farmer and tells the story of how he helped out a lost Ukrainian truck driver who was first treated badly by local police, but when he had the chance to tell his life story became a person treated with at least some respect.

In the film, only who has no direct contact to people passing through their valley, remains in the fear until the end, sometimes expressing absurd opinions („the people I see here are rich and healthy, they could have also survived in war.“). Thankfully, politicians are heard only through televisions hanging in the bars of the place – the filmmaker repeatedly cuts them away in the middle of their repetitive speeches – whereas we never see any migrants in the film, not even in the mountain meadow where the border is simply signed by a road sign.

The „crisis“ proposed as such by politicians remains thus in fact a phantasma and luckily does so also their „solution“ of a new fence. Let’s hope that also elsewhere in the world border fences will stay in their containers forever.

Austria, 2018, 112 mins.

Messi 400

I was there when Andres Iniesta stopped at FC Barcelona, last year – and I was there when Leo Messi made his goal number 400 for Barca. Yesterday. At Camp Nou. The first one, his first goal, was made at 17 years of age May 1st 2005 – you can see it on Youtube, as I did this morning, and you will also be able to enjoy the one and only Ronaldinho, the mentor of Messi, what a player he was and what a player Messi is.

As always I was there invited by Joan Gonzalez, on the Sunday before four days of selection work for the 2019 DocsBarcelona. A bit into the second half, I said to Joan “is Messi playing tonight”, he had been quite passive walking around on the middle of the pitch… it was as if the now bearded football star heard the ironic comment; moments later in a typical Barca tiqui-taca sequence he scored, and we 65.000 (Joan’s estimate) spectators got up from the chairs exploding in the cry of joy MESSI!

The photo is taken just after the match by Joan Gonzalez with my i-phone.

Gabrielle Brady: Island of the Hungry Ghosts

DOCS & TALKS 2019 / CINEMATEKET / ØST FOR PARADIS

 

STEDETS ÅND

Hun er bekymret, denne i alle måder smukke kvinde på fotografiet fra en scene i filmen, hun er nedtrykt, hun hedder Poh Lin Lee og hun holder mig fast i det filmen handler om, så den i en lyrisk form blidt og tålmodigt som hun i sit væsen indkredser øens genius loci. Men trods sin stilfærdighed er Gabrielle Bradys film en etisk og politisk pamflet som kunne bære overskriften j’accuse. Jeg er ikke i tvivl om mod hvad og mod hvem anklagen rettes. Styrken ved anklagen er ikke juridisk præcision, ikke overbevisende statistik, ikke kyndig antropologisk redegørelse, styrken er ved siden af disse berettigede og nødvendige fagligheder som må komme frem i festivalens samtale, dens talk-del, styrken ved anklagen er filmens cinematografi, dens inderlige skriven sin egen overbevisende research i sin egen fagligheds skrift, i en kunstnerisk indsigt i og forståelse af sin location, sit steds ånd og så her altså overgrebene mod den.

HUNGRY GHOSTS

Jeg ser Poh Lin Lee og hendes mands og deres børns respektfulde skildringer stedets gamle kultur, først af rituelle afbrændinger af symbolske papirrester efter de døde. Det handler om sjæl og legeme om ånd og materie, og moderen forklarer det til børnene: ”De første indvandrere kom til øen fra Kina for 100 år siden. De fik ikke en rigtig begravelse nogen af dem. Så vi som lever nu er nødt til at bede for dem. I en måned er de blandt de levende. De er the hungry ghosts. Hvis du på vejen ser en hvid skygge passere er det antagelig en vandrende ånd som går over.” Afbrændingen gælder, må jeg tro, de dødes menneskelighed så deres evighedshungrende ånd kan udvandre fra skyggetilværelsen til frihedens land. Og den lille familie besøger gravstenene over de første kinesiske migranter på øen og børnene lærer om monumenternes betydning for et steds historie og kultur. Jeg læser ikke filmen som analogi, læser ikke dens enkeltelementer som symboler. Jeg ser et voksende anklageskrifts konkrete passus akkumulere.

