DOK.fest Munich

The award honours German and international documentary film productions in which filmmakers with disabilities play a leading role. The prize is sponsored by the Werksviertel-Mitte Stiftung and comes with a cash endowment of 5,000 euros. The closing date for entries is 3 February 2025. The 40th edition of DOK.fest Munich runs May 7-18 2025.

Eliza Petkova won the The VIKTORIA DOK.international Main Competition for Silent Observers. The VIKTORIA DOK.deutsch winner was named as Wir Erben by Simon Baumann. The VIKTORIA DOK.horizonte Competition – Cinema of Urgency prize went to Rashid, l’enfant de Sinjar by Jasna Krajinovic. A total of 64,200 euros in prize money was awarded. All winners…

Primadonna Or Nothing (a world premiere at DOK.fest Munich) focuses on three top-level opera singers at very different stages of their careers, but all of whom share the same willingness to make huge sacrifices in pursuit of their careers. “A singer is not able to hide behind her instrument. A pianist or a violinist, they have their instrument…but the voice is so personal,” director Sauter tells BDE. “That’s why I decided that opera, and singing especially, was something that I would like to show.” (Section: The Sound of Music)

The tousle-haired musical knight Sir Simon Rattle is the focus of Benedikt Schulte’s new documentary world-premiering May 16 in The Sound of Music section of DOK.fest Munich. And given that Rattle is the chief conductor of Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and has German citizenship, he’ll be there in person to see it. Director Schulte gets musical with BDE.

For the 40th edition of DOK.fest Munich, new director Adele Kohout will be sharing executive duties with outgoing director Daniel Sponsel who is standing down after the festival. “What is our mission? It is basically to create dialogue, to be open and propose ideas, propose perspectives, and to stay in touch with all different fragments of society, especially when it comes to the democracy issues that we are all being challenged right now,” Kohout tells BDE.

After premiering his feature debut Mañana Sol at DOK.fest Munich in 2024, prolific German producer/director Denis Pavlovic is now screening the film on the Doc Around Europe VOD platform. Additionally, he has three further works in the pipeline. As producer, The Mountain Has Fallen (director Thomas Oswald) competes for a DOK.composition Award at DOK.fest Munich 2025. As director/producer, Pavlovic is raising finance on the feature doc Hidden Lines: A Life with Scoliosis, optioned by SWR, and is further raising finance on the feature doc A Land That Time Forgot.