All these wonderful things

The Top 25 Film Festivals for Documentaries, 2nd Edition - #2. (tie) IDFA & Toronto

Previously: #1. Sundance Film Festival

#2. (tie) International Documentary Festival Amsterdam and Toronto International Film Festival

Why a tie at number 2?  Because it depends on what kind of film you've made.  Have you made a film with a dynamic (and possibly famous) lead character that begs for theatrical distribution?  Head to Toronto.  Is your film a natural for a 50 minute slot on European television?  Go to Amsterdam.  Below, the pros and cons of each.

First up, IDFA

Our take: The most important all-documentary festival in the world keeps its reputation primarily by continuing to bring together more buyers and industry players than any other event.  Everyone goes to IDFA and almost everyone is accessible (although you might have to get in line), with a lack of exclusive parties and more focus on festival-wide cocktail hours and mixers.  It remains the top place to introduce your film to European buyers and American TV.  The competition still means something, particularly for international titles (which may be getting their Sundance invite in the midst of the festival)...

The downside: ...but if you're not in competition, you may get lost.  A huge (huge!) slate of films means that you're competing for attention with films from around the world.  A deep divide between those who love IDFA and those who think it's best days are behind them (see comments below) Among the latter there's a sense that IDFA may be resting on it's laurels, particularly as a host of European documentary festivals have sprung up in the weeks preceding Amsterdam.  Many think the Forum needs to be re-imagined, a sign of changing thoughts on the whole pitching forum concept.  The fest's crackdown on premiere status this year struck many as a sign of panic at the festival and not helpful to filmmakers.

Important recent premieres: ROUGH AUNTIES, LAST TRAIN HOME, ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE, EPISODE 3 - "ENJOY POVERTY"

Selection of US films screened at 2009 Fest: THE MOST DANGEROUS MAN IN AMERICA: DANIEL ELLSBERG AND THE PENTAGON PAPERS, THE COVE, COLONY, WINNEBAGO MAN, THE HORSE BOY, SOUNDTRACK FOR A REVOLUTION

Our coverage of IDFA here.

The Monday Brief: Sundance! Spirits! IDA! Gothams! Is This the Biggest Week of the Year?

The Monday Brief is back and just in time - as a month full of European mega-fests comes to a close (and VIDEOCRACY takes Sheffield, TRASH HUMPERS shocks Copenhagen and LAST TRAIN HOME conquers Amsterdam) and what may just be the biggest week of the year...

The Gothams kick off the award season in New York tonight as high profile docs FOOD, INC., GOOD HAIR and TYSON take on underdogs MY NEIGHBOR, MY KILLER and PARADISE.  In addition to those, festival favorite OCTOBER COUNTRY is up as the sole nonfiction title in the Films Not Yet Playing at a Theater Near You category. 

Here's a piece of trivia - in the five years that the Gothams have awarded a Best Documentary prize, the winning film has never gone on to win the Oscar, which is pretty good news if you're betting on THE COVE in March.

For the first time, the Gothams will be streaming live here, starting at 8 PM eastern tonight.

Then early tomorrow - probably before some Gotham revelers have gone to bed - Film Independent will announced nominations for its Spirit Awards.  Worth watching - will FOOD, INC. sweep the major doc award nominations prior to the Oscars?  Will the Spirits act (consciously or no) as a corrective on some of Oscar's snubs (I'm looking at you ANVIL, WE LIVE IN PUBLIC and SEPTEMBER ISSUE)? 

Also worth watching are the nominations in the Truer Than Fiction category, which recognize films and filmmakers who have not yet received the attention they deserve.

Then, on Wednesday, the dam will fully break as the Sundance Film Festival announces its competition films for 2010.  Here's what we know already - after what many agreed was a lackluster 2009 festival, next year's Sundance is shaping up (on paper at least) to be a barn-burner for docs.  At least three films from Oscar nominated filmmakers are on tap, along with 2 new films from folks who took Sundance by storm with their previous features, plus a veteran Sundance filmmaker is back as producer on a debut feature.

And that's not even including LAST TRAIN HOME, the IDFA-champ that everyone and their mother expects to show in Park City (along with 2 or 3 or more titles from the just-wrapped European doc circuit).