DRAGEN

Jeg ser havets brænding ved kystens klippeformationer, dønningerne slår ind, jeg hører en hviskende stemme. ”… så sagde han: ’Jeg vil udføre én sidste ting. Jeg vil flyve omkring øen og spytte vand alle vegne og vandet vil blive liggende og det vil sprøjte ud af klipperne for at beskytte øen mod menneskene.’ Og han fløj rundt om øen og spyttede vand ind i klippen og han skar med sin ånde huller ind i klipperne. Lige efter han var færdig begyndte alle de blæste huller at sprøjte vand op i luften og alle hullerne blæste vand op således at Christmas Island al tid var beskyttet mod menneskene. Og dragen vendte tilbage til sin hule hvor man siger han stadigvæk er.”

Skabelsesberetningens fortæling om at beskytte øen mod menneskene, er faderens godnathistorie. Det ser jeg efter replikken og tror jeg forstår den filmiske passus som konkret sindbillede.

Jeg ser et langt afsnit med familiens udflugt i øens beskyttede natur, en weekend med campering og fest med højdepunkt i opsendelse af en varmluft ballon lysende i natten, de fire hengiver sig til stedets uantastelighed og søger måske med det blødt stigende og varmt lysende legetøj dragens beskyttelse. Han afviser vel kun de onde og det onde, beskytter de gode mennesker og det gode som princip.

OMSORG OG BRUTALITET

Jeg ser Poh Lin Lees bekymret indlevede kliniske samtaler med nogle af de internerede indvandrere og flygtninge i øens berygtede flygtninge og indvandrer detention, som er etableret af australske myndigheder og hvor hun er ansat som traumepsykolog og terapeut. Jeg har set hende stille en sandkasse op i sin klinik sammen med et udvalg af legetøjsfigurer og sætstykker så en indsigt kan formuleres i et tableau på et dukketeaters scene. Poh Lin Lees undersøgelse under samtaleterapien begynder med at patienten bygger i hendes sandkasse og en tilbageskubbet oplevelse, en glemt drøm formuleres.

I en samtale fortæller en kvinde med en traumepåført skade at hun oplever sandet som et hav, hvori hun med rystende fingre forsigtigt anbringer en båd og deri en person, en far med rygsæk og med sit barn i favnen. Hun rører ved båden, så den kæntrer. Er det et uheld, er det en handling i teaterscenen, altså hendes erindring, hendes skyld at hun alene i den lille flygtende eller emigrerende familie overlevede?

I en anden samtale ser en lige så angst og høflig mand sandet i den lille kasse som en ørken, og øen er en oase med de små træer og andet levende natur, ”… men mit land som jeg måtte forlade er kun nøgent sand og ødelæggelse.” Han spreder små krigslegetøjs ruiner og endnu mindre vrag af køretøjer og materiel så lagt som muligt fra oasen han byggede på i det lille tableau.

Der klippes lige her til en kort scene hvor hun taler i telefon med en medarbejder på flygtninge og indvandrer detentionen. Hun får besked om aflysninger, men ikke om årsagerne, ikke om hvor hendes klienter befinder sig, hvor de er sendt hen. Hendes klienter forsvinder bare. Jeg ser bekymringen i hendes ansigt, så afdæmpet, så kontrolleret.

Og jeg overværer et interview med en indvandrer: ”… ja, vi kom ulovligt til dette land, men hvorfor er det nødvendigt for dem at behandle os ulovligt?” Og jeg hører en kvinde fortælle om afhentningen af veninden. Ser en sandkasseberetning om det kendte oprør i detentionscentret. Filmen handler om omsorg og brutalitet.

ANSTÆNDIGHED

Fortællingen om de sjældne og som art truede røde landkrabber på Christmas Island og deres årlige vandring ud af af urskoven og hen over landevejen og byens gader i menneskenes område, passage over det vanskelige forland og til slut ud i havet for at parres og lægge æg er en parallel story line filmen igennem. En vandring for livet som de sjældne fugle på Lindholm, hvis eksistens under deres træk er dybt afhængig af et beskyttet område på den ø, hvis fremtid nu planlægges med et udrejsecenter, vist nok faktisk et internat.

Krabberne beskyttes imidlertid af nogle. Medarbejdere fra naturparken på øen bygger broer til krabberne så de kan forcere forhindringer, de arrangerer en konvoj af biler gennem flokken af vandrende krabber ind og ud mellem de mange dyr uden at skade dem. Poh Lin Lee standser sin bil og skubber krabberne forsigtigt blidt over vejen med en kost. Hendes mand lærer børnene at bygge de små broer og skubbe de myldrende dyr over vejen mens bilkøer venter.

