Nick Cunningham

The prize, valued at €5000, will be handed out March 4 to a documentary project participating in Doc Station of Berlinale Talents. Thessaloniki also announced a series of initiatives in honour of renowned Doc Fest founder Dimitri Eipides, who died in January 2021.

Progress Film MD Gunnar Dedio speaks to Business Doc Europe about his company’s archive, at the heart of which is the ‘treasure’ of the DEFA library which chronicled life in the GDR (East Germany) until the Iron Curtain was dismantled. But there is a lot more to the Progress offer than DEFA, the company MD points out.

Finnish artist Jonna Kina is back at Berlinale Forum Expanded with her short diptych film After Life followed by Red Impasto Jar, inspired by her discovery of an ancient burial object, looted from a tomb and cemented into a wall before ending up in an Italian museum. She explains all to Business Doc Europe.

Aliaksei Paluyan tells Business Doc Europe about his extraordinary feature doc debut Courage, which follows three members of the Belarus Free Theatre (two of whom have been recently jailed) during a summer of riots following the country’s rigged 2020 election.

In Marc Bauder’s highly cinematic philosophical essay Who We Were, humanity is in the dock as he asks how our present generation we will be assessed one hundred years from now. The director talks to BDE.

Taking place during the 25th Ji.hlava IDFF (October 26-31), the 18th East Silver doc market will again support producers and distributors from Central and East Europe. Each year, approx 300 films from more than 29 countries are selected. The deadlines for submissions are March 31, May 31 and July 31 respectively.

DocSalon may have joined forces with the other EFM platforms during the market’s virtual Industry Meetings, but the focus on documentary and doc professionals is as sharp as ever in 2021. Doc Salon’s Nadja Tennstedt and the EFM Diversity and Inclusion Initiative’s Themba Bhebhe run through events with Business Doc Europe.

Copenhagen-based sales company LevelK has released the trailer for their documentary The Red Ring, about the global epidemic of tick-borne infections such as Lyme disease, which will screen at EFM.

After 20 years at the helm of the leading North America docfest, Hendrie will join Univ of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management. “It has been an incredible privilege to be a part of this inspiring organization for 20 years, and an honour to advance its mission to champion documentary films and filmmakers,” he said.

EDP is the largest co-production, funding and distribution platform for Central and East European documentaries, designed to connect East European filmmakers with global decision makers. Main prize of €7500 for best project in development / production.