By the way, if you haven't checked it out yet, gander at the newly re-designed Sundance fest website, which leads off with a retro graphic manifesto:

"REBEL.  This is the renewed rebellion.  This is the re-charged fight against the establishment of the expected.  This is the rebirth of the battle for brave new ideas.  This is Sundance, reminded.  And this is your call to join us."

That's a whole lot of "re" words. 

And what does it say, exactly, that John Cooper's first year at the helm begins with the declaration that Sundance needed a rebirth and a re-charge?  (Although, again, after last year, you won't get much argument from these's parts.)  Slogans aside, the week's first peak at this year's line-up will give our first clues as to whether there's a true revolution (a "re" word they didn't use) afoot.

IDFA 2009: LAST TRAIN HOME Takes Top Prize, Special Jury to Oscar Shortlister DANGEROUS MAN

A few hours ago, the folks at IDFA announced this year's prize winners and the winner of the festivals top prize, Best Feature Length Documentary, went to Lixin Fan's much buzzed-about LAST TRAIN HOME.  Just a few days ago, Eugene Hernandez heralded that the film was the "one film to watch" from IDFA this year, and quoted one insider as saying the film joins "the canon of great docs".  The film is expected to be announced next week as bound for Park City in January.

As described by Hernandez, "(T)he film is an exceptional observational documentary that charts a dramatic Chinese journey affecting just one family but representing the challenges facing a changing nation and a troubled world."  Fan previously worked on the award-winning UP THE YANGTZE and that film's production team at Montreal's EyeSteelFilm came aboard LAST TRAIN HOME.

Hernandez' rave captured what had been a building groundswell of enthusiasm at the festival:

"Stunningly photographed and expertly constructed, “Last Train Home” features the work of a filmmaker who has immersed himself in the lives of his subjects - the Zhangs - to explore the story of their fractured family. Many moments in this intimate movie are incredibly striking and ultimately so symbolic of a much broader situation. The drama of the Zhang’s personal story - and their specific struggle to simply get back home for a few days in 2006 - is so poignant that at times the film feels like it must have been scripted for a group of incredibly talented unknown actors."

Other finalists for the Feature-Length award included Rob Lemkin and Thet Sambath's ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE (UK/Cambodia) and John Appel's THE TRAIN, a Dutch film that picked up the festival's first Dutch Documentary prize.

(Shorter) Monday Brief: 2009 Docs Set New Box Office Mark, IDFA Announces & Links

On location in Indiana today, so no in depth Monday Brief this week.

Meantime, check out indieWIRE's recap of this weekend at the box office.  CAPITALISM: A LOVE STORY crosses the $10M mark (it's now estimated at $11.6M), making 2009 the first year ever to have 3 nonfictions grossing more than $10M.

Peter Knegt makes some Gotham predictions (nominations announced this afternoon).

Cinema Eye announced 98 eligible nonfiction features for this year's awards.

IDFA announces its 2009 lineup. 

COOKING HISTORY, RACING DREAMS and SOUNDTRACK FOR A REVOLUTION take prizes at the Chicago Film Festival, Roger Ebert reports.

Steve Pond at The Wrap looks at this year's Oscar Shorts shortlist and ponders HBO's dominance of the category.  

Amanda Hirsch surveys the cost of documentary film websites.

And finally, the directors of the new anti-Climate Change doc NOT EVIL, JUST WRONG recap their recent confrontation of Al Gore at an environment event in Madison, Wisconsin over claims that INCONVENIENT TRUTH contained factual errors. 

The Monday Brief: Post-Toronto Glow for ART & COLLAPSE, Moore Returns and Are These 5 Films Your Oscar Frontrunners?

The end of the Toronto International Film Festival means the two-month headlong rush toward IDFA is upon us, wherein there will be a major or mini-major film fest on pretty much every single weekend.  So get ready for Atlantic, New York, Camden, Woodstock, Mill Valley, Morelia, Pusan, Chicago, Hamptons, London, DocLisboa, Tokyo, Rome, Leipzig, Jihlava, Sheffield, AFI, Mar del Plata, Copenhagen, Denver, St. Louis, Gijon and, finally, yes, IDFA.  That's at least 23 fests of some import in just 10 weeks.  Hold onto your hats...

