News

Cph:Forum, the financing and co-production event on the industry programme of Copenhagen International Documentary Film Festival, has selected new projects from the producers of Flee and Cow for its 2024 edition; and has refreshed its industry awards with six prizes.

Danish producer Signe Byrge Sorensen will participate with Freedom (working title), directed by Camilla Nielsson, who previously made Sundance 2021 title President about a challenger in Zimbabwe’s corrupt presidential elections.

Scroll down for the full list of Forum projects

Sorensen is CEO of Danish documentary production house Final Cut For Real, which has made films including The Killing Of A Journalist,...

Cph:forum, the financing and co-production section of the Copenhagen Intl. Documentary Film Festival (also known as Cph:dox), will showcase 32 projects, including new works from producers such as Sidsel Lønvig Siersted, Signe Byrge Sørensen (“Flee”), Diane Becker (“Navalny”) and Mandy Chang, the creative director of Fremantle label Undeniable and former head of BBC documentary strand Storyville, as well as directors Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh (“Writing With Fire”), and Mads Brügger (“Cold Case Hammarskjöld”).

Other projects include those by directors Sky Hopinka (“Kicking the Clouds”), Talal Derki (“Of Fathers and Sons”), and Rachel Leah Jones and Philippe Bellaiche (“Advocat”), and producers Lindsey Dryden (“Trans in America”), Mila Aung-Thwin (“Midwives”) and Kat Mansoor (“Cow”).

Cph:forum will bring together more than 65 filmmakers and producers from 26 countries between March 18-21.

The selected projects will compete for a number of long-standing as well as newly-introduced awards at Cph:Industry, the professional section of the festival.

The political activism of pop stars is, as a rule, on the restrained side. Those who make their allegiances clear still tend to keep all factions in their fanbases sweet by limiting divisive rhetoric, or filtering their politics through broadly palatable humanitarian causes; those who speak a little more frankly still risk the wrath of the public, the internet and their record labels alike. Yet for Ugandan singer Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu — better known to his adoring fans as Bobi Wine — there’s both everything and nothing to lose by getting a little more directly involved in national politics than most such celebrities would dare. Entering a presidential election against corrupt, long-ruling incumbent Yoweri Museveni is, he knows, both a folly and a necessary symbolic stand — a certain path to honorable defeat that “Bobi Wine: Ghetto President” documents with angry urgency and bitter gallows humor.

With censorship rife in local broadcasting,...

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From her home in Copenhagen, Denmark, director Camilla Nielsson is fighting for justice. Justice in Zimbabwe.

The filmmaker has shot two acclaimed documentaries in the landlocked African nation: Democrats, which won the best documentary feature honor at Tribeca in 2015, and President, which premiered in Sundance in January, where it won the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award.

The first looks at efforts by the opposition parties allied against long-serving dictator Robert Mugabe to reform the country’s constitution and push Zimbabwe towards democracy. Mugabe’s government banned it. Only in 2018, following Mugabe’s resignation and the election of former Mugabe supporter Emmerson Mnangagwa as the country’s new president, did the country’s courts lift the ban.

President follows that election, documenting the widespread fraud that accompanied it. The film contrasts the campaign of 79-year-old Mnangagwa, known by the moniker “the crocodile,” with...

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The government of President Emmerson Mnangagwa of Zimbabwe has banned Camilla Nielsson’s award-winning political documentary President, saying the movie, which details alleged election fraud and violence during Zimbabwe’s 2018 presidential elections, has the “potential to incite violence.”

Nielsson’s documentary premiered at the Sundance Film Festival last year, where it won the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award. The film is set to have its on-demand premiere in the U.S. on PBS on Monday.

Calling the ban “a devastating blow to freedom of the press in Zimbabwe” the filmmakers filed a legal challenge to the decision with Zimbabwe’s constitutional court but, they reported Monday, it was rejected. In a statement, the filmmakers cited the Zimbabwe Ministry of Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage Censorship and Entertainment Control Unit, which said that the content of President “is likely to be contrary to...

The government of Zimbabwe has banned “President,” Danish filmmaker Camilla Nielsson’s Oscar-shortlisted documentary about the African nation’s corrupt 2018 presidential election, Variety can exclusively reveal.

In a letter dated June 16, the country’s censorship board slapped a ban on the Sundance prize-winning documentary, insisting that it “has the potential to incite violence” as Zimbabwe gears up for presidential elections in 2023.

The filmmakers are now challenging the ruling in Zimbabwe’s constitutional court, promising a long legal battle ahead.

“President” is the follow-up to Nielsson’s critically acclaimed “Democrats,” which chronicled the laborious construction of Zimbabwe’s 2013 constitution. It captures Zimbabwe at a crossroads, as it prepares for its first election since the ouster of Robert Mugabe, who was forced from power after nearly four decades in the wake of a 2017 military coup.

The film follows opposition leader Nelson Chamisa as he challenges the dictator’s successor, Emmerson Mnangagwa, while...

