Ji.hlava 22

The annual presentation of docs-in-post from Central and Eastern Europe will take place August 15 during Sarajevo FF. This year nine docs covering a range of geographically diverse topics are up for grabs. “It is surprising that a region often associated primarily with rural films from poor regions can geographically encompass literally the entire world: from Tokyo and Iran to Europe, New York and Salvador,” says Ji.hlava director Marek Hovorka.

In his film selected for International Competition, Mateo Ybarra returns to familiar ground as he examines Swiss army conscripts recording their drills and exercises, as well as their reflections on mandatory military service. “Far from being convinced by the relevance of such an institution and its functioning, the intertwining of civil and military society is…fascinating to me,” Ybarra tells BDE.

The final feature of the great Jan Švankmajer had its world premiere at Ji.hlava as a near two-hour director’s cut. This documentary on his idiosyncratic collection of art and other imaginative objects feels like stepping inside the surrealist mind of the illustrious Czech filmmaker – including its darker sides.

The festival programme will offer the ‘largest showcase of Filipino cinema in Europe,’ a reflection on Russian aggression in Ukraine and war as a theme, as well as new works by Armenian filmmaking legend Artavazd Peleshyan and Ukrainian director Sergei Loznitsa. Ji.hlava’s Inspiration Forum’s discussions will revolve around freedom, technology, the theory of degrowth and the situation in Ukraine.

US performance artist, writer and filmmaker Andrea Kleine talks to Business Doc Europe about her film in which she performs to an empty theatre, the same one she and her partner Bobby Previte holed up in during quarantine. “That was the crux of the film. How do you recreate that feeling of ‘live’ when nobody is there?” she muses.

On 29 October, Ji.hlava IDFF hosted a panel during which European festival directors discussed the boycott of Russian cinematography and other ethical dilemmas. Panelists included Cintia Gil (co-curator of Unidocs’ Artistic Differences), Veton Nurkollari (artistic director of Kosovo’s DokuFest), Viktoria Leshchenko (programme director of Docudays UA) and Marek Hovorka (director of Ji.hlava IDFF).

The 2nd edition of the Forum, running October 27-28, will 16 feature projects in development, production and post-production. The selected projects include diverse genres and audiovisual formats – such as fiction films with documentary aspects, hybrid, cinema expanded, experimental and short films. New awards in 2022.

What is it like to be young and female and/or queer in this day and age, when social media is part of your daily practice, defines who you are, undermines or boosts your self-confidence? Answers can be found in this atmospheric, sensitive and revealing documentary set in the world of girls on the verge of adulthood.

In her new film Those Who Dance In The Dark which screened in Ji.hlava’s Czech Joy Competition (as well as winning the Best Documentary Feature at the Warsaw Festival), Czech filmmaker Jana Ševčíková looks at the lives of young blind people. As the director acknowledges to BDE, however, her first idea was to make the film about their guide dogs.

The programme offers up 300 films including a unique retrospective of American Oscar-winning avant-gardist Shirley Clarke and the largest ever retrospective of Filipino cinema outside of Asia. The programme will also feature a reflection on the Russian aggression in Ukraine and a conference dedicated to ethics in documentary filmmaking. The 26th Ji.hlava IDFF will take place October 25–30.