But before we plunge headlong into the future fall festival frenzy, we pause to think of this year's Toronto Fest filmmakers, battered and bruised from several days of screenings, press, parties and the roller coaster ride that is a major premiere date. 

While there has yet to be a major sale announced for docs at this year's Toronto Fest, we should remember that some of last year's major TIFF titles (IT MIGHT GET LOUD, MORE THAN A GAME) didn't sell until well after the festival and at least one, VALENTINO: THE LAST EMPEROR, made very good money going it alone.  But there are rumors of a deal pending for THE ART OF THE STEAL and lots of strong critical praise for COLLAPSE, which probably left the biggest impact of any doc in Toronto.  Check out our wrap on many of the top nonfiction titles at TIFF: COLLAPSE, ART OF THE STEAL, COLONY, THE MOST DANGEROUS MAN IN AMERICA, HOW TO FOLD A FLAG, CLEANFLIX, HUGH HEFNER: PLAYBOY, ACTIVIST AND REBEL and People's Choice Award winner THE TOPP TWINS. 

In Praise of Sean Farnel's European Doc Tour Blogging

One of our recent joys has been digging into the relatively new and frequently awesome blog of Hot Docs programmer Sean Farnel, particularly last month as he was sending nearly daily dispatches from a non-stop tour of European documentary festivals.  The whole blog is great, filled with fascinating insights into the festivals themselves, as well as the way that programmers view and decide to book films for their festivals - so consider this a suggestion that you grab a coffee or a cocktail and spend the next hour digging through the blog to date. 

But, to whet your whistle, I thought I'd run a few excerpts from his European tour.

He began in late October in Jihlava in the Czech Republic:

"Jihlava has also been presenting the works of several photographers, and in the evening I attended a presentation by Adam Broomberg, featuring his work with collaborator Olivier Chanarin. I found Broomberg’s  slideshow talk completely engaging and compelling, and it  sparked many thoughts about the relationship of still photography to moving image documentary. Broomberg and Chanarin have a stated mistrust of their form, an anxiety or doubt about images (see Errol Morris). They particularly grappled with ways of representing conflict, including that between Israel and Palestine. During the section of the presentation where Broomberg discussed photographs from their “Chicago” project, documenting an artificial Arab town built by the Israeli Defense Force, a man in the audience shouted: “Why don’t you stop this propaganda, this is a film festival!” Another shouted back at the man to let Broomberg speak, and Broomberg himself asked the heckler to stay and that he be pleased to answer questions during the Q&A. “Fuck off!” the man yelled, storming out."

Next it was off, by bus, to Leipzig:

"The Jihlava and Leipzig festivals collaborated to charter a bus, lugging about twenty-five documentary vagabonds from one event to the other. So, here we are, reality addicts on a German tour bus. Weary from long days of screening and pitching, and long nights of everything else. Jan Rofekamp, snugly attired with his black addidas jumper, pecks away on his laptop, preparing his IDFA brochure; a Ukranian producer screens a colleague’s trailer; we all gossip a little and the business melts into pleasure, personal stories. A pit stop brings some Czech beer on board, and snacks, sweet and salty, to fuel the camaraderie for the remainder of the five hour journey."

And offers insight to the programmer's methodology:

"I’ll screen in the market for four hours today, and as always will jot notes on 4×6 inch index cards. I have ten years of these cards in my home office. I capture quick initial impressions, content reminders, and subjective remarks. Most of the time I use one card, front and back, for each film. In the case of (Heddy Honigmann's) OBLIVION card above, the back has most of my subjective thoughts (”deeply human,” “sublime” “an engaging people’s history” are some of musings on this particular card). I try to clear my head with each blank card as I press play. I ask Hot Docs programmers to be open and generous to each film, and follow my own advice. Yet I admit some (many?) of the cards have thoughts which aren’t so generous. The volume of work we see is overwhelming, and most often comes in very concentrated spurts, at the festivals we visit, and then during the intensive ten week process which ultimately yields the Festival programme..."