“Pov,” the longest-running series for independent documentaries on television, has unveiled the majority of its slate for the series’ 35th season, which launches on July 11 with Yung Chang’s “Wuhan Wuhan.”

Neighborhood gentrification on Chicago’s south side, land defenders in the Philippines and the 2018 Zimbabwean general election are among the many topics that will be examined by the 14 feature docus in the upcoming season, which will run through Jan. 16.

PBS has revealed 13 of the upcoming season’s “Pov” films beyond “Wuhan Wuhan,” an observational documentary about the first wave of the Covid-19 lockdown, with one more entry slated to be unveiled in June.

While celebrity driven docs are all the rage with streaming services, “Pov” will stay true to its roots and program social issues films that delve into topics including environmental justice immigration and systemic inequity.

“PBS is proud that after 35 years, “Pov” continues to deliver artistically unique,...

Thandiwe Newton wants to know why the BFI London Film Festival did not accept “President,” the award-winning documentary she produced about the 2018 Zimbabwe presidential election.

The Camilla Nielsson-directed film chronicles young presidential hopeful Nelson Chamisa’s unsuccessful bid to unseat Pres. Emmerson Mnangagwa, the country’s former vice president who staged a military coup that ousted decades-long dictator Robert Mugabe. “President” takes a look at allegations that Mnangagwa, who publicly promised a fair and transparent election, and his party held onto power through vote tampering and violence against his opposition.

“Every time it gets into another festival and wins another festival and then gets shortlisted for the Oscars, I’m just thinking London Film Festival, ‘Where were you?’” Newton says. “And the reason they weren’t there was because it was the week before Mnangagwa went to Scotland with 100 delegates from Zimbabwe, invited by the United Kingdom. That wouldn...

Every January, the Sundance Film Festival launches a slew of documentary Oscar contenders, and 2022 was no different. While there are exceptions, most eventual documentary Oscar nominees launch at Sundance. It’s the festival of choice for non-fiction films to be seen and discovered.

You can see why: Making the Oscar shortlist for 2022 were Sundance 2021 debuts from Nanfu Wang (HBO’s China Covid exposé “In the Same Breath”), Danish filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen (Neon’s animated immigration saga “Flee”), self-taught Jessica Beshir (Janus’ dive into Ethiopia’s khat industry “Faya Dayi”), Camilla Nielsson (Greenwich Entertainment’s Zimbabwe expose “President”); and rookie filmmaker Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson (Searchlight/Hulu’s 1969 concert film “Summer of Soul”).

This year’s new pandemic era Sundance crop is just as impressive.

Documentary award winners get a boost

The jury prizes didn’t go to the buzziest titles: those films nabbed the audience awards. But Sundance award-winners got...

Every January, the Sundance Film Festival launches a slew of documentary Oscar contenders, and 2022 was no different. While there are exceptions, most eventual documentary Oscar nominees launch at Sundance. It’s the festival of choice for non-fiction films to be seen and discovered.

You can see why: Making the Oscar shortlist for 2022 were Sundance 2021 debuts from Nanfu Wang (HBO’s China Covid exposé “In the Same Breath”), Danish filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen (Neon’s animated immigration saga “Flee”), self-taught Jessica Beshir (Janus’ dive into Ethiopia’s khat industry “Faya Dayi”), Camilla Nielsson (Greenwich Entertainment’s Zimbabwe expose “President”); and rookie filmmaker Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson (Searchlight/Hulu’s 1969 concert film “Summer of Soul”).

This year’s new pandemic era Sundance crop is just as impressive.

Documentary award winners get a boost

The jury prizes didn’t go to the buzziest titles: those films nabbed the audience awards. But Sundance award-winners got...

Louverture Films, the production company founded by actor Danny Glover and Joslyn Barnes, is moving into television as well as animation, gaming and installation works. With two new principal partners in situ, the expansion has enlisted a host of creatives, including directors Apichatpong Weerasethakul and Lucrecia Martel.

Co-founded by Glover and Barnes in 2005 — alongside long-time partners Susan Rockefeller and the Bertha Foundation’s Tony Tabatznik — the company has brought on board Sawsan Asfari and Jeffrey Clark as principal partners. Variety understands that the new partners will allow Louverture to access more funding resources.

In addition, producer Karin Chien, who on Sunday delivered a rousing Sundance Institute Producing Fellows’ keynote, is becoming a partner and executive VP. Meanwhile, Barnes has been promoted to president while Glover remains CEO and co-founder.

Louverture, named after Haitian revolutionary leader Toussaint Louverture, has built its reputation on international and arthouse films and a strong theatrical documentary slate.

Predicting the winner of the Best Documentary Feature Oscar became a lot easier on December 21 when the academy announced the 15 films that made the shortlist. Those semi-finalists are culled from the 138 titles that qualified this year for consideration. (Scroll down for the most up-to-date 2022 Oscars predictions for Best Documentary Feature.)

To winnow these down to a manageable number, the academy adds newly eligible documentary feature to a virtual screening room available to all 500 plus members of the documentary branch. While all members are encouraged to watch as many of these as they can, one-fifth of the voters are assigned each title. In the new year, each branch member will submit a preferential ballot listing their top 15 choices.