Jeg fastholder at dette ikke er allegori eller symbol, det er nøgtern reportage. Nærbillederne af krabbernes migrantsrøm er et nutidigt sindbillede over udsat eksistens og Gabrielle Bradys film handler helt direkte om anstændighed.

FLUGT

Gabrielle Bradys film begynder med at et menneske forcerer hegn og mure, løber stønnende gennem skoven og natten, mere og mere anstrengt af kampen mod hængende grene og filtret krat. Til sidst skriger dette menneske så det må høres over alt i skoven. Titelsekvensen slår fast at denne historie handler om at flygte. Højdepunktet mod slutningen er en tilsvarende scene. Poh Lin Lee baner sig vej modsat i en voldsom kamp med machete mod urskovens ufremkommelighed, hun baner sig vej med machete i en skuffelsens og vredens aggression, når ad den rute frem til det mennesket må flygte fra, ser fra skovgrænsen ned på detentionscentret, hvor mødre og sønner skilles, ser det som en beskrivelse af et helvede.

Mor og datter sidder ved havet. Jeg kan ikke hjælpe de mennesker mere, siger hun, vi må rejse væk. Derefter de sidste handlinger: nedpakningen i hjemmet, krabberne når kysten og traumepsykologen ofrer sandkassen til havet med alle minder og erindringer hver for sig bundet i et sandskorn, måske.

Gabrielle Brady, 2018 / Eng. undertekster / 94 min. / 145 min. inkl. debat / Cinemateket, København: Torsdag 31. januar 16:30 / Øst For Paradis, Aarhus: Tirsdag 26. februar 

https://www.dfi.dk/cinemateket/biograf/filmserier/serie/docs-talks-2019(program og billetter)

http://www.christmasislandfilm.com// (filmens hjemmeside)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDPu6FiAt8s(trailer)

SYNOPSIS

Gabrielle Brady’s poetic and visually striking work on the nature of migration with the Australian asylum system as backdrop. The scenic and mysterious Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean is not just home of the red crab, which migrates by thousands from the jungle to the sea every year, and to a local population marked by Asian migrant culture. The island also houses one of three Australian detention centres where asylum seekers are detained and isolated indefinitely. Trauma therapist Poh Lin Lee tries to work with the detainees on their war traumas and the psychological consequences of their hopeless confinement – but her work is gradually becoming more difficult as the asylum seekers suddenly disappear without explanation from the authorities. (Docs & Talks ed.)

EVENT

Cinemateket: After the film, DIIS Senior Researcher Ninna Nyberg Sørensen and PhD Nikolas Feith Tan, researcher at the Danish Institute for Human Rights and Aarhus University, discuss asylum policies in Australia and Europe. The debate is in English. After the event, Docs & Talks hosts the festival’s opening reception in Asta Bar.

https://www.dfi.dk/cinemateket/biograf/filmserier/serie/docs-talks-2019

Øst for Paradis: Efter filmen vil DIIS-seniorforsker Ninna Nyberg Sørensen og Ph.d. Nikolas Feith Tan, der forsker i Australiens asylsystem ved Institut for Menneskerettigheder og Aarhus Universitet, diskutere asylforhold i Australien og Europa. Debatten foregår på engelsk.

https://www.paradisbio.dk/MovieDetails.aspx?movieId=10524 

Danish Bodil Nominations

The Danish film critics have made their choice and nominated the Best Danish film, the best male and female performance etc. etc. AND nominated five documentaries for that category. On filmkommentaren we have reviewed 4 of them, links attached

Bobbi Jene (Elvira Lind)

http://www.filmkommentaren.dk/blog/blogpost/4030/

Fanget i de fries land (Land of the Free) (Camilla Magid)

http://www.filmkommentaren.dk/blog/blogpost/4208/

Hjertelandet (Janus Metz & Sine Plambech)

http://www.filmkommentaren.dk/blog/blogpost/4348/

Olegs krig – en barndom i krigens skygge (The Distant Barking of Dogs)  (Simon Lereng Wilmont)

http://www.filmkommentaren.dk/blog/blogpost/4099/

Skjold & Isabel (Emil Næsby Hansen)

The Bodil is named after two great Danish actresses: Bodil Ipsen and Bodil Kjer.