IDFA 2008: Director Sascha Paladino on HIs Debut in Amsterdam (or Don't You Americans Ever Shut Up)

Festival coverage sponsored by Indiepix.

Sascha Paladino, director of the award-winning documentary THROW DOWN YOUR HEART, files this reflection on IDFA after his first trip to the festival in Amsterdam:

As a first-timer, bringing my film to IDFA was like stepping into a Documentary Disneyland.  For the ten days of the festival, Amsterdam truly transforms into a documentary paradise.  Everywhere you turn you see amazing films, brilliant filmmakers you've always wanted to meet, engaging panels, attentive funders, cool parties and interested audiences.  With 300 docs in the lineup, it's pretty overwhelming. 

Looking over the schedule and reading the descriptions of all the films was exhilarating and paralyzing.  But once I realized there was no way I could partake in every single event and screening, I loosened up and went with the flow.  (And, made a mental note that spending four days at IDFA isn't nearly enough to do it justice.)  As festival director Ally Derks writes in her welcome note, the festival is like a labyrinth, and everyone needs to navigate it depending on their tastes and time.

IDFA is divided into various strands, including the film festival, the Docs for Sale marketplace, IDFAcademy, Media Talks, and the Forum.  The Forum is devoted to filmmakers pitching their projects to broadcasters, very similar to the Hot Docs Pitching Forum, which I had the fascinating and stressful experience of participating in a few years ago.  I wanted to observe some of the pitches, but without a Forum pass I was unable to get in (and they were pretty strict on the rules).  I ran into some folks who were in the throes of pitching, including Andrew Berends, who was recently detained in Nigeria while shooting his new project.  It was great to meet him and hear more about his new film, especially after reading so much about what had happened to him and seeing how the documentary community rallied to his support.

One of the things that struck me about the festival was how well technology was integrated into the whole experience.  For example, the audience award tallies were constantly being updated, so that every time you went into the festival headquarters you saw a flatscreen monitor with the latest standings and scores, kind of like the Olympics.  (Brett Gaylor's RiP: A REMIX MANIFESTO ended up taking the award, after a battle for first with buzz film BURMA VJ: REPORTING FROM A CLOSED COUNTRY and PERSONA NON GRATA.) The standings were also reported each morning in the half-Dutch, half-English daily festival newspaper.

The festival was tightly organized, and encouraged an active dialogue between its participants throughout.  The daily social hour (and a half), aptly titled "Guests Greet Guests," was a good way to hook up with old friends and make new ones.  It was interesting to meet filmmakers with such different motivations for being at the festival.  Some were there to show their films, some to sell their films, some to raise money for the films they hadn't yet made, and some, incredibly, were doing all of those things at the same time.

With so much going on, it was easy to feel like my film might get lost in the shuffle.  So I was a bit nervous about how many people would show up for my screenings.  But boy, if there's one thing I learned, it's that the Dutch love their docs.  I was thrilled with the turnout – a full house for both screenings that I attended.  (At the glorious Art Deco Tuschinski Theater, and the Arclight-on-steroids Munt Theater)  While there were some fellow filmmakers and festival folks in the crowd, it seemed like they were mostly locals.

They were engaged and responsive audiences, with thoughtful questions and comments during the Q&A.  The best and most revealing came from the Dutch woman who pulled me aside and noted that during the first few musical performances in my film, there are a few lines of voice over from one of my main characters.  "I just wanted to hear the beautiful music, but you kept interrupting it!" she said.  "And I thought, 'Don't you Americans ever shut up?'"

She had a point.  There was lots and lots of talking throughout the festival, not only from the Americans but from the assembled global filmmaking community, about all sorts of issues related to the art, craft, and business of documentary today.

There were some fascinating conversations about the staggering number of docs about Africa that were included in the festival – at least 40 films dealt with Africa in some way, including mine.  The festival acknowledged this fact in their opening night selection: EPISODE 3 – '"ENJOY POVERTY", a doc by Renzo Martens that posits that "images of poverty" are the Congo's most lucrative natural resource.  There was lots of discussion about the preponderance of Africa docs, and the fact that most of them were made by European and American filmmakers.

