http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/Eleven_Festival Sun, 19 May 2024 10:39:03 GMT /skins/default/en/15festival/ch01_newsfeed_logo.gif http://old.irandocfest.ir/ 100 70 en Copyright© Irandocfest.ir, all rights reserved Sun, 19 May 2024 10:39:03 GMT The 11th Festival 60 http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3360/the-grand-prize-of-the-festival-was-dedicated-to-victims-kermanshah-earthquake Samaneh Farahani In this ceremony, attended by a large number of officials, filmmakers, international guests and journalists, the festival's winners were described and praised as follows:   Honoring the Documentary Cinema of Eastern Azerbaijan In "Honoring the Documentary Cinema of Eastern Azerbaijan", the festival awarded 19 filmmakers with the festival's crystal statue, the honorary diploma and gold coins. These artists included Mohammad Hassan Daamenzan, Rahim Mortezavand, Hossein Poursatar, Mirhossein Servatmand, Mohammad Ehsani, Vahid Husseini-nami, Ali Kheyrkhah, Maryam Amini Ghazi-jahani, Masoumeh Mohammadpour, Ali Delkari, Farhoud Bahri-karami, Ghorbanali Taherfar, Shahram Alizadeh-Amniyeh, Mohammad Mahmoudi-Asl, Younes Moghaddam-eywandi, Mohammad-Bagher Vosoughi, Mohammad Farzin-nia, Farid Mirkhani and Majid Fathi. Art and Experience Cinema Awards Jafar Sanei-moghadam and Seifollah Samadian presented the Art and Experience Awards as follows: The honorary diploma and 30 million rials to Davoud Ashrafi, the director of "Boulevard Story"; The Art and Experience statue, the honorary diploma and 50 million rials to Azadeh Mousavi and Kourosh Ataei, directors of "In Search of Farideh". AIFIC Award The Award of the Association of Iranian Filmmaking Institutes and Companies (AIFIC) was received by Mahdi Koohian, the producer of "The Judge and Death". Documentary TV Award Salim Ghafouri, the director of Documentary TV of Iran, awarded this channel's honorary diploma and the 70 Million rials to the Director of "Edward", Mohammad Bagher Shahi. Tehran Municipality's Cultural and Art Organization Award Mahmoud Salahi, the director of Tehran Municipality's Cultural and Art Organization, presented this organization's awards as follows: Third prize: The honorary diploma and 30 Million rials to Shahram Mirab-Aghdam, the director of "Valley of Silents" Second prize: The honorary diploma and 40 million rials to Hasan Naghashi, the director Vazarieh First prize: The honorary diploma and 50 Million rials to Mahdi Bagheri, the director of "Looking for the house of the sun". Honoring Sa'adat Ali Saeedpour Mohammad Mohammadpour, the director of Culture and Islamic Guidance Office of East Azerbaijan and Mohammad Mahdi Tabatabayi-Nejad, the festival director, honored the experienced documentary director of Tabriz, Sa'adat Ali Saeedpourm by awarding him the Cinema Verite Turquoise Statue, the honorary diploma and the five gold coins.   International Competition   The jury of the International Competition, including Gianfranco Rosi, Darryl Els, Katayoun Shahabi, Matthieu Darras, Pimpaka Towira and Sam Kalantari, announced the festival's winners in this section as follows: The Short and Semi-Long Documentary Competition: Special Jury Prize: The statue of the festival, honorary diploma and $ 2,000 to Mohammad Reza Vatandoust for "Lotus", from Iran. Best Documentary Short: The statue of the festival, honorary diploma and $ 3,000 to Afsaneh Salari for "No Man's Land", from Portugal and France. Best Semi-Long Documentary: The statue of the festival, honorary diploma and $ 4,000 to Alejandro G. Salgado for "Bolingo, the Forest of Love", from Spain. Documentary Feature Competition: Special Jury Prize: The statue of the festival, honorary diploma and $ 2,000 to Ezatollah Parvazeh, for "My Mother, My Tribe", from Iran. Best Documentary: The statue of the festival, honorary diploma and $ 5,000 to Reza Farahmand, for "Women with Gunpowder Earrings", from Iran.   Avini Award Morteza Sarhangi and Reza Borji, the juries of the Avini Award, a special section for documentaries on the Islamic Revolution, Iran-Iraq war and the resistance, introduced and praised the winners as follows: Appreciation of the Jury: Shahid Avini statue, honorary diploma and 50 million rials to Ehsan Emadi, for "Razmara: A Silent Case". Special Jury Prize: Shahid Avini statue, honorary diploma and 80 million rials to Mostafa Razagh Karimi, for "Grand Dame of Iran". Best Documentary Short (Best Director): Shahid Avini Statue, honorary diploma and 100 Million rials to Ahmed Zayeri, the director of "Citizen War". Best Documentary (Best Director): Avini Statue, honorary diploma and 120 Million rials to Reza Farahmand, for "Women with Gunpowder Earrings". Special prize of the festival's secretary: Avini statue, honorary diploma and 80 million rials to Jamshid Bayat Tork, for "Empty Hands". Honorung Mostafa Razagh Karimi Mohammad Mehdi Heydarian and Ebrahim Hatamikia honored Mostafa Razagh Karimi, the prominent Tabrizian filmmaker, with the festival's Turquoise Statue, honorary diploma and gold coins.   