Category Archives: Film Festivals

Starting this Sunday, February 24 and running through next Sunday, March 3, Croatia’s documentary festival, ZagrebDox, holds its ninth edition. The event screens over 180 films, of which more than half are new or recent feature-length docs, with the balance consisting of shorts and retrospective programming. The festival balances a lineup representing a selection of familiar titles that have screened at higher-profile festivals such as IDFA, Sundance, and CPH:DOX, with lesser-known fare, including an impressive number of films from Croatia and its neighboring countries in the region. If I were to attend, the latter would be my priority, as noted in my brief highlights below: Continue reading →

Celebrating its tenth anniversary this year, True/False kicks off in one week, running Thursday, February 28 through Sunday, March 3. Over four days, filmmakers, industry, and non-fiction fans descend on the college town of Columbia MO to experience what many past attendees, myself included, have referred to as one of their favorite festivals. Founders, organizers, and co-conspirators David Wilson and Paul Sturtz have carefully considered how to make True/False not just a festival, but an event, and not using the typical “film and an after-party” pattern – though there are films, and there are after-parties. Beyond those elements, however, is an infectious spirit of fun and excitement around the social activity of gathering a group of people together to celebrate non-fiction (or in some cases, non-fiction-adjacent) cinema – and True/False has managed to foster this kind of atmosphere, from the annual March March which sees festival staff, guests, and townsfolk parade up Columbia’s main street, to the festival’s support of music, including live performances before each screening, with buskers passing the hat for some old-fashioned crowdfunding.

After sitting out 2012’s edition, I’m excited to be returning this year, and look forward to catch those films in the lineup that I haven’t seen yet. Eschewing the premiere frenzy that too many festivals suffer, Wilson, Sturtz, and their team annually offer their audience an early look at a very selective group of films that they’ve scouted at Sundance and at a number of key Fall festivals, including Toronto, CPH:DOX, and IDFA, as well as others that may not have had high profile berths yet. In addition, True/False presents color-coded “Secret Screenings” about which attendees, including press, are sworn to secrecy – the six such selections this year will be making their official premieres at other upcoming festivals like SXSW and Tribeca. While I won’t be able to write about them out of T/F, I’m particularly looking forward to seeing Green and Gold.

Of the films I’ve viewed elsewhere, of course I recommend attendees check out the dozen or so titles culled from Sundance, from CUTIE AND THE BOXER to THE MOO MAN, and AFTER TILLER to WHO IS DAYANI CRISTAL?. It will be curious to see what audiences make of the two fiction films included in the line-up – COMPUTER CHESS and NO – for certain documentary-like aesthetic techniques they employ. Columbia will also get a chance to see the provocative THE ACT OF KILLING and acclaimed STORIES WE TELL, both from Toronto, and IDFA’s affecting I AM BREATHING, among others.

There are quite a number of films that I haven’t seen yet that I’m eager to watch. Curiously, nearly all of them seem to be focused in a significant way about constructing a sense of place, as signaled by their titles. This is perhaps most explicit in the similarly named THE EXPEDITION TO THE END OF THE WORLD, Daniel Dencik’s chronicle of an Arctic voyage, and VILLAGE AT THE END OF THE WORLD, Sarah Gavron’s portrait of a Greenland community. Ran Tal’s THE GARDEN OF EDEN (pictured) presents an Israeli National Park over multiple seasons, while Cristian Soto and Catalina Vergara’s THE LAST STATION profiles a Chilean nursing home and a number of its residents. Andy Wolff’s THE CAPTAIN AND HIS PIRATE profiles its two subjects as well as their environments – a Somali pirate camp and a German psychiatric institution, and Omar Mullick and Bassam Tariq’s THESE BIRDS WALK uses a young boy’s experiences to present a view into a Pakistani orphanage. Nick Bentgen’s promising NORTHERN LIGHT explores Michigan’s Upper Peninsula through the community’s snowmobile race, while Specer McCall’s THE INSTITUTE presents an intriguing mystery involving the secret life of the San Francisco Bay Area.

Rounding out the program are three retrospective screenings: Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Ilisa Barbash’s 2009 SWEETGRASS, an accompaniment to Castaing-Taylor’s remarkable new film LEVIATHAN (with Verena Paravel), also screening here; Peter Whitehead’s masterful 1969 THE FALL; and Jim McBride’s prescient 1967 faux documentary, DAVID HOLZMAN’S DIARY.

