IDFA Industry Special 2015-3

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special industry

INCLUDING SCHEDULE

MON 23 & TUE 24 NOV

#3

For more news & full industry programme, see www.idfa.nl/industry

“The universe is full of sound,” says musician and producer Nick Koenig, aka Hot Sugar. Saturday afternoon, the Melkweg venue was certainly full of great sound (and some wonderful visuals) as Hot Sugar gave a performance following the screening of Adam Bhala Lough’s portrait of him, Hot Sugar’s Cold World. According to the audience, it wasn’t cold at all. photo: Michiel Landeweerd

Strong currents The conflicts wracking the Middle East and their far-reaching repercussions loom large in the projects to be presented at IDFA Forum, which opens on Monday. “That’s one of the things we’re looking for at the Forum, projects that deal with current issues, but not in a current affairs way. Many of the projects we selected feel especially relevant right now,” says IDFA’s head of industry Adriek van Nieuwenhuijzen. A number of projects tackle the refugee crisis, such as Leonard Retel Helmrich’s The Camp, about the Majdal Anjar camp in Lebanon, and In the Middle, about a young Eritrean refugee who survived a shipwreck off the Italian island of Lampedusa. Others hone in on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, such as Gaza-based filmmaker Mohamed Jabaly’s Ambulance, following ambulance crews in the Gaza Strip, and Israeli production By A Thread, about the critically ill son of a wanted Hamas leader, living most of his young life in an Israeli hospital. A total of 59 projects, selected from a record 600 submissions, will be presented over the three-day Forum, 16 of them in the event’s flagship Central Pitches and the rest in round table sessions, which Van Nieuwenhuijzen says are increasingly popular. Alongside Retel Helmrich, who has taken the top IDFA prize twice (Shape of the Moon, 2004, and Position Among the Stars, 2014), other IDFA veterans at the Forum include Nima Sarvestani, who plans to return to Afghanistan’s jails with Prison Sisters, and Jean-Xavier de Lestrade, who will present the third instalment in his The Staircase trilogy. There are also a number of projects on aspects of

By Melanie Goodfellow

contemporary Western life – often in a lighter, more innovative way – such as Paula Schargorodsky’s Get Over It, on the art of moving on after a break-up, and interactive comic strip How to Create a Crisis, exploring the causes of economic global crises. “It’s interesting that these stories, with a particular appeal to younger audiences, are to be found in the cross-media section,” says Van Nieuwenhuijzen. The cross-media line-up for the first time includes two virtual reality projects: Oscar Raby’s Islands, reflecting on human interaction by exploring remote and intimate places, and Adi Lavy’s Once Upon a Sea, about the Dead Sea.

Top TEN

Docs for Sale 1

S onita Rokhsareh Ghaem Maghami

2 A Family Affair Tom Fassaert

3 A Strange Love Affair with Ego Ester Gould

4 Thy Father’s Chair Antonio Tibaldi, Alex Lora

5 Holy Cow

Imam Hasanov

“Many of the projects we selected feel especially relevant right now” “I’m really curious about what kind of response these projects get. It’s not for broadcasters, but because we have DocLab and the interactive conference, there are a whole bunch of other people coming for this type of content,” comments Van Nieuwenhuijzen. Other events on the fringes of the Forum include the launch of a new initiative focusing on Southeast Asia’s underfunded documentary makers called Dare to Dream, and the Documentaries for Children event on Wednesday.

6 Among the Believers

Hemal Trivedi, Mohammed Ali Naqvi

7 Walls

Pablo Iraburu, Migueltxo Molina

8 Next Stop: Utopia

Apostolos Karakasis

9 Don Juan

Jerzy Sladkowski

10 U krainian Sheriffs

Roman Bondarchuk

As of 4 pm, Sunday 22 November

Mind the (funding) gap Television is still the engine that drives documentary financing in Europe. As IDFA’s Forum begins, senior figures in Amsterdam this weekend have warned that this engine is in danger of sputtering to a halt, with potentially dire consequences for documentary makers. By Geoffrey Macnab

“I am surprised how few people are aware of the situation,” Nick Fraser, editor of BBC Storyville, says. “Part of the problem is that there is a real crisis in documentary funding among broadcasters and it [the funding gap] is not being closed by NGOs and non-profits, it really isn’t… I feel like Cassandra by now. You tell people but, it is not acknowledged.” In the UK, the BBC is facing severe cuts. The organisation is looking for savings of £700 million and there has been speculation that entire channels or departments (including possibly BBC4) may have to close in the long term. The Beeb’s travails are mirrored across Europe. Flemish broadcaster Lichtpunt recently confirmed its final broadcast will be in December, while Dutch channel NPO/DOC is also facing closure. Speaking on the eve of the Forum, EDN Director Paul Pauwels highlights the scale of the problem. “We’re in a really bad situation right now. If you compare it with 15 to 20 years ago, it is a completely different world, and it has to do with the lack of respect for documentary within the broadcasters – a lack of respect and a lack of knowledge.” continues on page 7


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