All of these ballots were collated to determine the 15 semi-finalists. Branch members were encouraged to watch those films on this list that they haven’t seen yet before casting another preferential ballot on...

It’s tempting to draw a straight line between the Academy’s increasingly global composition and the unprecedented triumph of Bong Joon Ho’s “Parasite” in 2019. And if we regard the Academy’s changing attitude less as a driver and more as a symptom of a more general broadening of cultural horizons, the correlation is more than pure coincidence.

But the real story of international talent making waves at the Oscars is more complex, differing from category to category and complicated by varied international release strategies. With respect to the role international festivals can play in this process, “Parasite’s” win at Cannes gave it an enviable profile boost in 2019, but even that was a little anomalous: in recent years Venice has eclipsed Cannes and U.S. festivals as a launchpad for Oscar players.

Cannes prizewinner “Drive My Car” has a shot at Oscar noms in several categories.

After 2020’s instability,...

The BBC’s Storyville strand, which sets out to showcase the world’s best international documentaries, has picked up a new slate of eight films.

They will be screened on BBC Four and iPlayer over eight weeks starting Jan. 26.

“We’re excited to offer U.K. audiences this eclectic range of documentaries from around the globe,” Philippa Kowarsky, commissioning editor of Storyville, said in a statement.

“These stories deal with the issues of our times, from mistrust of political systems to the challenges of educational attainment, and from class and racial discrimination to the fight for women’s rights. They shine a light on some truly inspirational, and some controversial, characters, as well as some appealing canines!”

Check out the full slate below:

“Final Account” [Pictured above]

About the last living generation of everyday people to participate in the Third Reich

Filmed and Directed by Luke Holland

Produced by John Battsek, Luke Holland,...

The Oscars have announced that 276 feature films are eligible for this year’s Academy Awards, with nomination voting set to begin Thursday, Jan. 27 until Tuesday, Feb. 1.

Last year, the Academy extended the eligibility year until Feb. 28, 2021 due to the pandemic, which produced 366 eligible films, the largest number of submissions since 1970. With only 10 months in this period, 2022’s eligibility list is on par with previous submission years.

All of the presumed Oscar contenders are on the list including “Being the Ricardos” (Amazon Studios), “Belfast” (Focus Features), “C’mon C’mon” (A24), “Candyman” (Universal Pictures), “Coda” (Apple Original Films), “Dune” (Warner Bros), “Encanto” (Walt Disney Pictures), “House of Gucci” (MGM/United Artists Releasing), “Nightmare Alley” (Searchlight Pictures), “Parallel Mothers” (Sony Pictures Classics), “The Power of the Dog” (Netflix), “A Quiet Place Part II” (Paramount Pictures), “Spencer” (Neon/Topic Studios), “Spider-Man: No Way Home” (Sony Pictures) and “West Side Story” (20th Century Studios).

Some of...

In the past decade, the inclusion of streaming services in the documentary market has made it increasingly harder for smaller docus struggling with funding to break into the nonfiction feature Oscar race. But in spite of the deep pockets they are up against, a number of cash-strapped docs inevitably make it onto the shortlist every year. This year was no exception.

Jessica Beshir’s “Faya Dayi”, Camilla Nielsson’s “President” (Greenwich Entertainment) and Sushmit Ghosh and Rintu Thomas’ “Writing with Fire” (Music Box Films) are three films on this year’s feature doc shortlist that are up against competitors with multi-million-dollar campaign budgets being paid by media and tech conglomerates including Apple, Netflix, ViacomCBS, the Walt Disney Co. and WarnerMedia.

As the field narrows and lobbying and marketing takeover, it’s clear that money and brand recognition are key factors in the race for Oscar gold, which makes “Faya Dayi,...

Camilla Nielsson’s thrilling documentary takes a behind-the-scenes look at the 2018 election that followed the ousting of Robert Mugabe

“A free, fair and credible election.” These words of promise echo throughout Camilla Nielsson’s riveting documentary, capturing the fervour of the 2018 presidential vote in Zimbabwe, the country’s first without Robert Mugabe since its independence.

While opening with the rip-roaring rallies for Nelson Chamisa, who is running for the presidency against the incumbent Emmerson Mnangagwa, Mugabe’s former aide, President is more than an intimate portrait of a charismatic opposition leader. Considering the fraudulent electoral practices that existed under Mugabe’s 30-year reign, this election concretises a collective cry for democracy to triumph over decades of corruption and lies. Such a desire, alas, comes with blood, sweat and tears.

The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has announced the shortlists in 10 categories for the upcoming 94th Oscars ceremony.

The shortlist voting concluded on Dec. 15, and the remaining ones will move on to the official phase one voting. Nominations voting begins on Thursday, Jan. 27, and ends on Tuesday, Feb. 1. The official credits and nominees for all the films will be announced, with the rest of the Oscar nominations on Tuesday, Feb. 8.

Check out the list of the films and categories below:

Original Song

“So May We Start?” from “Annette” (Amazon Studios)

Ron Mael, Russell Mael (Sparks) “Down To Joy” from “Belfast” (Focus Features)

Van Morrison “Right Where I Belong” from “Brian Wilson: Long Promised Road” (Screen Media Films)

Brian Wilson, Jim James “Automatic Woman” from “Bruised” (Netflix)

H.E.R. (other songwriters to be added) “Dream Girl” from “Cinderella” (Amazon Studios)

Idina Menzel, Laura Veltz “Beyond The Shore” from...

What does it take to pull a country back from a state of tyranny? A collective leap of faith is required. People need to have confidence that others will back them, and that they’ll be successful – at least to the extent that they won’t have to fear violent reprisals from a regime they have failed to overthrow. Making this happen takes a leader whom people can really believe in. When Robert Mugabe finally stood down as President of Zimbabwe in 2017, that leader looked to be Morgan Tsvangirai; but when Tsvangirai died from colorectal cancer just a few months later, the task of leading the country’s main opposition party to victory fell upon the shoulders of 40-year-old lawyer Nelson Chamisa.

Made at some considerable personal risk to those involved, Camilla Nielsson’s documentary has unprecedented access to Chamisa’s campaign, embedded at the very heart of it during the four weeks before.

The 31st annual edition of the Gotham Independent Film Awards, taking place Nov. 29, will feature a variety of updates, including acting awards that are not defined by gender, a kudo for breakthrough nonfiction series and the inclusion of international documentaries in the doc feature category.

The third new rule allowed for two European-based documentaries to be nominated in Gotham’s feature nonfiction category: Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s “Flee” and Camilla Nielsson’s “President.” Rounding out the Gotham category are three U.S.-based docus — Jessica Beshir’s “Faya Dayi,” Jessica Kingdon’s “Ascension” and Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson’s debut, “Summer of Soul (…Or When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised).”

The decision to include international nonfiction into the doc feature category came to fruition this year for various reasons according to Jeffrey Sharp, executive director of the Gotham Film and Media Institute.

“In this continuing movement towards inclusion we wanted...

The Gotham Awards will be the first awards body on the independent circuit to choose its winners for the year on Monday.

On the film side, two Netflix features lead the tally, both from debut women filmmakers — Rebecca Hall’s “Passing” and Maggie Gyllenhaal’s “The Lost Daughter.” There isn’t always an obvious blueprint to predicting this group. As we saw with last year’s two tied categories, things could get interesting at Cipriani Wall Street. The Gotham are just the start of a busy week that has a great influence on the Oscar race. After Monday’s first critics and guild screening of Steven Spielberg’s “West Side Story” and Wednesday’s unveiling of Guillermo del Toro’s “Nightmare Alley,” Thursday brings us the National Board of Review selections before the New York Film Critics Circle weighs in on Friday.

As for the television side, the Gothams will...

"So, this is a democracy?" Greenwich Ent. has released an official trailer for an acclaimed documentary film titled President, which first premiered at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival this year and won a Special Jury Prize. It's the latest film from doc filmmaker Camilla Nielsson, director of the doc Democrats previously. This time she heads to Zimbabwe for an inside look at the country's 2018 election. A young and charismatic leader named Nelson Chamisa takes on the corrupt ruling party in Zimbabwe’s 2018 presidential election. Disputes over voter rolls, a compromised election commission, voter intimidation, and violence mount as election day nears. After decades of a corrupt government clinging to power using any tool available—legal or not—can a free, fair, and transparent election be truly possible? Nielsson's "President is a riveting & epic reminder that, while individuals and their specific ideals may differ, the fight for democracy is never-ending and of profound significance everywhere.

Exclusive: Greenwich Entertainment has acquired North American rights to Ilinca Calugareanu’s documentary A Cops and Robbers Story, with plans for a day-and-date release January 14.

The film’s subject is Corey Pegues, who in the 1990s found himself embroiled in a life of crime as a member of New York’s City’s infamous Supreme Team gang. After a near-death incident forces Pegues away from the streets, he unexpectedly emerges as a rising star in the NYPD. But when his former life is revealed, Pegues’s police career is threatened, raising the perennial question of who deserves – and who doesn’t deserve – a second chance in life.

The feature which made its world premiere at Doc NYC 2020 was produced by Mara Adina, Calugareanu’s collaborator on the 2015 doc Chuck Norris vs. Communism. Brenda Robinson exec produced with Julie Parker Benello, Erika Olde, Nion McEvoy, Sam Roseme, Tanja Tawadjoh, John Battsek,...

The International Documentary Association came out with its shortlist of the year’s best documentaries today, a list as notable for what was left out as what made it in.

A total of 29 feature films earned a spot on the IDA shortlist, including some considered Oscar frontrunners: Summer of Soul, Ascension, and Flee—each of which earned nominations last week for both the Critics’ Choice Documentary Awards and the Gotham Awards. But several other films making a strong bid for Oscar attention were snubbed, among them The Rescue, Becoming Cousteau, Attica, Procession, and My Name Is Pauli Murray.

