News

Hot on the heels of its Impact Days and Movies That Matter pitches (March), the First Hand films-produced Kalari Kid tells of the eponymous Indian martial art that is taking on greater significance for women within a society where gender-based violence is commonplace. “Raising awareness is essential to spreading the clear message of zero tolerance for all forms of violence against women and girls,” First Hand Films’ Daniel Schneider tells BDE.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that film festival masterclasses are delivered in hushed, reverential tones to an ostensibly mute and seated audience. Not when Northern Irish filmmaker/academic/doc maverick Mark Cousins comes to town. This week he was in Warsaw to engage head-to-head with MDAG Artistic Director Karol Piekarczyk and, in the process, deliver what he called his “anti-masterclass.”

On May 11, the awards of Millennium Docs Against Gravity Industry programme were handed out. This year’s event featured 4 pitching sessions, 42 projects and over 340 one-on-one meetings. “We’re proud to support these outstanding projects at every stage of their journey. With such bold voices and powerful stories, we truly believe the films developed here will resonate with audiences around the world,” said Anna Szczypińska, Head of MDAG Industry.

Kompleta is an intimate record of an extremely difficult period in the lives of the directors Tomasz Śliwiński and Magdalena Hueckel. Magdalena, while 8 months pregnant, was diagnosed with aggressive breast cancer. In the film, which world-premiered May 10 and pitched at the Pole Position event in Warsaw, the directors combine raw documentary footage with elements of music video, photography and collage in an experimental attempt to process their trauma through art.

Nava Mama, by Romanian Ana Vîjdea, tells of her return to the village – the mothership of the title – where she grew up, in order to break the cycle of violence that she experienced throughout her childhood. “It was a violence that seemed so pervasive that my grandmother used to cry herself to sleep. She woke up crying and I was crying alongside her without really understanding why,” she told the professional audience in Warsaw.

Running 25 June to 24 August in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, the Oscar-qualifying docfest will present 32 world premieres and 20 international premieres, “Tackling themes of community, resilience, and the universal power of human connection,” organisers write, “these films are bold, raw, and resonant—reflecting the festival’s 20-year legacy of fearless storytelling.”

If you’ve ever wanted to run away to the circus (who hasn’t?), Always Far Away will be a must-see, offering us deep insights into life in the big top within today’s changing world, as seen through the eyes of three young brothers born into the community. “The youngest generation of circus acts face a new challenge: how to adapt the circus to this new era,” says producer Richard Šimeček of Svjetski Films.

At MDAG Industry Days, BDE caught up with Aliona Kachkan of Ukrainian production company TABOR ahead of her presentation of new project, Missing in Action. “Although the film is rooted in the context of war, the theme of disappearance extends far beyond it,” she says. “It touches on the broader, universal experience of absence, unresolved grief, and the human need for closure, whether caused by migration, political repression, social injustice, or natural disasters.”

Dubbed ‘Britain’s most glamourous spy,’ and an inspiration for the character of James Bond, Polish-born Countess Maria Krystyna Janina Skarbek is the subject of director Sylwia Rosak’s new documentary to be presented during this week’s MDAG Industry Days. “It’s a powerful exploration of how we construct and forget our heroes — especially women who live beyond the limits of what is socially acceptable,” producer Justyna Kluczewska tells BDE.

The programme includes 51 world, 16 international, 8 European and 39 UK premieres from 68 countries of production. Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato are named as Guests of Honour while the first solo exhibition in the Alternate Realities Programme features Baff Akoto’s cutting-edge immersive work Collateral Echoes. Talks to include a BBC Interview with Professor Brian Cox, a Channel 4 Masterclass with Oobah Butler, and David Blaine x Nat Geo: Bringing the Magic to Factual.