The Association of Danish film critics have 50 members.

http://www.bodilprisen.dk/

DOCS & TALKS 2019 / PROGRAMME

THE DANISH INSTITUTE FOR INTERNATIONAL STUDIES (DIIS) AND CINEMATEKET PRESENT DOCS & TALKS – FILM AND RESEARCH DAYS, JANUARY 31st – FEBRUARY 6th, 2019

Daughters of foreign fighters from Georgia, flood-affected islanders in Kiribati and Australia’s hermetically sealed asylum centres. This year, we will once again travel far and wide at the third annual Docs & Talks film and research festival from January 31st to February 6th. The festival is organized by the Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS) and Cinemateket.

With its combination of both proximity and a larger social perspective, documentary film is an ideal point of departure for research dissemination and debate. Docs & Talks offers a total of eight film events, in which researchers from DIIS and scholars from other leading international research institutes, filmmakers and practitioners discuss and put into perspective the different themes of the films – and we invite the audience to participate in the debate.

This year, three of the films will focus on the fate of children in war: in eastern Ukraine, we experience the war through the eyes of ten-year-old Oleg; in the Idlib province of Syria, al-Nusra fighters raise their sons to join the armed struggle in a society where violence is breeding violence; and in Georgia, two young teenage girls are deeply marked by the absence of their fathers, who have left to fight for the Islamic State.

Two films in the program touch upon the issues of poverty, health, inequality and climate change, and we host a special event where we scrutinize the visual narratives that dominate the development world and the communication of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Where nothing else is mentioned, the debates are in Danish.

Sara Thelle og Mira Bach Hansen / Forum for Film og Formidling

Anne Blaabjerg, Troels Jensen og Sine Plambech / DIIS

Rasmus Brendstrup, programredaktør / Cinemateket

https://www.diis.dk/en/trending-topic/docs-talks-film-and-research-days-2019

 

PROGRAMME

THURS 31/01 16:30

ASYLUM POLITICS / ISLAND OF THE HUNGRY GHOSTS

Gabrielle Brady, 2018 / Eng. subtitles / 94 min. / 145 min. incl. debate

We open the festival with Gabrielle Brady’s poetic and visually striking work on the nature of migration with the Australian asylum system as backdrop. The scenic and mysterious Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean is not just home of the red crab, which migrates by thousands from the jungle to the sea every year, and to a local population marked by Asian migrant culture. The island also houses one of three Australian detention centres where asylum seekers are detained and isolated indefinitely. Trauma therapist Poh Lin Lee tries to work with the detainees on their war traumas and the psychological consequences of their hopeless confinement – but her work is gradually becoming more difficult as the asylum seekers suddenly disappear without explanation from the authorities.

EVENT After the film, DIIS Senior Researcher Ninna Nyberg Sørensen and PhD Nikolas Feith Tan, researcher at the Danish Institute for Human Rights and Aarhus University, discuss asylum policies in Australia and Europe. The debate is in English.

 

 

FRI 01/02 16:45

CLIMATE CHANGE / ANOTE’S ARK

Matthieu Rytz, 2018 / Eng. subtitles / 77 min. / 140 min. incl. debate

Imagine if your home country was swallowed by the sea? The impacts of climate change threaten the small island nation of Kiribati with total obliteration, and the inhabitants must prepare for a future in climate exile. ‘Anote’s Ark’ follows both the relentless struggle of President Anote Tong to raise international awareness and to ensure the survival and cultural heritage of his countrymen, as well as the young mother Sermary, who literally fights against the rising water level while trying to reconcile herself to the idea of a new life in New Zealand. With ethnographic sensibility, Rytz has created a relevant and unsentimental story about the harsh consequences of the rising sea level for ordinary people.

EVENT How do we mitigate the consequences of the climate changes that we will have to live with and adapt to? This will be discussed by PhD Lily Lindegaard, who has researched climate adaptation and climate mobility in Vietnam, and former Emergency Managing Director of the UN in the Pacific, Sune Gudnitz. The debate is in English. Tickets: 95/65 kr.