National Competetion The jury of the national competition, Manouchehr Tayyab, Mohammad Ali Farsi, Ramin Heydari Farouqi, Alireza Zarindast, Amir Tajik, Moin Karimoddini and Mastaneh Mohajer, introduced and praised the winners as follows: Best Narration Writing: The festival's statue, honorary diploma and 60 Million rials to Milad Mohammadi, the writing the narration of "The Love of the Geranioums". Best Sound: The festival's statue, honorary diploma and 60 Million rials to Kioumars Mohammad Chenari (Sound Recorder) and Hasan Mahdavi (Sound Design) for "Women with Gunpowder Earrings". Best Cinematography: The festival's statue, honorary diploma and 60 Million rials to Cameraman Ali Shilandarim for "To See and to Be". Best Editing: The festival's statue, honorary diploma and 60 Million rials to Hamid Najafirad, for "In Search of Farideh". Best Music: The festival's statue, honorary diploma and the 60 Million rials to Afshin Azizi, for "In Search of Farideh". Best Researcher: The festival's statue, honorary diploma and 70 Million rials to Sudabeh Mojaveri, for Veh Antiock Shapour. Best Documentary Short (Directing): The festival's statue, honorary diploma and 100 Million rials to Fatthollah Amiri and Nima Asgari for "Ranger and Leopard". Best Documentary (Directing): The festival's statue, honorary diploma and 120 Million rials Cash to Reza Farahmand for "Women with Gunpowder Earrings". Special Jury Award: The Jury of the 11th Iran International Documentary Film Festival, with honoring all the crews of "Love Rotory", gave their special prize, including the festival's statue, honorary diploma and 80 million rials on behalf of the group, to Ali Hamraz, the director and Mohammed Kart, the producer of this documentary. The special prize of the festival's secretary: including the festival's statue, honorary diploma and was presented by Mohammad Mehdi Tabatabaye Nejad to Azadeh Mousavi Kourosh Ataei, the directors of "In Search of Farideh". Best Documentary (Producing): The festival's statue, honorary diploma and 140 Million rials donated to Orouj Cultural and Art Institute for producing "Grand Dame of Iran". Gholamali Asgarian, on behalf of this institute, donated a cash prize to the victims of Kermanshah earthquake.   ]]> The 11th Festival Mon, 25 Dec 2017 10:52:58 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3360/the-grand-prize-of-the-festival-was-dedicated-to-victims-kermanshah-earthquake http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3182/darryl-els-the-director-of-south-africa-s-encounters-festival-i-wished-to-get-know-iranian-art-and-culture The reporter of Public Relations bulletin interviewed this successful cinema artist and director:   What motivated you to accept to the invitation to travel to Iran and be a jury member of Cinema Verite film festival? For many years, I was looking for an opportunity to travel to Iran in order to see the Iranian culture and its various aspects, such as food and art. Since I was much younger, I wished to travel to Isfahan; it was one of my great dreams, but due to the long distance, it was never possible until I received the invitation from the organizers of the Cinema Verite to judge in this cinematic event, which I proudly accepted. In my opinion, the experience of watching documentaries and encountering Iranian culture is a very special thing. How much do you know about Iran's cinema, especially Iranian documentaries, before traveling here? My knowledge of the Iranian cinema is by watching the great films of Abbas Kiarostami and Asghar Farhadi. In fact, I had the chance to meet with the great filmmakers who has traveled to South Africa over the years to the Durban Film Festival (the oldest and most important film festival in South Africa). But my knowledge is limited to this, until I accepted managing of Encounters Film Festival and so I become more and more familiar with Iranian documentary and experimental cinema and met some of its young filmmakers, who were very energetic and smart. What features have made you so attracted to Iranian culture and art? Do you see any mutual aspect between the two countries? Iran and South Africa are very similar in some aspects. Both are very complex societies that have gone through their particular historical crises. There is energy, passion and curiosity in the face of the young Iranian filmmakers that I have met over these years. In a way, they can be said to represent another aspect of Iran that has been less seen and known. I think the same thing is happening to the young filmmakers in South Africa, as if some kind of cultural reconstruction is happening. What are the conditions of documentary