Nick Cunningham

Peruvian Carla Gutiérrez’s directorial debut comprises a raw and magical journey into the life of iconic artist Frida Kahlo, told through her own words culled from diaries, letters, essays and interviews. The film, which premiered at Sundance 2024, is vividly brought to life via lyrical animation inspired by Karla’s artworks. Gutierrez speaks about her film with Academy Award-nominated documentary maker Petra Costa.

No Other Land by Basel Adra, Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor was awarded November 23 the IDFA NPO Doc Audience Award 2024, the grand public prize of the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam. The award was followed by a special screening of the film in Amsterdam’s Royal Theater Tuschinski. International sales of No Other Land are handled by Autlook. The film is twice-nominated for the upcoming European Film Awards in the Documentary and Best Film categories. 

Polish Maciej J. Drygas’s feature doc picked up the €15,000 top prize. Chronicles of the Absurd won Best Film in the Envision Competition also valued at €15,000. The IDFA Award for Best Directing (worth €5,000) in the International Competition went to Auberi Edler for An American Pastoral (France). The Best Dutch Film nod went to Luuk Bouwman for The Propagandist, Best First Feature went to CycleMahesh (India) by Suhel Banerjee and the  FIPRESCI Award went to Writing Hawa by Najiba Noori. All prizes…

The market for co-creation and co-production of DOK.fest München is now looking for “strong documentary projects” across all development stages and formats for its next edition running 7 to 11 May 2025. DOK.forum Marketplace presents up to 40 selected projects participating in on-stage pitch events, roundtables and one-to-one meetings, connecting them with high level international professionals.

The 2024 IDFA Forum Awards were announced November 20 with Ibrahim Omar’s project Dry Sky winning the IDFA Forum Award for Best Pitch. Lana Y. Daher’s Do You Love Me picked up the Forum Award for Best Rough Cut, while the DocLab Forum Award went to Amorphous by May Abdalla. The new Producers Connection Award was won by Yara Costa for Looking for the Mermaid. Each award includes a cash prize of €1,500.

In her experimental film which world-premiered at Venice Biennale and now playing in Amsterdam, the Dutch artist and filmmaker examines, explains and demonstrates our species’ fundamental need for the sensation of touch. “Connect to your sensual and erotic sense,” we are encouraged in the experimental work, and be prepared for an experience that is “playful, open, humorous, symbiotic, sensual.”

The Cinéma du réel professional sidebar event for projects nearing completion “actively supports the distribution, promotion and placement of feature documentaries by linking, at a key stage of the production process, project holders (filmmakers and producers) to industry professionals.” The projects are selected in line with the editorial policy of the host festival, running 26-27 March 2025.

The prizes went to 6 projects in development at the end of the Hungarian platform, which is a partnership between Verzió Film Festival and the international festival network DocAround Europe. Prizes include the €1,500 HBO and Warner Bros. Discovery development prize which was awarded to the Greek project Moving Sisters by Christos Stefanou. The Best Hungarian prize went to Loránd Balázs Imre’s Bee In My Mouth.

Palestinian exile Jamal Hindawi wants to put on a political stage play which features a metaphorical patchwork jacket which represents the feuding interests that have staked a claim over Palestine. When the jacket is lost Jamal determines to find it, in the process demonstrating how the politics and economics of the region have severely affected the lives and livelihoods of its people. Director Mathijs Poppe discusses the film with BDE.

The fascinating subject of well-educated Kenyans making money writing essays for Western undergraduates and doctoral students is investigated with a distinctly personal touch by sociologist Patricia Kingori, the youngest female black professor in the 925-year history of the University of Oxford. With so many opportunities for ‘contract cheating,’ what is the true value of education, she asks.