Category Archives: Film Festivals

After a particularly challenging week, some normalcy returns to the Hub city with the start of the Independent Film Festival Boston tomorrow, Wednesday, April 24. Running through next Tuesday, April 30, this year marks the eleventh edition of what has been called the city’s premier film event, and the largest film festival in the whole of New England. Continue reading →

The longest-running film festival in both North and South America, San Francisco International Film Festival, kicks off its 56th edition this Thursday evening and runs through Thursday, May 9. This is the first festival with new Executive Director Ted Hope at the helm, bringing a welcome and familiar leadership to the organization after the tragic back-to-back deaths of his respected predecessors Graham Leggat and Bingham Ray. He’s brought with him Colin Stanfield as Managing Director, with longtime Director of Programming Rachel Rosen providing continuity and her regular keen curatorial eye. This year’s lineup includes over 150 films, including nearly thirty documentary features. I’ll be in town for the festival’s first weekend and may try to catch a few titles I haven’t already seen, time and schedule permitting. Regardless, here’s a quick look at some of the selections to consider checking out if you’re in the Bay Area: Continue reading →

In less than one week, Toronto’s Hot Docs, North America’s largest documentary festival, kicks off its twentieth edition, which will run through Sunday, May 5. An essential stop on the doc fest circuit, I’ve been fortunate to attend for the past several years, and will be covering the event for Indiewire once again. Like Amsterdam’s IDFA, what’s especially notable about Hot Docs is its ability not only to draw a huge general public audience, but to attract the participation of nonfiction industry players, especially decision makers for key international broadcasters and funds. The latter annually take meetings and hear pitches in the accompanying Hot Docs Forum, for which I was honored to serve on the selection committee this year, and which I plan to include in my coverage as I have done in the past. That said, my main focus will be on the films – as many of the 205 titles appearing in the lineup as I can see during my time there. Director of Programming Charlotte Cook and her team culled this year’s selections, representing 43 countries, from 2386 submissions, organizing them into eleven different sections. The following spotlights the feature docs I’m most looking forward to, going section-by-section: Continue reading →

This Friday kicks off the 44th edition of Nyon, Switzerland’s Visions du Réel, one of the oldest doc events in the world. Founded in 1969 as the Nyon International Documentary Film Festival, the event was originally led by Moritz de Hadeln of later Berlin, Locarno, and Venice fame, and had an expressly political motivation – beyond showcasing Swiss nonfiction, the fest’s geographical location, situated in the center of Europe, motivated de Hadeln to provide a platform for productions from Eastern Bloc nations as a means to foster societal change. In the present, the festival features an expansive lineup of more than 150 films over the course of its weeklong run, representing new Swiss and international documentaries to its growing audience. I’ve never attended, but here’s a sampling of the titles that piqued my interest, separated by programming strand: Continue reading →

The twelfth annual Tribeca Film Festival begins in one week, running Wednesday, April 17 through Sunday, April 28. This is the second year of programming overseen by Tribeca’s Chief Creative Officer Geoff Gilmore, VP of Programming Genna Terranova, and Artistic Director Frederic Boyer, and they’ve pulled together a promising slate. Out of more than 6000 submissions, 89 features will screen, including 45 documentaries which appear in the festival’s various sections. As has been typical for Tribeca for several years, the nonfiction programming is strong. Going section-by-section below, I’ll highlight several selections that I can recommend from advance viewing and others that I’m looking forward to seeing during the course of the event: Continue reading →