filmmaking in South Africa? What challenges do such filmmakers face there? I think the conditions for making documentaries has its own particular difficulties all over the world, and finding a specific investor and buyer in this field is a global problem. Some of the challenges are very specific to this field, including the fact that almost no distributer is doing this in a broad public scale everything gets political. As a result, it can be said that important distributers withhold their support from the production of documentary films and their young filmmakers. Currently, many who go to for making documentaries in fact get involved in a kind of deconstruction because they have to work outside the mainstream. Such limitations are attractive, but they ring their own specific challenges; challenges that filmmakers need to learn how to manage. Do you have any special recommendation for young filmmakers? It seems very important to me that the festivals, whether in Africa or Middle East, Asia or South America, should mutually be connected and interact. This interaction is fascinating, and it's very important for me personally to learn new things from others, especially from younger filmmakers. Although my knowledge of Iranian society is not very deep yet, in my conversations with the young filmmakers who I met I recognized some changes that are occurring in the Iranian society. As I said, the same thing is happening for young filmmakers in South Africa, and they are also looking for a language, so they can make a difference in the transformation of their society. That's why I think we should expand our relationships so that we can learn more from each other.   ]]> The 11th Festival Wed, 13 Dec 2017 11:56:02 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3182/darryl-els-the-director-of-south-africa-s-encounters-festival-i-wished-to-get-know-iranian-art-and-culture http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3181/gianfranco-rosi-there-way-no-i-d-say-to-iran-s-cinema-verite As you know last year, your works has been celebrated at Cinema Verite and some of them were screened, in your absence. This year, aside from the invitation, what made you to come to Iran and attend the festival? Unfortunately, last year I was mostly traveling for the screenings of my latest film "Fire at Sea", which was nominated for an Oscar, so I couldn’t attend this festival. This prevented me to travel to Iran, as I was at the same time in the US for the promotion of my film for the Oscars. But this year, when I was invited as jury member to the festival - which was an honor – there was no way I’d say no. Also for some years I wanted to travel to Iran, since the Iranian cinema is well known all over the world. Personally, I think the Iranian cinema is one of the most important and influential parts of the world’s cinema. So I personally wanted to travel here. With this interest in Iranian cinema, have you had the chance to watch Iranian documentaries that have been screened in recent years? I have some brief knowledge of it but I cannot specifically name names. However, one of the best Iranian movies I‘ve seen in recent years, is “A Separation” - very impressive movie. In these years, all the filmmakers who introduced the Iranian cinema to the world have produced very impressive movies, even very revolutionary in ways such as narratives and global codes of cinema. Personally, it was always important for me to discover the universality of your cinematic language. And what features did you find in this discovery that has attracted you? Well, this capacity to look deeper into the world is commendable; not just in terms of the narrative but also in terms of offering a very special thing to the audience, while being able to portray it in a universal language. For me, personally, this has always been a big challenge in filmmaking. When you find your story, then you should look for characters who portray that story. This is what I always do in my documentaries; to find a person I can portray my story through them. So, the most important challenge for me has always been to bring the story to a universal level. This is the same capacity that Abbas Kiarostami's cinema benefitted from, and among its younger filmmakers, it seems that Iranian cinema still has the ability to achieve significant achievements. In one of your interviews you have said that you prefer to use the word "people" in your documentaries rather than "character". Tell us a little about this. Yes, I used to use the term as part of the cinematic language. But it's true that, especially in the documentary, first there are people and you are dealing with people, then as you begin to structure your film and story, people naturally become characters. Whenever I watch movie, I want to see this feature in it. But especially in documentaries, we