News

The professional market of the Barcelona International Documentary Film Festival will take place May 6 to 10 with John Wilson, Albert Serra, Efthymia Zymvragaki and Estephan Wagner among the main guests. Every year DocsBarcelona gathers approximately 600 professionals who attend conferences, pitch sessions, speed meetings and other activities.

This year, 42 projects from 21 countries will compete for the Best Pitch Prize. The selected projects will be presented across seven thematic pitch sessions. Australia will be back in force 2024, with a total of seven documentary projects. Five further projects are selected for the Innovation WIP support programme dedicated to innovative documentary creation. Sunny Side of the Docs runs June 24-27 in La Rochelle, France.

The UK festival will join forces with the International Documentary Association (IDA) on the Alternate Realities Exhibition and Summit of its 31st edition, taking place 12-17 June 2024. The exhibition will be curated by DocFest Creative Director Raul Niño Zambrano alongside IDA’s Keisha Knight, Director of Funds, and Abby Sun, Director of Artist Programmes, supported by Alternate Realities Programme Producer Jack Rutherford.

The Grand Jury Prize of International Feature Film Competition was given to The Landscape and the Fury by Nicole Vögele (Switzerland) while the Special Jury Award was won by Rising Up at Night by Nelson Makengo (Democratic Republic of Congo, Belgium, Germany, Burkina Faso, Qatar). The Jury Prize in the Burning Lights Competition was awarded to A Fidai Film by Kamal Aljafari (Palestine, Germany, Qatar, Brazil, France). All awards...

Over CHF 100,000 of prizes were distributed to sixteen winning projects during the 2024 Visions du Réel Industry Awards Ceremony. The project The Last Days of the Hospital won the Eurimages Co-production Development Award (€20,000) while the Special Eurimages Co-production Development Award (€20,000) was handed to the Ukrainian project Fixing the War. The visions sud est award went to Hanz Rippe Gabriel, for their project The Shadow of Yolüja. All awards...

In recent years Nijsmans has been project manager for the international promotion of documentaries, short films and immersive productions. He was also involved in the organisation of CONNEXT, the annual film and series showcase event. He takes up the role April 17 and replaces Christian de Schutter whose departure from Flanders Image was announced in December 2023. Flanders Image is the audiovisual export agency for Flanders and Brussels, Belgium.

The Docs&Pearls Official Section, featuring 15 films, also addresses other contemporary debates such as the dangers of the digital world and the empowerment of women. “This year's Docs will be full of discoveries and doors that open to invite us to walk along paths not yet explored, full of questions and tools to unlearn and relearn different ways of thinking and being in the world," comments Artistic Director, Anna Petrus.

The Main Competition of the 21st edition of Millennium Docs Against Gravity comprises 12 films from around the world directed by a total of 10 female and 9 male directors. The films will compete for six awards across six festival cities, including the Grand Prix - Millennium Bank Award. The Polish fest also revealed the Jury members: Anna Hints, Murtada Elfadl and Lauren Greenfield. The upcoming MDAG runs 10–19 May in cinemas and 21 May to 3 June online.

On April 15 Visions du Réel awarded the 2024 Prix d’honneur to Chinese director Jia Zhang-Ke. French filmmaker Claire Denis, Guest of Honour at the Festival in 2020, paid tribute to him while the prize itself was awarded by Carlo Chatrian, International Feature Film Competition Jury member and former Artistic Director of the Berlinale.

Swiss Films’ Doc topper Charlotte Ducos discusses the six projects nearing completion that have been selected for the SWISS FILMS Previews showcase of April 17. Most of the projects are just about ready to be launched onto the festival circuit. “I think we have a great diversity of storytelling and of background and among the six projects we have three women directors and three women producers. That's important for us,” Ducos underlines to Business Doc Europe.