The Munich DOK.fest this year presents a total of 130 films from 55 countries, culled from a whopping 1178 submissions. Twenty-eight films are world-premieres and a further 58 are German premieres.
Prizes are up for grabs across 4 competitive sections (DOK.international Main Competition; DOK.deutsch Competition, DOK.horizonte – Cinema of Urgency and Student Award), and the festival will oversee awards across further five cross-sectional competitions. In total, a cool €64,000 will be granted in 2023.
What’s more the festival offer is once again two-pronged. Not only can audiences watch new docs live across 20 festival venues within Munich, the festival (or at least 90% of its programme) goes online May 8-21.
“As Germany’s largest documentary film festival, we see ourselves as a relevant platform for mediation, participation and exchange between viewers and the creative industry, and thus also as ambassadors for documentary film,” explains Munich’s Deputy Festival Director Adele Kohout.
“The dual edition, which we launched last year for the first time, also allows for expanded participation and inclusion. By being able to show the films online on the digital screen, they have a wider reach and more viewers. In addition, we also include many more people in the discourses about important subjects that our selection of films reflects. Another unique aspect of DOK.fest München is that we show our films not only in cinemas, but also in over 15 special venues, including theaters, various museums, the Münchner Literaturhaus, etc. This way, we connect places, films and people,” she adds.
The 2023 programme is highly eclectic with a diverse array of emphases across its numerous sections. There will, for example, be a focus on Turkish documentary; a DOK.focus POWER OF MEDIA? section; a DOK.network Africa retrospective, and an homage to top Austrian doccer Nikolaus Geyrhalter.
“We are very pleased that you emphasize the variety and diversity of the programme. Every year, we put a lot of effort into adapting the selection for the individual program series to current trends and circumstances,” says Kohout.
“This year, we have observed a major trend in the exploration of media. With DOK.focus Power of Media? we shed light on the contradictory as well as crucial role our media play in today’s world. Not least due to the rise of social media, news coverage has become extremely much faster, more vibrant, but also more fragile. The films show the media as a power that enlightens, informs, but also manipulates and distorts, and which is thus at the same time extremely important for democracy and endangers it.” This series kicks off with Axel Danielson and Maximilien Van Aertryck Sundance pick And the the King Said, What a Fantastic Machine.
Kohout adds: “The DOK.network Africa series is also very important to us, offering African filmmakers a platform in Europe – and has been doing so for ten years. To mark this anniversary, we have dedicated this year’s retrospective to DOK.network Africa, with six great films from the 1970s to the 2020s.”
From an Industry perspective, DOK.forum Marketplace will present 42 new doc projects at various stages of development, from first idea to rough cut. These are presented within three formats, Master’s Pitch, Roundtables and One-to-one Meetings. What’s more, they will compete for three cash prizes (totaling €7500) which include With the DOK.archive Award from British Pathé for outstanding archive film projects, the DOK.composition Award for composition ideas, and the DOK.talent Award for students. There is an additional spread of mentoring and festival awards.
DOK.forum Perspectives entails two major conferences on the future of documentary film “in all its facets,” the festival underlines. The ‘Perspektive Kino! Concepts for a Future-proof Practice’ conference (May 4-5) explores mooted synergies between regular cinema and festival operations, while the ‘It’s a Match! Connecting Formats to Audiences’ conference (also May 4-5) will focus on the interplay between programme content and viewers.
On this latter point, Deputy Director Kohout applauds her local audience and explains how the festival works to educate new generations both in media literacy and, in part, the craft and mechanics of docmaking. “We have a very diverse audience, which we‘ve built up over the years. It is very loyal and comes in large numbers,” she underlines.
“An important aspect is our intensified effort in the area of the young generation. With our educational platform DOK.education, we bring young people in touch with documentary film, as well as with the artful shaping of reality in documentary film, so they can become sovereign media users,” she continues. “The aim of School of Seeing is to teach them how to ‘read‘ films, understand the meaning and the conscious use of editing, music and camera perspectives. With the great success of DOK.education in schools, we are launching this learning format for adults as well this year.”
With the non-fiction genre as popular as it’s ever been, Kohout further draws a line between what she terms “documentation”, as evidenced within the output of the streamers with their increasing emphasis placed on true crime or portraits of celebrity profiles, and “artistic documentaries.” Her festival, she underlines, advocates for and promotes the latter. “These are artistic documentaries that should encourage reflection, debate, and form opinions,” she ends.