The IDA gave recognition to several documentaries with an international dimension, like Faya Dayi, from Mexican-Ethiopian director Jessica Bashir, Chinese-born filmmaker Nanfu Wang’s Covid-19-related doc In The Same Breath, and Miguel’s War, the story of a gay Lebanese man who exiles himself to Spain. The IDA-shortlisted President focuses on...

Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Lost Daughter and Rebecca Hall’s Passing, both from Netflix, swept the top nominations for the Gotham Awards this year as the independent film honors and awards-season portal unveiled its noms list Thursday morning ahead of an in-person ceremony next month.

The Lost Daughter was nominated in the Best Feature, Breakthrough Director and Screenplay for Gyllenhall, lead performance for Olivia Colman and Supporting Performance for Jessie Buckley. Passing scored four noms including Best Feature.

Others in the Best Feature category include The Green Knight (A24), Pig (Neon) and Test Pattern (Kino Lorber).

Films released from March 1-December 31, 2021 and TV series from Oct. 1, 2020-September 30, 2021 were eligible. See full list of nominations below.

A24 and Netflix each had 10 nominations overall. Others were spread across distributors. A24 titles included Red Rocket; lead performance nods to Taylour Paige...

Ahead of a ceremony on November 29, this year’s Gotham Awards nominations have been unveiled, featuring some of the year’s finest cinema. Among the nominations are some personal favorites here at The Film Stage, including Drive My Car, Faya Dayi, The Worst Person in the World (a film that still doesn’t have an actual 2021 U.S. release date), Test Pattern, and El Planeta.

This year, the Gothams made a switch to have all performance categories be gender neutral, with those categories have been restructured into Outstanding Leading and Supporting Performance categories for feature films, joining the already existing Breakthrough Performer category.

Check out the film nominations for the Gotham Awards below.

Best Feature

The Green Knight

David Lowery, director; Toby Halbrooks, James M. Johnston, David Lowery, Tim Headington, Theresa Steele Page, producers (A24)

The Lost Daughter

Maggie Gyllenhaal, director; Osnat Handelsman Keren, Talia Kleinhendler, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Charles Dorfman,...

“The Green Knight,” “The Lost Daughter,” “Passing,” “Pig” and “Test Pattern” will compete for best feature film at the 31st annual Gotham Awards. The event is key stop in the awards season marathon, particularly for lower-budgeted indie fare that is looking to elbow into the Oscars race.

At the Gothams, “Passing,” a black-and-white drama that examines racism and colorist, and “The Lost Daughter,” a searing look at motherhood, led the pack with five nominations apiece. Close behind was “Coda,” a tender look at a teenager who is the only hearing member of a deaf family, earned three nominations including one of breakthrough performer for its star Emilia Jones. “Red Rocket,” the story of a washed-up porn star who returns to his hometown, also nabbed three nominations.

Nominees for the best documentary prize include “Ascension,” “Faya Dayi,” “Flee,” “President,” and “Summer Of Soul.” Best international feature is a race between “Azor,...

Exclusive: Greenwich Entertainment and levelFILM have struck a multi-year partnership for the Canadian distributor to handle all of Greenwich’s films in Canada starting with the upcoming release of Ebs Burnough’s The Capote Tapes, which explores the explosive unpublished novel Answered Prayers by Truman Capote.

The film had its world premiere at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival, its U.S. premiere at Doc NYC and Greenwich is releasing the film in theaters on September 10.

Founded in 2017, Greenwich is led by Co-Presidents Ed Arentz and Andy Bohn and has grown into one of the leading U.S. distributors of arthouse films and documentaries.

Greenwich handled the record-setting theatrical release of Jimmy Chin and Chai Vasarhelyi’s Academy Award-Winning documentary Free Solo, which grossed more thhan $17M at the North American box office.

Other Greenwich releases include Andrew Slater’s Echo in the Canyon, Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My...

Exclusive: Greenwich Entertainment has picked up North American distribution rights to President, directed by Camilla Nielsson (Democrats).

Produced by Danish company Final Cut For Real and U.S.-based Louverture Films, in co-production with Norway-based Sant & Usant, the film premiered to strong notices at the Sundance Film Festival.

Nielsson won a Special Jury Award for Verité Filmmaking in Park City. Greenwich is aiming to generate awards traction for the film with a December theatrical release.

The movie charts the dangerous aftermath of Robert Mugabe’s removal from power in Zimbabwe. Against a backdrop of economic crisis, food shortages, and political violence, the stakes could not be higher. Working to defeat the ruling party, which has controlled Zimbabwe since independence, is the young and charismatic Nelson Chamisa, who draws comparisons to a young Nelson Mandela in expressing the country’s utmost desire to be “led” and not “ruled”. After decades...

British-Zimbabwean actor and activist Thandiwe Newton, who was named to the Queen’s New Year’s Honors List, receiving an OBE for services to film and charity, has joined documentary “President” as executive producer. The film won a Special Jury Prize at Sundance Film Festival this year and will screen at AFI Docs on Thursday.

