Thessaloniki Doc Festival 20 Years

Oh, really… The documentary film festival in Thessaloniki has existed for 20 years! I remember with pleasure, during my time at the EDN (European Documentary Network) the collaboration we had with the founder of the festival Dimitri Eipides. A man with a big heart for the artistic documentary and for films that deal with human rights.

And it is an equal pleasure to see how alive and professional the EDN Docs in Thessaloniki is, the development and pitching session. And the occasion for giving out the yearly EDN Award – actually that happens today. Name tomorrow.

The festival ha of course an international competition section, it has tributes to Agnès Varda and to Véréna Paravel & Lucien Castaing-Taylor, who gave us the innovative masterpiece “Leviathan”. And like at every doc festival right now discussions about human rights are being held after screenings. In Thessaloniki after the film “The Cleaners”.

Third pleasure is that there is a special tribute to commissioning editor Madeleine Avramoussis from arte with a screening of the Greek documentary success, “Dolphin Man”. Madeleine, with Greek roots, has always supported the festival and Docs in Thessaloniki – I have so many good memories, as moderator of pitching session, of Madeleine being a sharp and constructive critical voice in the panel.

http://www2.filmfestival.gr/en

http://edn.network/activities/edn-activities-2018/docs-in-thessaloniki-2018/

Tue Steen Müller

Müller, Tue Steen
Documentary Consultant and Critic, DENMARK

Worked with documentary films for more than 20 years at the Danish Film Board, as press officer, festival representative and film consultant/commissioner. Co-founder of Balticum Film and TV Festival, Filmkontakt Nord, Documentary of the EU and EDN (European Documentary Network).
Awards: 2004 the Danish Roos Prize for his contribution to the Danish and European documentary culture. 2006 an award for promoting Portuguese documentaries. 2014 he received the EDN Award “for an outstanding contribution to the development of the European documentary culture”. 2016 The Cross of the Knight of the Order for Merits to Lithuania. 2019 a Big Stamp at the 15th edition of ZagrebDox. 2021 receipt of the highest state decoration, Order of the Three Stars, Fourth Class, for the significant contribution to the development and promotion of Latvian documentary cinema outside Latvia. In 2022 he received an honorary award at DocsBarcelona’s 25th edition having served as organizer and programmer since the start of the festival.
From 1996 until 2005 he was the first director of EDN (European Documentary Network). From 2006 a freelance consultant and teacher in workshops like Ex Oriente, DocsBarcelona, Archidoc, Documentary Campus, Storydoc, Baltic Sea Forum, Black Sea DocStories, Caucadoc, CinéDOC Tbilisi, Docudays Kiev, Dealing With the Past Sarajevo FF as well as programme consultant for the festivals Magnificent7 in Belgrade, DOCSBarcelona, Verzio Budapest, Message2Man in St. Petersburg and DOKLeipzig. Teaches at the Zelig Documentary School in Bolzano Italy.

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