Among the film professionals sitting on the jury were: Anais Clanet – sales and acquisitions manager with Wide Management; Sean Farnel – director of programming of the Hot Docs international documentary festival and market; Cynthia Kane – programming manager for ITVS International, Philippa Kowarsky – founder of the Cinephil distribution and co-production company; Charlotte Gry Madsen – sales and programme consultant for DR; Charles Schuerhoff – director of acquisitions and sales with PBS International; Catherine Le Clef from Cats & Docs; Jenny Ross from Al Jazeera English; and Danielle Digiacomo – pre-selector for the Tribeca Gucci Fund and consultant for IFP. Some members of the jury could also be seen among the producers attending the final presentations of the East European Forum on Saturday and Sunday.
During the closing ceremonial of the 13th International Documentary Film Festival, the Silver Eye awards were presented to the winning films in all three categories.
The winner of the short-length category was the film ’Six Weeks’:
Six Weeks (Szesc tygodni)
Poland, 2009, 18 min.
Director: Marcin Janos Krawczyk
Producer: Malgorzata Staron, Staron Films
Kvůli různým životním situacím existují matky, které nechtějí nebo nemohou vychovávat své děti. Mají právo dát je pryč hned po narození. Během prvních šesti týdnů života novorozence musí jeho matka učinit rozhodnutí o své definitivní resignaci na svá mateřská práva. Má absolutní svobodu ke svému rozhodnutí, ale v okamžiku, kdy je učiní, již nejde vzít zpět. Biologická matka pak nadobro ztrácí kontakt se svým dítětem. Jediné, co ještě může, je napsat mu dopis na rozloučenou. Film poetickou cestou ukazuje prvních šest týdnů malé lidské bytosti, kterou jeho matka odložila.
In the mid-length category the award went to ‘Rabbit a la Berlin’, a project that has been part of the following programmes and workshops: Nipkow Foundation, Ex Oriente Film, IDF and the Discovery Campus Masterschool (now Documentary Campus), it was also presented at the 2008 Docu Talents from the East.
Rabbit à la Berlin
Germany, Poland 2009, 40 a 51 min.
Director: Bartek Konopka
Producer: Anna Wydra
Screenplay: Bartek Konopka, Piotr Rosołowski
Camera: Piotr Rosołowski
Editor: Mateusz Romaszkan
SFX: Grzegorz Korczaky
Sound: Franciszek Kozłowski
Music: Maciej Cieślak
It's an important lesson of history that a system of order intended to produce one result will often give birth to something entirely unexpected. So it was with the Berlin Wall, which was, in fact, two separate walls, one on the east and one on the west with a 120-kilometre strip of land between them. The enclosed patch was unintentionally converted into a kind of rabbit reserve as the walls encircled the lush green meadows of Potsdamer Platz and cut its rabbit population off from both escape and predators. But then one day the walls came down and the rabbits were suddenly freed from a restrictive system, albeit one to which they had become accustomed. Told in the style of a nature documentary, with a captivatingly dreamy tone and a tongue-in-cheek nod to the story's allegorical significance, Rabbit à la Berlin provides a fascinating history lesson told through the eyes of animals.
In the feature-length section, the award was given to Jaak Kilmi’s ‘Disco & Atomic War’, which was presented at the at the East European Forum in 2007 and in 2008 at Docu Talents from the East.
Disco & Atomic War
Estonia 2009, 80 min.
Director: Jaak Kilmi
Producer: Kiur Aarma
Production company: RUUT, Helsinki Filmi
Disco and Atomic War tells the story of a strange kind of information war in which a totalitarian regime stands face to face with the heroes of popular culture. And loses. Western popular culture had an incomparable role shaping Soviet children's worldviews in those days - in ways that now seem slightly odd. Finnish television was a window to a world of dreams that the authorities could not block in any way. Though Finnish channels were banned, many households found some way to access the forbidden fruit. Disco and Atomic War offers its own version of recent history, mixing spy games into a human tragicomedy.
The award-winning films will receive a cash prize of € 1500 and will be further supported throughout the year, presented at film markets and recommended to TV broadcasters.
Except the main awards the jury has decided to specialy mention two more documentaries. In the short film category the film Arsy-Versy by Slovak filmmaker Miro Reno and in the mid-lenght category the jury wanted to mention document The Sidetrack by Polish director Anna Kazejak.
Read more:
