Nick Cunningham

A delegation from Al Jazeera Documentary, comprising by Mehdi Bekkar (Senior Producer, pictured) and Jamel Dellali (Production Manager), is attending Cannes Docs both to search for projects in which to invest, as well as pitch two new works in the Spotlighted Projects section. Additionally Al Jazeera Documentary will hand out the AJD DOC Award, for which the company will board the winning project as a co-producer, with a minimum contribution of $15,000.

Swiss/German filmmaker Susanne Regina Meures was handed the award May 21 for her tale of Leonie who lives the crazy life of a modern day influencer. The film also tells the story of her manager parents and that of Melanie, her greatest fan. The award comes with a cash payment of €2000.

The International Coalition for Filmmakers at Risk (ICFR) remains extremely disturbed by continued reports of arrests of filmmakers in Iran and demands an end to a growing environment of fear and insecurity in which filmmakers live and work, the organization writes, following the 6-month travel ban imposed on the two filmmakers.

Docudays UA in association with the Ukrainian Institute presents May 21 a showcase of four new creative documentaries at production or post-production stage. “The section we curated were all started before the current war but each of them was highly impacted by the events that are threatening the existence of our country. These 4 exceptionally cinematic projects present the reality of Ukraine before and during the war,” write the two organisations.

The May 21 Scandinavian Showcase is one of eight country/regional presentations of soon to be finalised docs-in-progress, presented at Cannes Docs. The showcases are primarily designed for decision makers looking for new titles, in particular festival programmers and sales agents. In some cases the projects are also looking for post-production funding or general gap financing, and some are still open to co-production opportunities.

Hot Docs award-winning producer Johannes Schubert (Austria) outlines to BDE his plans for the 2022 EFP programme and explains his fascination both for the doc form and its practitioners. "Documentary filmmakers are incredibly kind and open-minded people. They are ambassadors for a better world and are courageous. I am longing for collaboration with them, and together we always try to challenge the status quo."

Dutch director Shamira Raphaëla is chair of the New Dawn fund, launching May 22 in Cannes, that aims to address inequities across the current international funding systems. The nine-member fund will support films from previously unheard voices in order to help create more diverse, and hence more representational, production output in the future. Raphaëla explains the fund’s rationale and modus operandi.

Brussels-based producer Maarten Schmidt comes to European Film Promotion’s showcase for leading producers with four projects, two of which (The Last Frontier and Under the Surface) are feature docs, another of which (Exit Tales) is a 6 x 12-minute animated series based on the voice-recorded interviews of six child refugees. Schmidt talks the magic of documentary with Business Doc Europe.

The Institute of Documentary Film has put out a final all for submission of films produced in 2021 and 2022, as well as rough cuts, to the East Silver Market 2022. Supporting producers and distributors from Central and Eastern Europe, each year approximately 150 films are included in the event, the 19th edition of which will take place at the 26th Ji.hlava IDFF on October 25-30 2022.

In solidarity with Ukraine, Sheffield DocFest unveils ‘Password: Palianytsia,’ a collaborative doc programme with Docudays UA which will launch the British Council and Ukrainian Institute’s UK/Ukraine Season of Culture with the world premiere of One Day in Ukraine by media activist and filmmaking collective Babylon 13. The co-created film focusses on a single day during the war in Ukraine: March 14 2022.