Opening tomorrow, Tuesday, February 19 and running through Sunday, February 24, Punto de Vista: The International Documentary Film Festival of Navarra holds its eighth edition in Pamplona, Spain. Championing innovation and risk-taking, the festival tends to focus on more formally inventive or rigorous projects, including hybrids, rather than strictly social issue-oriented documentaries. I’ve never attended, but am intrigued by their eclectic programming, and by their commitment to screen some work that might not typically be made at most non-fiction events, such as the work in their avant-garde section, The Central Region. Continue reading →

Coming to BAM for its third edition this weekend, New Voices in Black Cinema offers a showcase for new films exploring the black experience both in the US and internationally. Co-presented with the ActNow Foundation, a film and theatre company that provides a platform for artists of color, the series presents sixteen programs between Friday, February 15 and Monday, February 18.

Among this number are five documentaries, the best known being Ken Burns, David McMahon, and Sarah Burns’ indepth revisitation of criminal injustice in NYC, THE CENTRAL PARK FIVE. Making their NYC premieres are four other docs: Andy Mundy-Castle’s THE FADE (pictured), a week in the lives of four barbers in four distinct environments; Oliver Hardt’s THE UNITED STATES OF HOODOO, a consideration of the influence of traditional African spirituality on American pop culture; Fred Kuwornu’s 18 IUS SOLI, which explores the impact of the Italian law that denies automatic citizenship to Italian-born children of immigrants; and Jason Orr’s epic FUNK JAZZ KAFÉ: DIARY OF A DECADE, an indepth look at the artistic renaissance stemming from Atlanta’s music scene of the 1980s.

Celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, Missoula MT’s Big Sky Documentary Film Festival opens this Friday, February 15 and runs through Sunday, February 24. Montana’s largest film event, the festival annually features more than a hundred selections and welcomes scores of visiting filmmakers to experience Big Sky Country. While I’ve never attended, I’ve heard glowing reports from those who have, and the event has certainly established itself on the documentary festival circuit. Following are some feature highlights from this year’s edition, which, in addition to screening a robust selection of new films, also includes a retrospective series of films from the fest’s first decade; Resistance,” a thematic grouping of films about social unrest; “Stories from the City,” docs on NYC; sidebars on Montana-made films, seniors, indigenous communities, and art; and a retrospective of Stanley Nelson’s work.

Big Sky’s Feature Competition includes a couple of Sundance alums, including big winner BLOOD BROTHER, as well as 99% – THE OCCUPY WALL STREET COLLABORATIVE FILM, plus DOC NYC alums BETTING THE FARM and THE MOSUO SISTERS. Other titles include the world premiere of Logan Hendricks’ LOVE AT A CERTAIN AGE, focusing on intimacy and relationships among seniors; YOUNG LAKOTA (pictured), Marion Lipschutz and Rose Rosenblatt’s (THE EDUCATION OF SHELBY KNOX) portrait of a college student and her young friend who become involved in reservation politics; Andrew Berends’ DELTA BOYS, an exploration of the struggle of the people of the Niger Delta against their corrupt government; and Shannon Walsh and Arya Lalloo’s JEPPE ON A FRIDAY, a day-in-the-life of a Johannesburg neighborhood.

The Big Sky Award Competition includes, among other titles, Maxine Trump’s MUSICWOOD, where the future of guitar manufacturing is caught up in a political, economic, and environmental controversy; Brian Lindstrom’s ALIEN BOY: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF JAMES CHASSE, an investigation into the death of a schizophrenic man at the hands of Portland OR police; Brian Truglio’s RACING THE REZ (pictured), about rival high school Native American cross-country runners; and Sabrina Lee and Shasta Grenier’s NOT YET BEGUN TO FIGHT, which explores the healing power of fishing on wounded veterans.

Outside of the competition titles are a mix of a number of recent docs that have been well-represented elsewhere on the festival circuit, as well as others that perhaps may not be as recognizable but are worth a look. Among these are TC Johnstone’s RISING FROM THE ASHES, about the hope engendered by the development of a professional Rwandan cycling team; Red Tremmel’s EXOTIC WORLD, following the efforts of a former dancer to keep her small desert burlesque museum open; Brent Chesanek’s post-apocalyptic hybrid CITY WORLD; Caroline Båcle’s LOST RIVERS, an exploration of now-buried urban waterways; Mike Gualdoni’s DIGNITY HARBOR, a portrait of a homeless community in winter; Mike Scholtz’s WILD BILL’S RUN (pictured), which revisits the unbelievable legend of a snowmobiling outlaw in 1972; and Lindsay Pollock and Sam Lawlor’s THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY, the story of Holocaust survivors Thomas and Edith, separated by six decades.