Interviews

International Film Initiative of Bangladesh presents four docs-in-Progress during the South Asia Showcase at Cannes Docs 2021. Elsewhere, 2021 marks the first time a Bangladeshi film is selected to compete in Cannes (Rehana Maruim by Abdullah Mohammad Saad, Un Certain Regard), and Bangladeshi producer Arifur Rahman will present his project Solo (Eka) at La Fabrique.

Ahead of the Chiledoc presentation of new docs-in-progress at Cannes Docs, the association’s director Paula Ossandón Cabrera explains to Business Doc Europe the success of her country’s documentary sector over the past decade, the power of collaboration and how geographical diversity equates to an equally rich diversity of output.

Spanish director Miguel Eek’s feature doc The First Woman (screening this week at Docaviv) was a project which took extreme resilience and sensitivity to complete. Its protagonist Eva is a schizophrenic who has been in a psychiatric hospital in Mallorca for several years and about to leave and move into an assisted living residence. The director talks to BDE.

With 27 feature docs selected across most festival sections in 2021 (the previous highest was 18 in 2019), Cannes Docs chief Pierre-Alexis Chevit is in naturally buoyant mood on the eve of the festival, especially when combined with the re-opening of the market which will allow face to face interaction once more. Chevit gets down to business with BDE.

The Switzerland-based company announces early sales on its Cannes 2021 market slate, plus details of additional projects in the works to be pitched online to the international doc community over the coming week. Their Little Palestine, Diary of a Siege is selected for Cannes ACID.

What do you get when you cross a leading trade editor, a very well-connected former festival director/critic, arguably Cannes’ top snapper over the years and a UK producer with an archive of Croisette coverage going back over a quarter century? Answer: potentially the most definitive documentary history of the Cannes FF, currently in production ahead of delivery for next year’s 75th edition.

Cannes will mark the first event in over a year at which Salma Abdalla, CEO of doc sales outfit Autlook, will come face to face with theatrical distributors, with titles that include Loving Highsmith, just acquired, and the sports doc Running For The Revolution, about legendary Cuban runner Alberto Juantorena. Abdalla gets on her marks with Business Doc Europe.

On the day that his grandfather died, Greek director Nikos Ziogas finally decided to make the film he had always wanted to make, about the tiny village of Giromeri where, every Easter, the dead are serenaded in musical laments that are in equal part melancholy and joyous. The director talks to Business Doc Europe.

The eponymous Demetra K has a beautiful house in a friendly Athenian neighbourhood and loves her job. She is a workers rights campaigner, an animal lover and somewhat of a philosopher. As significantly she is also the flamboyant owner of an art deco brothel in Athens with one employee - herself. Director Stefani tells all to Business Doc Europe.

John Alexander’s new documentary, which world-premiered at Thessaloniki, tells the highly moving story of a woman rendered invisible for decades by a secret that had to be maintained by all parties. She was the love child of the legendary jazzman Louis Armstrong. Director Alexander explains more to Business Doc Europe.