One film that had everyone was talking was Anders Østergaard's BURMA VJ, about Burmese journalists reporting on the uprising against the dictatorship with hidden cameras.  The film ended up winning the top prize as well as the Movies that Matter Award.  I didn't get to see nearly as many films as I would've liked, but a few standouts for me were Joshua Weinstein's FLYING ON ONE ENGINE, a sly and surprising look at a brilliant Indian doctor, Matt Tyrnauer's entertaining and fascinating VALENTINO: THE LAST EMPEROR and Brett Gaylor's RiP, a playful and energetic look at mash-up master Girl Talk and the issues of copyright that spring up around sampling and remixing.  The latter film also had the best parting gift of any documentary screening I've been to:  During the Q&A, we were all invited to reach down into the space between our seats and armrests, and found our very own membership cards to the MLF, or Mouse Liberation Front, a group profiled in the film that sprung out of an artist's battles with Disney over his use of Mickey Mouse imagery in the 1970s.  Documentary Disneyland, indeed.

IDFA does a wonderful job making its filmmakers feel like they are part of an international community of artists and activists.  It's an amazing feeling, and one that I hope I can hold onto for a while.

BURMA VJ Wins Top Prize at IDFA

BURMA VJ, the acclaimed new documentary from Anders Østergaard that took top honors in Copenhagen two weeks ago, was awarded the Joris Ivens prize at this year's IDFA.  In addition to the top prize, it also won the Movies That Matter award - the best documentary on human rights and dignity.  Look for the film to have an extensive fest run in 2009 - and possible theatrical distribution in the US - with many eyeing a possible (probable?) North American premiere in Park City (like THE MONASTERY and STRANDED - the two previous Joris Ivens winners).

A full list of winners after the jump.

IDFA Announces Nominees Going Into Saturday's Award Ceremony

Festival coverage sponsored by Indiepix.

IDFA juries have narrowed their selections down to three nominees in each of the major prize categories heading into Saturday night's award ceremonies.  Of note is the inclusion of the much talked-about film BURMA VJ, which recently took top prize in Copenhagen, for the Joris Ivens prize of best feature length film at the fest.

Joris Ivens Competition

BURMA VJ - REPORTING FROM A CLOSED COUNTRY (Denmark/Sweden/England/Norwary)
Directed by Anders Østergaard
NECROBUSINESS (Sweden)
Directed by Fredrik von Krusenstjerna, Richard Solarz and Monika Sieradzka
YODOK STORIES (Norway/Poland)
Directed by Andrzej Fidyk

Silver Wolf (Films up to 60 minutes)

BORIS RYZHY (The Netherlands)
Directed by Aliona van der Horst
LADY KUL EL ARAB (Isreal)
Directed by Ibtisam Mara'ana
LOVE ON DELIVERY (Denmark)
Directed by Janus Metz

Silver Cub (Films up to 30 minutes)

SLAVES - AN ANIMATED DOCUMENTARY (Sweden/Norway/Denmark)
Directed by Hanna Heilborn and David Aronowitsch
THE FIRST KID TO LEARN ENGLISH FROM MEXICO (USA)
Directed by Peter Jordan
WANJA (Australia)
Directed by Angie Abdilla

First Appearance

AFGHAN STAR (England/Afghanistan)
Directed by Havana Marking
CONSTANTIN AND ELENA (Romania/Spain)
Directed by Andrei Dascalescu
MY FIRST WAR (Isreal)
Directed by Yariv Mozer

International Student Competition

12 NOTES DOWN (Denmark)

Directed by Andreas Koefoed

SHAKESPEARE AND VICTOR HUGO'S INTIMACIES

Directed by Yulene Olaizola

WAITING FOR WOMEN

Directed by Estephan Wagner

 

Movies that Matter

AT THE DEATH HOUSE DOOR (USA)

Directed by Steve James and Peter Gilbert

BURMA VJ - REPORTING FROM A CLOSED COUNTRY (Denmark/Sweden/England/Norwary)
Directed by Anders Østergaard

ISETA BEHIND THE ROADBLOCK (Kenya)

Directed by Juan Reina

LUCANAMARCA (Peru)

Directed by Carlos Cárdenas Tovar and Héctor Gálvez.