 

SAT 02/02 17:00

RADICALIZATION / BEFORE FATHER GETS BACK

Sanam mama dabrundeba / Mari Gulbiani, 2018 / Eng. subtitles / 80 min. / 140 min. incl. debate

The Pankisi Valley in Georgia is notorious for being the breeding ground of a large number of radicalized Islamic State foreign fighters. In ‘Before Father Gets Back’, the camera is turned towards the society they departed from, giving us a rare insight into the life of the families left behind. The film is a touching coming-of-age story about the two young friends Iman and Eve whose lives are filled with so much more than the absence of their fathers.

EVENT Meet the director of the film, Mari Gulbiani, who has worked with adolescents of the region through various projects, and Maja Greenwood, who recently finished her PhD on foreign fighters. Together they will shed light on why men and women choose to go to war on behalf of Islamic groups in the Middle East and the consequences for the families they leave behind. The debate is in English. Tickets: 95/65 kr.

 

SUN 03/02 14:00

CHILDREN IN WAR / THE DISTANT BARKING OF DOGS

Olegs krig, Simon Lereng Wilmont, 2017 / English ssubt. / 90 min. / 145 min. incl. debate

[EVENT IN DANISH] Den prisbelønnede danske dokumentarfilm ‘The Distant Barking of Dogs’ tager os med til Ukraines frontlinje, hvor vi gennem 10-årige Olegs øjne bliver vidne til det uskyldstab, krigen gradvist påtvinger barnesindet. Instruktør Simon Lereng Wilmonts mesterligt fotograferede film portrætterer indlevende, hvor centrale de nære relationer er, når verden, som man kender den, udvikler sig til en krigszone, når naboerne flygter og alt, hvad der er velkendt og trygt, opløses omkring en.

EVENT Efter filmen perspektiverer seniorforsker på DIIS Johannes Lang i samtale med Mozhdeh Ghasemiyani, psykolog hos Læger uden Grænser, konsekvenserne af at vokse op og leve i en krigszone, og ikke mindst betydningen af de nære relationer, når krig bliver hverdag. Billetpris 95/65 kr.

 

MON 04/02 16:30

SYRIA / OF FATHERS AND SONS

Talal Derki, 2017 / Engl. subt. / 98 min. / 150 min. incl. debate

[EVENT IN DANISH] Den gribende og dybt foruroligende dokumentar ‘Of Fathers and Sons’ har vundet et utal af priser på filmfestivaler verden over det sidste år. Syriske Talal Derki (‘Return to Homs’) har på imponerende vis fået adgang til det intime familieliv blandt en gruppe al-Nusra-krigere i det nordlige Syrien. Instruktøren vender kameraet mod børnene, og filmen bliver til en hjerteskærende skildring af, hvordan den voldelige ideologi overleveres til den næste generation. Sønnerne vokser op i en verden, hvor brutaliteten siver ned i barnelivet og former dem til en fremtid som børnesoldater.

I den efterfølgende debat ser DIIS-forsker Tore Refslund Hamming m.fl. nærmere på de jihadistiske grupperinger i Syriens ideologiske grundlag, deres brug af vold og hvordan det påvirker individet, særligt den yngre generation. Billetpris 95/65 kr.

 

MON 04/02 17:00

DOCS & TALKS SPECIAL / UN GLOBAL GOALS: THE POWER OF IMAGES

Talk & debate / English / 90 min

With this special event, we look at the power of images in relation to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and development issues in general. How has poverty, inequality and other development topics been portrayed through images and films up until today – and what are the consequences of this visual representation?

DIIS researcher Adam Moe Fejerskov moderates the discussion spiced with case examples from the past up until today. Meet researcher Tobias Denskus from Malmö University, Danish development journalist Pernille Bærendtsen and BBC journalist Sammy Awami. The talk is in English. Admission is free, but reservations are required.

 

MON 04/02 19:30

POVERTY / MOTHERLAND

Bayang Ina Mo / Ramona S. Diaz, 2017 / Eng. subtitles / 94 min. / 150 min. incl. debate

With Ramona Diaz’s award-winning observational documentary, we find ourselves in the middle of the hustle and bustle of the world’s largest maternity clinic at the public Fabella Hospital in Manila, where poor women have to share the beds with each other. Personal stories are being told in between laughter and tears, screaming children, noisy loudspeakers and babies lost and found. The medical staff counselling on contraception and sterilization is met with scepticism in a society with strong catholic roots, and where young women often give birth to one child a year.

EVENT The film is followed by a discussion about reproductive health, inequality, poverty and sustainable development with DIIS Senior Researcher Helle Munk Ravnborg and Arthur Larok from ActionAid International. The debate is in English. Tickets: 95/65 kr.

 

TUES 05/02 16:45

TRAFFICKING / BLOWIN’ UP

Stephanie Wang-Breal, 2018 / Eng. subtitles / 98 min. / 150 min. incl. debate.

In Queens, New York, Judge Toko Serita is leading the first US Human Trafficking Intervention Court, a ground- breaking initiative to change the way women arrested for prostitution are prosecuted. The critically acclaimed documentary ‘Blowin’ Up’ brings us right into the turmoil of interpreters, lawyers and advisors inside and outside the courtroom and gives us a very close look at how the court works.

There is much at stake for the young women who have been arrested by the police on the street or in the many massage parlors of the city: in addition to a sentence, they often face problems with immigration authorities and risk deportation. With great insight and nuances, the film depicts how this profound change of the legal system affects the individuals involved, and what happens when prosecution and punishment are replaced with support and advice.

EVENT After the film, director Stephanie Wang-Breal, Maja Løvbjerg Hansen of the NGO The Danish Street Lawyers (Gadejuristen) and the leader of the NGO The Nest International (Reden), Kira West, will discuss the legal and social connections between migration, trafficking and sex work. DIIS senior researcher Sine Plambech moderates the debate in English. Tickets: 95/65 kr. 

 

WED 06/02 17:30

RESEARCH & FILM / HEARTBOUND

Hjertelandet / Janus Metz, Sine Plambech, 2018 / 90 min. / 145 min. inkl. debat

[EVENT IN DANISH] Få et indblik i, hvordan antropologisk feltarbejde og migrationsforskning forvandles til en prisvindende dokumentarfilm. Gennem ti år har filmskaberne Janus Metz og DIIS-seniorforsker Sine Plambech fulgt en håndfuld familier, som gennem arrangerede ægteskaber binder to perifere områder i Danmark og Thailand tæt sammen. Det er blevet til filmen ‘Hjertelandet’, en alternativ kærligheds- og migrationshistorie. Filmen havde danmarkspremiere i efteråret 2018 og har siden rejst verden rundt på festivaler.

EVENT Se eller gense Hjertelandet og mød filmens hovedrolleindehaver Sommai Molbæk og antropolog Sine Plambech til en samtale om at lade sit liv og sine valg være omdrejningspunktet i en film og et forskningsprojekt – og om værdien af at lade sin historie fortælle til den brede befolkning. Billetpris 95/65 kr.

TICKETS

https://www.dfi.dk/cinemateket/biograf/filmserier/serie/docs-talks-2019

 

DIIS OG CINEMATEKET I PARADIS PRÆSENTERER

DOCS & TALKS AARHUS

FILM- OG FORSKNINGSDAG D. 26. FEBRUAR 2019

 Dansk Institut for Internationale Studier (DIIS) og Cinemateket byder endnu en gang velkommen til DOCS & TALKS AARHUS – Film- og Forskningsdag tirsdag d. 26. februar i Øst for Paradis, hvor vi i år byder på to tankevækkende arrangementer, der kombinerer dokumentarfilm med forskningsformidling og debat.

Forskere fra DIIS vil sammen med kolleger fra bl.a. Aarhus Universitet diskutere og perspektivere filmenes temaer – og invitere publikum til at tage del i debatten.

Med DOCS & TALKS går vi endnu tættere på aktuelle begivenheder end i den daglige nyhedsstrøm, samtidig med at vi skildrer de grundlæggende politikker, ideologier og udviklingstendenser, der ligger bag. Festivalen løber af stablen i Cinemateket i København d. 31. januar. til 6. februar og i Aarhus d. 26. februar. Tanken med Docs & Talks er at formidle viden på en anderledes og spændende måde til et bredt publikum – og at gøre båndet mellem film og forskning stærkere. Vi glæder os til at byde et spørge- og diskussionslystent publikum velkommen!

