Visions du Réel 2022

An elegant and insightful blend of childlike art, music and observation helps elevate Vida Dena’s documentary My Paper Life (Ma vie en papier) to something rather special, and helps deliver a thoughtful and warm immersion into the thoughts, memories and present-day realities for a Syrian family who have escaped the war and are now living in Belgium.

Twenty-seven projects by 32 filmmakers, produced across 29 countries, will participate in the VdR-Pitching, VdR-Work In Progress and VdR-Rough Cut Lab programmes. 15 directors are female, 17 are men. 13 projects are directed and produced by filmmakers from countries of the global South or global East. VdR Industry activities will take place from April 10-14.

The dramatic portrait of volcanologists Katia and Maurice Krafft will kick off this year’s edition 7 April. “It is a pleasure to open the 53rd edition of Visions du Réel with a film that sends out such a strong signal. Indeed, we are working on a shimmering and sparkling festival, with a line-up that encompasses human existences and forms that are in tune with our audience’s expectations,” says fest chief Emilie Bujès.

As unlikely it sounds, Dogwatch is a delight to watch, an aesthetically pleasing and almost poetic observation of three men working as armed guards on ships traversing pirate-infested waters.

The short film Aralkum by Munich-based filmmakers Daniel Asadi Faezi and Mila Zhluktenko looks to reverse, at least cinematically, the desertification of the Aral Sea between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Commissioned by the Tashkent International Film Festival, who provided the pair with a full crew, the film is lyrical, tragic and inventive in equal measure. The filmmakers talk to Business Doc Europe.

Chaylla is a powerful portrait of a woman fighting her addiction to an abusive relationship as well as a substantiated plea for a more empathic judicial system. A rewarding, inspiring and sometimes uncomfortable journey, and one totally worth taking.

World premiering in Visions du Réel’s International Feature Film Competition, Éclaireuses follows two passionate teachers in Brussels who create their own little safe space for children – many of them refugees – who never went to school before. The doc may eschew analysis of wider pedagogical issues but shines a deserved light on two teachers who lovingly, patiently, and professionally take care of children who have fallen through the cracks of the system.

Visions du Réel 2022 has announced that the Special Guest of its 53rd edition running 7 to 17 April 2022 will be Kirsten Johnson (Dick Johnson is Dead, 2020 Sundance US Doc Jury Award winner) who will present a retrospective of her films as well as a selection of films to which she has contributed, which includes Laura Poitras’ Citizenfour (2014, co-producer and camera).

An intriguing and languid blend of magical realism and observational documentary, Tizian Büchi’s Like An Island (L'îlot) presents the often enigmatic story of two men whose job is to watch over the area around the Vuachère, the burbling river running through a suburban neighbourhood in Lausanne (Switzerland).

The VdR-Industry Awards 2022 were announced April 13. With more than 2100 accredited professionals from over 80 countries, the Festival says it has broken the Industry attendance record of last year's hybrid edition (+27%). “With its numerous prizes and grants, VdR-Industry and its partners reaffirm their determination to support independent documentary filmmaking in all its diversity,” say organisers. Festival Awards will be presented on Saturday April 16.