 

DOC U!

A COMPLETE HISTORY OF MY SEXUAL FAILURES (England)
Directed by Chris Waitt

KASSIM THE DREAM (USA/Germany)

Directed by Kief Davidson

SLINGSHOT HIP HOP (USA/Palestine)

Directed by Jackie Reem Salloum

 

A Proposition: Let's Admit That Pitch Panels are Really Game Shows in Disguise and Start Bringing in Confetti

From London, where BritDoc '08 is still lingering in our collective minds...

As I prepare to head back to the states, it's worth reflecting on last week's festivities in Oxford and there is much good to say about this year's festival, particularly the strong slate of British features (led by MAN ON WIRE). 

One of the things that BritDoc has consistently gotten right has been the pitch panel format, wherein filmmakers have a limited amount of time to pitch their projects to an impressive table of commissioning editors.  Danielle Beverly described the sights and sounds at last year's IDFA Forum for Variety's The Circuit blog:

"Part theatre, part business meeting, The Forum at The International Documentary Film Festival of Amsterdam is a nail-biting window into the mysterious commissioning process of international broadcasters. For documentary filmmakers, it's a necessary stop on their funding quest, even if it feels like the Spanish Inquisition...

Teams get 7 minutes to present their clip, and their case.  In turn, the Commissioning Editors have 8 minutes to ask difficult and probing questions, throw money at the project, or politely - and sometimes not so politely - decline to fund it."

Anyone who has sat through this exercise - or talked to anyone who has - knows that often the big story is not who did very well, but who got shot down and by whom and what was said.  It sounds hugely dramatic.  Yet, in truth, the pitching forums can be, particularly after you've sat through a few, a bit dull.  You keep waiting for the moment for someone to get their budgets handed to them, but what you really get is polite demurrals and deferrals.  And frankly, you can't blame the panelists.  There's truly only so many ways that these CE's can say, "sorry, I don't have a strand for that" or "let's talk later".  But after a couple hours of that, you just want something to happen.

No wonder everyone keeps waiting for some kind of Simon Cowell moment, wherein the presumptuous or badly prepared filmmaker is dressed down by one of the doyennes of documentary.

Therein lies the rub.  If the essential appeal of the pitching forum is that it's the equivalent of an indie doc game show, why not go all in and make the thing an actual game show.  How 'bout this - everyone who wants to sit at the table tosses in 25K (or £ or euro) and at the end of the pitches, there is a vote and one filmmaker walks away with his or her budget.  Everybody else gets a gift bag.

Would it really be so bad if someone actually left the forum room knowing that they were going to get to make their film?  Rather than wager on whether they'd get praised or torn to shreds?

BritDoc is something else entirely.  Here, the CE's are actually nice, they're asked to be nice and  if they are really, really helpful, they just may win the prize of Best Panelist from the filmmakers who are pitching to them (although good luck unseating Sundance DocFund's Cara Mertes, who's won the award two years in a row).  Surprisingly, perhaps, this positivity doesn't make the BritDoc pitch panel (this year labeled "The Big Pitch") more boring, as CE's seem to go out of their way to think of advice that could be helpful (even if they aren't going to write a check.  It doesn't hurt that Jess Search is probably the best panel moderator that one could hope for in this kind of situation.

This year, BritDoc added "The Good Pitch" which may just be the beginning of pulling the pitching forum into the future.  Instead of loading up a table with the same group of commissioners, there were representatives from granting agencies, production companies, film funds, corporations, websites, magazines and more.  It was a fresh take on the whole pitching forum and one that viewers in the packed and overheated theater seemed to give good grades (even if it did have the whole social justice thing branded right across its arse).

So here's an addendum to the proposal - how about in addition to the commissioners, we throw in some wealthy millionaires who want to get into the film business (there's got to be a few more of those around, right?) along with a couple of distributors and producers?  And along with projects highlighting good deeds, can we have a few that are (whether by content or by style) a little less angelic?

BritDoc's ahead of the curve, but maybe it's time to embrace our inner American Idol (or maybe I should say Pop Idol) and start ending these pitching forums with confetti and a check.