 

TIR 26/02 14:00

ASYLPOLITIK / ISLAND OF THE HUNGRY GHOSTS

INSTRUKTØR: GABRIELLE BRADY / 150 min. inkl. debat

Gabrielle Bradys poetiske og visuelt slående værk om migrationens væsen har den australske asyllovgivning som baggrund. Den på én gang naturskønne og sælsomme ø Christmas Island i det Indiske Ocean er ikke bare hjemsted for den røde krabbe, der hvert år migrerer i tusindtal fra junglen til havet, og for en lokalbefolkning præget af asiatisk migrantkultur. Øen huser også en af de tre australske lejre, hvor asylansøgere tilbageholdes og isoleres på ubestemt tid. Traumeterapeuten Poh Lin Lee forsøger at få migranterne til at bearbejde deres krigstraumer og konsekvenserne af den udsigtsløse indespærring – men hendes arbejde bliver gradvist sværere at udføre, fordi asylansøgerne pludselig forsvinder uden forklaring fra myndighederne.

 Efter filmen vil DIIS-seniorforsker Ninna Nyberg Sørensen og Ph.d. Nikolas Feith Tan, der forsker i Australiens asylsystem ved Institut for Menneskerettigheder og Aarhus Universitet, diskutere asylforhold i Australien og Europa. Debatten foregår på engelsk.

AUSTRALIEN, TYSKLAND, UK, 2018. DCP FARVE. 94 MIN. ENGELSKE UNDERTEKSTER. TILLADT OVER 15 ÅR. ENTRE 80 KR.

 

TIRS 26/02 17:00

SYRIEN / OF FATHERS AND SONS

INSTRUKTØR: TALAL DERKI / 160 min. inkl. debat

Den gribende og dybt foruroligende dokumentar ‘Of Fathers and Sons’ har vundet et utal af priser på filmfestivaler verden over det sidste år. Syriske Talal Derki (‘Return to Homs’) har på imponerende vis fået adgang til det intime familieliv blandt en gruppe syriske al-Nusra-krigere i det nordlige Syrien. Instruktøren vender kameraet mod børnene, og filmen bliver til en hjerteskærende skildring af, hvordan den voldelige ideologi overleveres til den næste generation. Sønnerne vokser op i en verden, hvor brutaliteten siver ned i barnelivet og former dem til en fremtid som børnesoldater.

I den efterfølgende debat ser DIIS-forsker Tore Refslund Hamming m.fl. nærmere på de jihadistiske grupperinger i Syriens ideologiske grundlag, deres brug af vold og hvordan det påvirker individet, særligt den yngre generation.

TYSKLAND, SYRIEN, 2017. DCP FARVE. 98 MIN. ENGELSKE UNDERTEKSTER. TILLADT OVER 15 ÅR. ENTRE 80 KR.

BILLETTER

https://www.paradisbio.dk/MovieDetails.aspx?movieId=10524

(Island of the Hungry Ghosts)

https://www.paradisbio.dk/MovieDetails.aspx?movieId=10525 

(Of Fathers and Sons)

Viviane Candas: A Possible Algeria

TODAY, NOW…

Viviane Candas: A Possible Algeria 

by Allan Berg Nielsen / Filmkommentaren, le 4.2.2018 / Docs & Talks 2018 / translation into English: Sara Thelle

1.

The film is built upon the voice, the director of the film’s own voice. It tells the story. I always like that, it is honest, it is literary, closer to writing. And Viviane Candas’ voice makes me feel safe and makes me listen, even though what it tells me is horrifying. Next, her film builds on the archive material, a rare collection of historical footage edited together with a private archive. I almost always like that too, at least when it is done in a poetic construction like it is here, and not as a pedantic communication of a curriculum. In Candas’ work, this material is the very connection between the history of the world, the history of Algeria, the history of France and the biography of Yves Mathieu. He was Viviane Candas’ father, French as she, but deeply connected with Algeria in the country’s fateful hour. The narrative of the film is embedded in the two lines of the title, A Possible Algeria: The Revolution of Yves Mathieu, and in the contrast between society/nation/people and the individual lies the existential drama and the reflection on the nature of identity. Finally, the film is built on Candas’ uniquely sensitive and honest interviews with a few of the story’s key figures, which in the literary spirit of the film are more searching conversations than factual question/answer scenes. The heterogeneity of this material testifies to a long-standing collection of footage for the film, and it is linked by vignettes from the research travels in a reconstruction that has a fixed visual uniformity which works as a refuge for reflection. But curiously, these vignettes do not function as the “now” of the story. The present of the film is the voice of Candas narrating, and the protagonists leading the conversation in the interview scenes, where the director’s voice is usually cut out, and yet in a strange way she is still very present. The conclusion of all this results in me really meeting these people, and the encounter with an old Ahmed Ben Bella is an emotional shock. This is the present of the film, here is world history itself present in this fragile body that speaks of itself as a socialist. Today, now …

2.