The film captures Zimbabwe at a crossroads. In the first election since the removal of Robert Mugabe, the new leader of the opposition Nelson Chamisa is challenging the dictator’s corrupt legacy, and his successor Emmerson “the crocodile” Mnangagwa. The election will be the ultimate test for both sides. How they interpret the principles of democracy, if they can inspire trust among the citizenry, not succumb to violence, and foster faith in institutions, will set the course for the future for the country.

Newton said: “Zimbabwe needs this film like a body needs oxygen. It...

Oslo-based private non-profit Foundation Fritt Ord, which is behind ten doc features that bowed at Cph:dox, has upped its overall annual budget allocation from a pre-pandemic $12 million to $19 million in 2020, a level that will be sustained in 2021.

The Fritt Ord Foundation supports journalism, literature, training, documentary photography, and documentary filmmaking. As its name implies – fritt ord means “free speech” in Norwegian – a cornerstone of its mandate is to protect and promote freedom of expression in Norway and globally. Around 15% of its annual budget is earmarked for documentaries. High-profile Norwegian productions or co-productions that have received its funding include “Gunda,” exec produced by Joachin Phoenix, the Oscar short film entry “Do Not Split” and top IDFA winner “Radiograph of a Family”.

“Unlike many funders that come in later in production, we’re in from development, through production, promotion and outreach,” said Bente Roalvig, project manager and deputy executive director who sits on numerous pitch forums.

Currently competing for both the Dox:Award and the Politiken Danish:Dox Award at this year’s hybrid Cph:dox (April 21-May 5), Camilla Nielsson’s President is a riveting followup to 2014’s Democrats, which centered on two political rivals in a Sisyphean quest to transform Zimbabwe from a corrupt dictatorship into a fledgling democracy. It’s also a film Nielsson never intended to make. But that was before a ban, a military coup, and the rise of two new political rivals led the undaunted director to pick up her camera once again. With President Nielsson focuses on the young and charismatic leader of the Mdc (Movement for Democratic Change) Nelson […]

The post “Decolonization Has to Work in Both Directions; Both the Colonized and Colonizer Have to be Decolonized”: Camilla Nielsson on President first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

Currently competing for both the Dox:Award and the Politiken Danish:Dox Award at this year’s hybrid Cph:dox (April 21-May 5), Camilla Nielsson’s President is a riveting followup to 2014’s Democrats, which centered on two political rivals in a Sisyphean quest to transform Zimbabwe from a corrupt dictatorship into a fledgling democracy. It’s also a film Nielsson never intended to make. But that was before a ban, a military coup, and the rise of two new political rivals led the undaunted director to pick up her camera once again. With President Nielsson focuses on the young and charismatic leader of the Mdc (Movement for Democratic Change) Nelson […]

The post “Decolonization Has to Work in Both Directions; Both the Colonized and Colonizer Have to be Decolonized”: Camilla Nielsson on President first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

Award-winning filmmakers and a documentary from ‘The Act Of Killing’ producer Signe Byrge Sørensen among those selected.

Copenhagen International Documentary Film Festival (Cph:Dox) has revealed its line-up of competition titles for 2021, set to run April 21 to May 2.

The programme includes films that focus on the dominance of tech giants, new democratic movements, decolonization and climate change among other topics.

The competition programmes consist of 64 titles with 47 world premieres, nine international premieres and six European premieres. In total, 58% of the titles (37 films) are directed by one or more women. This increases to 66% when including films co-directed by male and female directors.

As Americans are painfully aware these days, democracy is messy business. Following her fascinating 2014 documentary Democrats, about the work of creating a new constitution in Zimbabwe, Camilla Nielsson’s sweeping President explores the nation’s second democratic election, in 2018, through the eyes of the opposition party. The legacy of Robert Mugabe looms large in the ruling Zanu-pf party, which controls all manner of life in the nation despite inroads made by the liberal Mdc (Movement for Democratic Change) and its presidential candidate Nelson Chamisa. Challenging incumbent Emmerson Mnangagwa, the film shifts modes between fly-on-the-wall picture about the inner workings of a campaign and an on-the-ground study in real election rigging, wherein the Zanu-pf use all manner—from soft approaches like food giveaways to disturbing allegations of sexual violence against poll workers.

The film is a straightforward act of courage by Danish journalist-turned-filmmaker Nielsson, whose film Democrats was considered pornographic and...

Democracy is a fragile enterprise no matter where it takes shape, but Zimbabwe’s past decade has proved an especially troubling case. Though dictator Robert Mugabe was booted by his own party in 2017, his replacement, Emmerson Mnangagwa — whose reputation for crude strategies led to the nickname “the crocodile” — hasn’t fared much better. In 2018, Mnangagwa faced a contemptuous election showdown with lawyer and activist Nelson Chamisa, the leader of the opposition party known as the Movement for Democratic Change Alliance (Mdc). The results, delayed by the ruling party for days, were blatantly rigged by Mnangagwa’s government; Mdc challenged them in nationally televised court proceedings and failed.