are in a challenging moment. There is a tremendous transformation in documentaries all over the world, especially in the language of this kind of cinema which is expanding. The line between documentary and fiction is getting narrower and narrower. A very interesting process is underway; you can explore the deepest and more and more make the line between fiction and documentary disappear. I personally do not like to separate documentary and fiction, but it's important for me to challenge the right and wrong. These two are very important to me. It's amazing that now, all around the world, from China and the Middle East to Europe, the United States and South America, a feature film is undergoing such a change and transformation that the line between documentary and fiction is practically broken. I was very lucky to have one of my films featured in the Venice Film Festival competition, and my latest documentary has been featured in in the Berlin Film Festival’s main competition. For me, this success was gaining the goal that was always in my head from the start; from the day I started shooting my first film, “Boatman” in India. You went to New York at age 19 and studied cinema. Why did you started to make documentaries from the very beginning, never changed over the years and you continued your filmmaking in this category? Making a documentary gives me an infinite freedom. I do not have to narrate my story before shooting. I just need to have the core of my story and develop it in the process. So, this is a kind of lifestyle for me. You know that I do almost all of the stuff for my films alone. I make movies in isolation, without the presence of others; I shoot, making sound and produce my own film. As a result, making documentaries gives me great freedom unavailable in making feature fiction films. Because it has such a complicated and huge structure that you need to fully share your story with others beforehand, and I do not have the patience to do that. On the other hand, I have no interest in writing a screenplay, because as soon as I put my story on paper, it no longer is attracted enough for me to make it. It is fascinating for me to search for my story, for people and characters and go for the unexpected encounters that are about to happen. Without these encounters, my movie will not be created and will not exist. So, I enjoyed this filming process very much, because my way of working requires something like that: discovering the story, discovering people and the structure of the film, and the way it should be edited. The whole process is my writing. In fact, I put my story on the paper by camera and quite mentally. As a result, the biggest challenge lies here; the fact that every time, I have to find a new structure for my next movie and to have a new story to narrate. I do not like to repeat myself. I want to discover a new language every time to narrate my story. So your approach to filmmaking is totally experimental? I don't know, I usually prefer to run away from such labels. For me, the documentary cinema is essentially experimental, since from the beginning of documentary’s history, since (Robert) Flaherty, this cinema has always been unbelievable and revolutionary changes. It is this transformation of cinema that enchants me. So, I don’t think my works are experimental, but the documentary cinema essentially must be so. Without experience, the documentary is doomed to end. I think that this applies to all the arts. Since you are actually alone in the whole process of filmmaking, what challenges does it make for you? For me, it's hard to isolate filming from directing and the rest. I cannot possibly imagine myself working with a cameraman or a sound recordist. It's very important for me to make an intimate connection with the world in front of me and its people. As I mentioned earlier, the word "encounter" is of great importance to me – encounter with people – and this is where the structure of my film begins to form. So, first you encounter a place, then you encounter people and then it’s these people who reflect the core of the story. As a result, working alone allows me to create the desired intimacy in encountering the place, its people and things around. It seems to me that when twenty people are around, like when you are making a feature film, the intimacy I seek is lost. I lose the intimacy component that is important in my work. As a result, I'm not able to separate the filming from directing and sound recording. When I look at the lens of my camera, I’m like a scientist who looks in his microscope and discovers a world. As a result, I can't just look at my surroundings and order something to be done. When the eye looks out of a camera, the thinking process happens in a different way, and I discover the realities that are not possible without a camera. It is the