The war in Algeria was a French matter, as I remember it, and the war was the brutality of the French military. I read about Djamila Boupacha in the Danish periodical Perspektiv, a specific quote from her during the trial, her important testimony, is still locked in my memory, still shaking me, because I remember how it was with me and the knowledge of violent brutality back then. She was always Picasso’s drawing, but it was not about Picasso, it was her. She, the model imprinted on the small portrait drawn after a photograph, was stronger than the artist, in a way opposite Guernica, who was always the famous painter more than the wretched city. I read Simone de Beauvoir’s novel The Mandarins about the French Intellectual Left in the 1940s, on the circle of Camus and Sartre. And I read about the war and about General Jacques Massu and his paratroopers’ victory in 1957 over the FLN Resistance in the capital, which he tore up with arbitrary arrests and brutal interrogations and systematic torture. It was The Battle of Algiers, which in 1966 also became a film by Gillo Pontecorvo with Jean Martin in the role of Colonel Mathieu, who is probably a portrait of General Massu, a feature film in black and white documentary style with amateurs straight in from the street in most of the other roles. The mimic documentary quality of Pontecorvo’s film is so astonishing that Candas has been able to use scenes from it as part of her archive material, for example the execution scenes.

3.

The opening sequence, the first images: the bridge with the cars in the mountain landscape, the roads seen from the car, the railway station with the train on a regular day, the style of the images as a whole and their particular technical quality define the time of the film as present, right now when these images where filmed, and right now where I am experiencing it, recalling the story of Algeria’s war of independence as scattered fragments bound in the films, photographs and documents from the archives, which are consistent layers in the architecture of the film: its past.

4.

The participants in the conversations are in this now, the director’s voice is in this now, the scenes of the vignettes are this now, thereby framing everything with the present, also the layers of the archive footage, which through the superb editing work is writing the film’s past. It is the fragile images of the memory, the fragments of the past, to which the voices add details. To all the terrifying events. But also adding clarifications, about what really happened: the guillotine in the prison yard; the execution of an Algerian resistance fighter; how an exit at a main road holds the information about the way in which Yves Mathieu in all probability was murdered, a circumstantial evidence indicating that this was possible, such as the car wreck was found. It is a film about memory based on archive material more related to Chris Marker’s Level 5 (1997) written in the present of the editing room, with its minimal and indistinct but utterly decisive archive scenes and photos; and it is related to Emile de Antonio’s Millhouse (1971), made solely on archive clips and, as I remember it, written in the past tense as a form of serious entertainment, while Chris Marker’s film is a moral philosophical task in the present tense, precisely like the core of Viviane Candas’ oeuvre, which is a similar obligation for me, a challenge to my thoughts, precisely what the festival Docs & Talks where the film is screened is intending.

5.

Candas’s film does not document this brief but violent chapter of Algeria’s history, rather her film is documenting a qualified thought about this period in history, a thought qualified by the memory of a state leader, the memory of a minister, and a daughter’s remembrance of her absent father. She now needs to share their memories, in order to understand her well-ordered fragments as historical knowledge, to come to love her revolutionary father, who was far away and buried in work, understand him and love him unreservedly now, despite him having been dead for many years. She stands in the present with the plate with the grave inscriptions in her hand, considering the right lapidary summary of this person’s life.

6.

The subtitle of the film is La révolution d’Yves Mathieu as I read on the screen after the title sequence. This is a couple of days ago, and I only now begin to understand the importance of the title as a whole. I am ready to watch this remarkable film again, ready to listen to Rasmus Alenius Boserup’s introduction and to his conversation with Viviane Candas in Cinemateket at the Docs & Talks Film and Research Festival.

Photos: Yves Mathieu and Ahmet Ben Bella

http://www.filmkommentaren.dk/blog/blogpost/4151/  (Filmkommentaren, le 4.2.2018)

 

DOCS & TALKS 2019

DIIS OG CINEMATEKET / FILM- OG FORSKNINGSDAGE /

31. JANUAR- 6. FEBRUAR 2019