Those events fill the frantic, infuriating two-plus hours of hectic campaigning in “President,” director Camilla Nielsson’s probing look at the passion and uncertainty of working to preserve an ideal when the ruling party can discard it at will. If these recent events are new to you,...

Chicago – The 2021 Sundance Film Festival will be long remembered as the “virtual” version due to the pandemic, but there are always the real films, and the festival announced their competition honorees on February 2nd, in a virtual ceremony hosted by comedian Patton Oswalt.

After six days, 73 feature films and 50 Short Films, the Grand Jury Prizes were awarded to “Coda” (U.S. Dramatic) … Coda is an acronym for Child of Deaf Adults, and highlights the character of Ruby. “Summer of Soul” (U.S. Documentary) … the “Black Woodstock” of Harlem in the same Summer of 1969. “Flee” (World Cinema Documentary) … a child immigrant grows up to be a respected academic, but still harbors a secret. And “Hive” (World Cinema Dramatic) … a woman has a husband missing in action during the Kosovo war – should she continue to support herself or wait?

The list of all award winners are below.

Grand Jury Prize

Coda

Photo credit: Sundance Film Festival

U.

Siân Heder’s US feel-good family tale Coda won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize.

Coda and Hive were the big winners at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival virtual awards ceremony on Tuesday night (February 2), taking home four and three prizes, respectively.

Siân Heder’s US feel-good family tale Coda – set up after producer Patrick Wachsberger took remake rights to French film La Famille Bélier with him when he left Lionsgate – won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic, Audience Award: U.S. Dramatic, U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Ensemble Cast, and Directing Award: U.S. Dramatic prizes.

The...

The mostly virtual 2021 Sundance Film Festival is coming to a close. The festival announced awards winners Tuesday night, trading an in-person ceremony for one broadcast live and hosted by Patton Oswalt. The biggest winner was Sian Heder’s coming of age drama “Coda,” which earned four U.S. Dramatic Competition awards, including the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award. Other Big winners were “Summer of Soul,” which took home the two top U.S. Documentary awards.

Blerta Basholli’s “Hive” won three awards in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition: the Directing and Audience awards and the Grand Jury Prize. Rintu Thomas and Sushmit Ghosh’s “Writing with Fire” earned two World Cinema Documentary awards.

A total of 72 features screened over the last week, along with 50 shorts, four Indie Series, and 14 New Frontier VR/new media projects. Those projects were judged by a jury made up of Zeynep Atakan, Raúl Castillo,...

The narrative feature “Coda” and the documentary “Summer of Soul” swept the top categories at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, winning the Grand Jury Prizes and also taking the audience awards in the U.S. dramatic and documentary competitions.

“Coda,” director Sian Heder’s coming-of-age story in which Emilia Jones plays the only hearing member of a deaf family, also won an award for its ensemble, many of them deaf actors who performed in ASL. Its wins come three days after the film set a record for the largest sale in Sundance history, a $25 million deal with Apple.

“Summer of Soul,” which like “Coda” screened on the festival’s opening night, is a documentary by Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson built around long-unseen concert footage from the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, a six-weekend event that first-time director Questlove uses as a launching pad to explore race relations and Black culture in that tumultuous time.

The 2021 Sundance Film Festival awards went off at a very fast clip tonight, in an hour’s time. Host Patton Oswalt — or as he billed himself, “Discount Giamatti” — kept the jokes flowing.

Siân Heder’s Coda, which we first told you was swooped up by Apple with a rich $25 million bid, came up big. It won both the U.S. Grand Jury Prize, U.S. Dramatic Audience Award and a Special Jury Ensemble Cast award too. Heder also won Best Director in the U.S. Dramatic section. The movie follows a girl named Ruby. As the only hearing person in an otherwise deaf family, she is divided about staying with them as their fishing business is threatened.

Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson’s Summer of Soul took the Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award for Documentary.

Blerta Basholli’s Hive, about a woman in Kosovo who fights against a patriarchal society and whose husband is missing,...

The 2018 presidential elections in Zimbabwe, fought between former vice president Emmerson “the crocodile” Mnangagwa and the bright young opposition candidate Nelson Chamisa, were a dismal affair rife with election fraud, if you follow the persuasive arguments mounted by documaker Camilla Nielsson in President. Chamisa, a 40-year-old lawyer running on an anti-corruption, pro-employment platform, is obviously the people’s candidate, but can his team buck the dirty tricks and ballot-stuffing of his adversary? It’s a through-the-looking-glass moment in history that can’t help but echo the recent election furor in you-know-what-country.

Being all about stolen elections, President has an extraordinary topicality that’s a double-edged ...

The 2018 presidential elections in Zimbabwe, fought between former vice president Emmerson “the crocodile” Mnangagwa and the bright young opposition candidate Nelson Chamisa, were a dismal affair rife with election fraud, if you follow the persuasive arguments mounted by documaker Camilla Nielsson in President. Chamisa, a 40-year-old lawyer running on an anti-corruption, pro-employment platform, is obviously the people’s candidate, but can his team buck the dirty tricks and ballot-stuffing of his adversary? It’s a through-the-looking-glass moment in history that can’t help but echo the recent election furor in you-know-what-country.