camera that does the isolation from the outside world and provides the necessary information for narration. As soon as I put my eye on the camera, my mind begins to process and edit the film. Does spending this amount of energy alone make you tired? Of course it makes me tired. From my first film, "Boatman", I said to myself that I would not make another movies again, and every time I say that this is my last. My films are made in a long process, often several years. It took just four, five years for me to make my first movie. "Below Sea Level" took several years. "Sacro GRA” took three years to make. The last film "Fire at the Sea" took one and a half year to make. This movie I'm about to begin making, I don’t know exactly how long it's going to take. Therefore, in making each movie I face a great challenge, and that's why I completely lose my personal life, because all my life becomes the story I'm about to tell. So, after making each film, I'm completely exhausted. But in the other hand, after finishing each film, I must completely abandon my past and forget it. Every time I start a new film, it's as if I'm going to make my first film and it’s the first time I’m about to get involved with cinema art. That's why I don’t have a long filmography and so far, I have only made five films, each time deciding it’s the last. It might be interesting for our audiences to know how do you invest so much energy and time on low-budget and self-produced films? How do you spent whole your time on your documentary making and still have a life? It was not like this in the past, and I had to work much more. One of the reasons for my works took so long to make was that I had to do other things like filming for other projects to make a living. I’ve never took money from any foundation, organization or studio for making my films. I’ve always made the money for this. Sometimes I didn’t have a penny and start from nothing. It was only after the success of "Sacro" in Venice that things changed, and after "Fire at Sea", the situation has improved considerably. It is a great blessing for a filmmaker to be able to devote all his time to the film he is creating and to have no financial interest. This happened very late in my career. How is the documentary cinema and the support of it in Italy? Over past years, regardless of the Venice's gold lion award, which is a great honor, have you ever received financial aid or sponsorship from studios and film production companies? Well, the situation has changed a lot recently. When I was making my first films, "Boatman", "Below Sea Level" and "Sicario", there was no support from Italian cinema. I was a completely castoff and marginalized creature who nobody paid any attention or interest to him and his films. In the recent decade, the situation has changed, and documentary filmmaking is taken more and more serious. In the whole world, the status of documentary cinema is improving, and in addition to the support of big and famous studios, it is also welcomed by cinema audiences. The nomination of "Fire at the Sea" in the Oscars is a proof to this claim.   ]]> The 11th Festival Wed, 13 Dec 2017 11:23:24 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3181/gianfranco-rosi-there-way-no-i-d-say-to-iran-s-cinema-verite http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3132/cinema-verite-international-film-festival-and-tabriz-2018 In the section "Honoring the Documentary Cinema of Eastern Azerbaijan" this festival, which is going to be held with the participation of the Cultural & Art Organization of Tabriz, 21 selected films from the works of documentary filmmakers of East Azerbaijan are going to be screened and will be honored at the closing ceremony. These filmmakers are festival's guests and have a lodge in the Charsou Cineplex, so they can meet and talk with peers and audience.   Honoring Mostafa Razaqkarimi and Saadat Ali Saeedpour Honoring the two veterans of Tabriz documentary cinema is one of the special programs of the 11th Cinema Verite. The festival will honor Mostafa Razaqkarimi and Saadat Ali Saeedpour with the Turquoise Medal of Cinema Verite, the statue of the festival, the appreciation plate and financial award. "Memories for all Seasons" and "Captain Solomon" are the two selected films by these filmmakers for screening in this section of the festival.   21 Documentary Filmmakers from the East Azerbaijan 21 filmmakers from East Azerbaijan who are going to be honored in 11th Cinema Verite are: Mostafa Razaqkarimi, Saadat Ali Saeedpour, Rahim Mortezavard, Mohammad Hassan Damenzan, Hossein Poursattar, Mirhossein Servatmand, Mohammad Ehsani, Vahid Hoseini-Nami, Ali Kheyrkhah, Maryam Amini Ghazi-Jahani, Masoumeh Mohammadpour, Ali Delkari, Farhoud Bahri-Karami, Ghorbanali Taherfar, Shahram Alizadeh Amniyeh, Mohammad Mahmoudi-Asl, Jounes Moqadam-Ivandi, Mohammad-Baqer Vosouqi, Mohammad Farzin-nia, Farid Mirkhani and Majid Fathi. The Azerbaijan Documentary Cinema is going to be screened every day of the festival at 16:15 to 17:45, cinema theater 3, at Charsou Cineplex.   