Being all about stolen elections, President has an extraordinary topicality that’s a double-edged ...

Camilla Nielsson’s President tells the tumultuous story of Zimbabwe’s 2018 general election, the first since the country attained independence that Robert Mugabe was not a candidate. It is in many ways a follow-up to Nielsson’s 2014 film Democrats. Editor Jeppe Bødskov discusses his ongoing collaboration with Nielssoni. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Bødskov: I worked with Camilla Nielsson on her previous documentary Democrats. So, I knew her already. I know quite a lot about Zimbabwe and about […]

The post "There Were so Many Parallels and Contrasts": Editor Jeppe Bødskov on President first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

Camilla Nielsson’s President tells the tumultuous story of Zimbabwe’s 2018 general election, the first since the country attained independence that Robert Mugabe was not a candidate. It is in many ways a follow-up to Nielsson’s 2014 film Democrats. Editor Jeppe Bødskov discusses his ongoing collaboration with Nielssoni. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the editor of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Bødskov: I worked with Camilla Nielsson on her previous documentary Democrats. So, I knew her already. I know quite a lot about Zimbabwe and about […]

The post "There Were so Many Parallels and Contrasts": Editor Jeppe Bødskov on President first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

Camilla Nielsson’s President tells the tumultuous story of Zimbabwe’s 2018 general election, the first since the country attained independence that Robert Mugabe was not a candidate. It is in many ways a follow-up to Nielsson’s 2014 film Democrats. Dp Henrik Bohn Ipsen discusses the film’s difficult and ephemeral subject matter, and the synergy between his camerawork and Nielsson’s direction. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Ipsen: I had worked with director Camilla Nielsson on her previous film Democrats, […]

The post "On the First Film We Had Been Arrested, so We Knew This Danger Was Real": Dp Henrik Bohn Ipsen on President first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

Camilla Nielsson’s President tells the tumultuous story of Zimbabwe’s 2018 general election, the first since the country attained independence that Robert Mugabe was not a candidate. It is in many ways a follow-up to Nielsson’s 2014 film Democrats. Dp Henrik Bohn Ipsen discusses the film’s difficult and ephemeral subject matter, and the synergy between his camerawork and Nielsson’s direction. Filmmaker: How and why did you wind up being the cinematographer of your film? What were the factors and attributes that led to your being hired for this job? Ipsen: I had worked with director Camilla Nielsson on her previous film Democrats, […]

The post "On the First Film We Had Been Arrested, so We Knew This Danger Was Real": Dp Henrik Bohn Ipsen on President first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.

“Democrats,” Camilla Nielsson’s superb 2014 documentary about the tortuous construction of Zimbabwe’s 2013 constitution, was most riveting as a snapshot of a country still trying democracy on for size, wary of what it saw in the mirror. Studying the troubled coalition government that paired president Robert Mugabe’s long-ruling Zanu-pf party with the more liberal opposition of Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (Mdc) Alliance, Nielsson’s film posited any progress at all as fragile, easily undone by a volatile political system: Audiences might have left hoping for a more optimistic sequel, but hardly counting on one.

Even so, those who haven’t checked any headlines from Harare in the interim could hardly be prepared for the gut-punch of “President,” Nielsson’s galvanizing, epic-scale docuthriller tracking Zimbabwe’s corruption-riddled 2018 presidential election — presented here as a brazen feat of hijacked democracy to make Donald Trump positively chartreuse with envy. As...

Anticipated Friday premieres include John And The Hole, On The Count of Three, Luzzu, How It Ends.

Sundance has got off to a busy start on Friday (January 29) as Neon picked up North American rights to Flee and offers were understood to be coming in on Coda.

Sources said the Flee deal was in the $1m range and closed around 6am following the Day One screening on Thursday evening.

‘Flee’: Sundance Review

Neon negotiated the deal with 30West on behalf of the filmmakers. 30West is a majority-owner in Neon.

It is unclear whether Neon’s output partner Hulu backed the acquisition.

Poh Si Teng, producer of Oscar-nominated documentary short “St. Louis Superman,” has joined the International Documentary Association (IDA) as the new director of the IDA Funds and Enterprise program.

Poh will oversee and build IDA’s grants portfolio and serve as a key liaison with the documentary field in the U.S. and globally, working with IDA’s program officer Dana Merwin.

Poh succeeds Carrie Lozano who joined the Sundance Institute as director of the documentary film program in fall 2020.

Prior to joining IDA, Poh oversaw the U.S., Canada and Latin America as documentary commissioner and senior producer for Al Jazeera English’s flagship documentary strand, “Witness.” She was previously a journalist with The New York Times, where she received an Emmy nomination and other awards from the Scripps Howard Foundation, the Society of Professional Journalists and the Nppa for her work.

Originally from Penang, Malaysia, Poh has also...