Tabriz 2018 Since Tabriz is introduced as the capital of the Islamic world tourism in 2018, referred to as Tabriz 2018, the Honoring of the Documentary Cinema of East Azarbaijan in Cinema Verite, which is going to be held by the prominent Iranian and international guests on the days near the new year, will be one of the first events to show and celebrate the cultural and artistic grandeur of the historic city of Tabriz.   ]]> The 11th Festival Tue, 12 Dec 2017 12:07:43 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3132/cinema-verite-international-film-festival-and-tabriz-2018 http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3131/cinema-verite-international-film-festival-and-tabriz-2018 In the section "Honoring the Documentary Cinema of Eastern Azerbaijan" this festival, which is going to be held with the participation of the Cultural & Art Organization of Tabriz, 21 selected films from the works of documentary filmmakers of East Azerbaijan are going to be screened and will be honored at the closing ceremony. These filmmakers are festival's guests and have a lodge in the Charsou Cineplex, so they can meet and talk with peers and audience.   Honoring Mostafa Razaqkarimi and Saadat Ali Saeedpour Honoring the two veterans of Tabriz documentary cinema is one of the special programs of the 11th Cinema Verite. The festival will honor Mostafa Razaqkarimi and Saadat Ali Saeedpour with the Turquoise Medal of Cinema Verite, the statue of the festival, the appreciation plate and financial award. "Memories for all Seasons" and "Captain Solomon" are the two selected films by these filmmakers for screening in this section of the festival.   21 Documentary Filmmakers from the East Azerbaijan 21 filmmakers from East Azerbaijan who are going to be honored in 11th Cinema Verite are: Mostafa Razaqkarimi, Saadat Ali Saeedpour, Rahim Mortezavard, Mohammad Hassan Damenzan, Hossein Poursattar, Mirhossein Servatmand, Mohammad Ehsani, Vahid Hoseini-Nami, Ali Kheyrkhah, Maryam Amini Ghazi-Jahani, Masoumeh Mohammadpour, Ali Delkari, Farhoud Bahri-Karami, Ghorbanali Taherfar, Shahram Alizadeh Amniyeh, Mohammad Mahmoudi-Asl, Jounes Moqadam-Ivandi, Mohammad-Baqer Vosouqi, Mohammad Farzin-nia, Farid Mirkhani and Majid Fathi. The Azerbaijan Documentary Cinema is going to be screened every day of the festival at 16:15 to 17:45, cinema theater 3, at Charsou Cineplex.   Tabriz 2018 Since Tabriz is introduced as the capital of the Islamic world tourism in 2018, referred to as Tabriz 2018, the Honoring of the Documentary Cinema of East Azarbaijan in Cinema Verite, which is going to be held by the prominent Iranian and international guests on the days near the new year, will be one of the first events to show and celebrate the cultural and artistic grandeur of the historic city of Tabriz.   ]]> The 11th Festival Tue, 12 Dec 2017 12:05:13 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3131/cinema-verite-international-film-festival-and-tabriz-2018 http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3129/victor-forniés-visit-travels-to-tehran-with-a-father He has a BA from the University of Zaragoza and has a MA in directing creative documentaries and video editing from the University of Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona. Forniés, a resident of Paris, has collaborated with artists such as Jean-Claude Carrière, Marcel Lozinki, Victor Kozakowski, Javier Riblo, Albert Sera, and Mercedes Alvarez. He has started documentary filmmaking with The Voice of the Wind, and then directed works such as It Ends (2012), The Plague (2013) and Demonstration (2013). A Father (2016) is his first long documentary to be featured in some European film festivals. This 61-minute documentary coproduced by Spain and France in 2016, is about A "Grandfather, father, and son, And many unanswered questions. The director paints an intimate portrait of his father, seeking to understand the silence that has defined their relationship. Through a personal, honest and sensitive voice, we observe the emotional complexity of father-son relationships. A personal search that ends up becoming homage to Franco’s victims." that Victor Forniés is currently preparing to make his second feature film, Facing Light.   ]]> The 11th Festival Tue, 12 Dec 2017 12:02:33 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3129/victor-forniés-visit-travels-to-tehran-with-a-father http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3128/tabatabaei-nejad-our-approach-is-to-promote-iranian-documentaries-and-the-presence-of-productions-in-international-film-festivals At the beginning of the conference, Shahnam Safajou, about this major event in Iranian cinema said: "This year, for the second consecutive year, the festival is held in the Charsou Cineplex. During the festival, 227 films will be screened in two national and international sections, with 124 Iranian and 103 international films from 46 countries selected to be featured in various sections of the festivals." Then Mohammad Mehdi Tabatabaei-Nejad continued: "The Iran's Cinema Verite begins its second decade while, with the efforts of the Iranian creative documentary filmmakers, has succeeded in experiencing a magnificent decade. In the words of its filmmakers, this festival has managed to become a turning point, and our prominent artists of the field with their brilliant background have helped to grow." Pointing to the history of documentary cinema, he stated: "Documentary cinema benefited from a good start in Iran, and it has gone through many highs and lows, but with the foundation of the Cinema Verite Film Festival, a new era in the Iranian documentary cinema has begun – a festival with such high quality that would be noted." The managing director of DEFC, emphasized that, just like the previous festivals, this year too there was an effort to bring the best Iranian and international films to screen for the audience. "We have always tried to define documentary cinema for the public and will continue to hold the festival with the same approach. According to the statistics, over these years, we have succeeded to bring the documentary enthusiasts to the cinema, so much that last year, 35% of our audiences were non-professional audience of the documentary cinema." He added: "With a comprehensive plan we announced this year by Iranian Organization of Cinema and it emphasizing the goal to increase coproduction in order to enter the international film markets, a new special horizon is set for our documentary. We, in Cinema Verite, has also tried to focus on these two issues, which is why the international section was of special focus to us. Our team in international section has started their work many months ago, 4100 films have been reviewed and eventually 25 of them managed to enter the competition section. There will also be 78 documentaries in other international sections." Stating that more than 700 Iranian documentaries has come to the secretariat of the Film Festival, Tabatabaei-Nejad added: "The selection board chose 80 films for the National Contest, including 42 feature films and 38 short documentaries. This year's 60 foreign guests, mostly of influential figures in the world of documentary cinema, will come to the festival as jury members, documentary filmmakers, festival directors and global networks, buyer and distributors." He added: "As before, the film market will be held in different sections. The distributors of documentary films, prestigious TV networks and representatives of international festivals will be present at the market, and there will also be meetings we hope to be useful to our filmmakers, since there are about 14 distributors of the field in the festival this year." Tabatabaie-Nejad introduced the new "Danish Docs", a section in the 11th Cinema Verite dedicated to the Danish documentary cinema, and stated: "We have films from the best film festivals of the world, such as the French Cinema Du Reel and American Jacksonville Film Festival, as well as the most prominent feature films in the world." He continued: "Workshops are going to be held like every year. Coproduction and Funding, Visual Effects in Documentary Cinema, Can thought be converted to the Visual, International Standardization in the Documentary, The Truth of the Moment, Wildlife Documentary, A Creative Coproduction and Feature Documentary are workshops of this year's festival. There number of people registered to attend the workshops of the 11th Cinema Verite was so significant that we were forced to select, choosing those who were more active and had a more fruitful resume." About this year's guests, the managing director of the festival said: "Gianfranco Rossi is one of our guests who is a board member of the jury for feature films section, as well as hosting a workshop called The Truth of the Moment." Stating that 25 percent of the screenings in Iran is dedicated to the documentary cinema, he said: "Today among the Iranian producers, attention to the atmosphere of cinema has become critical. Maybe in recent past, the approach was to make documentaries for TV, but today these films are being produced to be screened in cinema theatres. That's why it was necessary for us to consider the requirements of cinematic productions at our workshops." At the end of this press conference, Shahnam Safajou said: "The documentaries submitted to the National Competition and a selection of international documentaries has been sent to the critics before the festival and their reviews will be posted in our website during the festival." He reminded that this year Critics' or Q & A Conferences are moved to the 6th floor of Charsou Cineplex, in order to allow filmmakers to meet with more journalists and audience.   ]]> The 11th Festival Tue, 12 Dec 2017 11:54:17 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3128/tabatabaei-nejad-our-approach-is-to-promote-iranian-documentaries-and-the-presence-of-productions-in-international-film-festivals http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3124/the-twelve-year-old-story-of-an-lady-narrated-by-vatandoust-s-camera Mohammad Reza Vatandoust, who last year was in Cinema Verite with the documentary "Nana" attended the 10th Film Festival of the Truth, was nominated for awards and won the special jury award. This year, with "Lotus", has is in two sections of the National Competition and the Shahid Avini Award of the festival. About his latest documentary, he explained: "In the beginning of the film, we see an old woman living alone in wild, and from those very first moments, the old woman starts to speak her thoughts. She talks about the person she is going to visit..." This experimental filmmaker continued: "The whole movie is from a morning to the next, in which we go through the autumn to winter and then to the spring." About the differences between his two films, "Lotus" and the experimental documentary "Nana", Vatandoust said: "Nana was a unique experience, which took six years to make, the entire film a reflection in water with unique sound editing and music, but the theme of Lotus didn't allow us such structure. However, in terms of composition and atmosphere, we tried to capture beautiful pictures from the nature, but the final plan aside, which had a particular complexity (the camera had to go through two rooms, out of small doors and to the sky), there was no special creative in its visual form." By emphasizing on the creative narrative structure of the "Lotus", the filmmaker continued: "We used a new narrative form in this film. Despite the usual form in which the character is and his problem are presented in the film, we started it with a suspension which lasted until the end. In fact, our character was dramatized in this documentary; a subject that is still a problem in Iranian cinema, since many filmmakers and people in film industry have a bad reaction to it, while in the world this is not the case and in many of the documentaries we see dramatization of character and suspension of narrative."   ]]> The 11th Festival Tue, 12 Dec 2017 11:34:43 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3124/the-twelve-year-old-story-of-an-lady-narrated-by-vatandoust-s-camera http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3121/the-director-of-arte-tv-network-hosts-creative-documentary-coproduction-workshop-in-cinema-verite Fabrice Puchault was born in 1965 in France. He graduated from the French National School and worked as an Independent Producer from 1992 to 2003. Then he joined the French TV 3 as Editor-in-Chief of Science and Wildlife, documentary section. In November 2005, he joined the France TV 2, documentary section and since 2008 has been responsible for planning the network and digital media. From February 2011 to January 2016, he served as director of the documentary section of French TV 2. Fabrice Puchault is currently the director and the editor-in-chief of Arte, documentary section and works on social, history and cultural issues. He also teaches documentary history at the Sorbonne University of Paris. ARTE is a European cultural network in, which aims to raise awareness among its viewers by producing creative and innovative programs.       ]]> The 11th Festival Tue, 12 Dec 2017 11:24:44 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3121/the-director-of-arte-tv-network-hosts-creative-documentary-coproduction-workshop-in-cinema-verite http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3039/special-place-for-anthropology-documentaries-in-cinema-verite Seven anthropology documentaries of this 11th Cinema Verite are: The Last Ice Hunters (Jure Breceljnik, Rožle Bregar / Slovenia), Come Back Free (Ksenia Okhapkina / Estonia), Sent Away Boys (Harjant Gill / India), Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World (Catherine Bainbridge, Alfonso Maiorana / Canada), A Hole In the Head (Robert Kirchhoff / Czech Republic, Slovakia), Small Peoples, Big Trees (Vadim Vitovtsev / Russia) and All That Passes By Through a Window That Doesn’t Open (Martin DiCicco / America, Qatar). Anthropology Documentaries is one of the non-competitive sections of Iran Documentary Film Festival.   ]]> The 11th Festival Sat, 09 Dec 2017 07:04:52 GMT http://old.irandocfest.ir/en/news/3039/special-place-for-anthropology-documentaries-in-cinema-verite