[photo: Ivetka and the Mountain, dir. Vít Janeček, Czech Republic 2008, presented at the 2008 Docu Talents from the East]
Docu Talents from the East 2009
A presentation of 9 outstanding documentary projects from Central and Eastern Europe scheduled for release between July 2009 and July 2010
Date: July 7, 2009, 10:30am
Venue: Cinema A, Hotel Thermal (Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic)
Organizers: Jihlava IDFF / Institute of Documentary Film / Karlovy Vary IFF
Moderated by: Hana Rezková and Andrea Slováková
Docu Cocktail Party (following the presentation)
July 7, 2009 / 12 noon / Terrace, Hotel Thermal (Meeting Point)
Doc Alliance Films - Presentation of the Online Distribution Portal
July 7, 2009 / 15:30 / Cinema A, Hotel Thermal
+Screening of short documentary films that were awarded at the 2007 and 2008 Karlovy Vary IFF
Co-organized by the Doc Alliance festivals: Jihlava IDFF / DOK Leipzig / CPH:DOX / Visions du Réel / Planete Doc Review
Download the 2009 Docu Talents flyer [PDF]
VILLAGE WITHOUT WOMEN / SELO BEZ ŽENA
Bosnia and Herzegovina / France
Director: Srdjan Sarenac
Producer: Estelle Robin-You, Les films du balibari
Director of Photography: Pablo Ferro
Run Time: 52 / 90 min
Current Stage of Development: Shooting
Estimated Date of Release: 2010
Dragan, Zoran, and Rodoljub Jankovic live in Zabrdje, a womanless village in southern Serbia. These three brothers represent nearly half of the village population where only seven inhabitants hold down the fort in what was once a vibrant rural community. If the three brothers remain single, the village will disappear. Their plan is to marry women willing to put up with the tough living conditions in Zabrdje, but they have had no luck convincing neighbouring Serbian women to join them.
KATKA / KATKA
Czech Republic
Director: Helena Třeštíková
Producer: Kateřina Černá, Pavel Strnad, Negativ Ltd.
Director of Photography: Vlastimil Hamerník
Run Time: 90 min
Current Stage of Development: Editing
Estimated Date of Release: December 2, 2009
Observed over a decade (13 years), this documentary follows Katka, Lada and Jana through their world of drugs, prison, love and responsibility. They live on the streets of Prague, hustling for drugs, stealing, attempting murder. Lada and Jana end up in prison. Katka ends up expecting a child. Will she manage to overcome this most difficult battle of her life? This is not a film about drug abuse, but a film about the replenishing power of life, about values and their price, about mothers and their relationship with their children.
OBSCURANTIST AND HIS LINEAGE / TMÁŘ A JEHO ROD
Czech Republic
Director: Karel Vachek
Producer: Radim Procházka
Director of Photography: Karel Slach
Editor: Renata Pařezová
Sound: Libor Sedláček
Run Time: 120 min
Current Stage of Development: Shooting
Estimated Date of Release: July 2010
A feature-length film about politics, economics, and social relationships, with a view to other cultures in the Czech Republic — the study of oldfashioned phenomena such as dowsing; parallel worlds and gates to other universes; time machines; involuntary spontaneous invisibility; colour therapy; living and dead water; hibernation; magic mushrooms; UFOs…. Life in the Czech Republic, within the broader context of globalization, is seen through the crooked mirror of non-rational and expansive perception of reality: psychics and mediums contribute to the film and draw connections to social reality.
I LIKE MY BORING LIFE* / MÁM RÁDA NUDNÝ ŽIVOT*
Czech Republic
Director: Jan Gogola
Producer: Jiří Konečný, endorfilm
Run Time: 26 min
Estimated Date of Release: October 2009
The diary of a grandmother from the Prague neighbourhood of Zbraslav as a diary of eternity. Using informal language, Alena Němcová from Zbraslav has been writing down weather forecasts, dreams, morning exercise, recipes, regular house bustle or global events etc. The film captures the life in her house, as a place that could represent a slice of the world.
THE PHANTOM OF LIBERTY II* / PŘÍZRAK SVOBODY II*
Czech Republic
Director: Karel Žalud
Producer: Jiří Konečný, endorfilm
Run Time: 26 min
Estimated Date of Release: October 2009
In the so-called global age, man is caught in the trap of time that he has set for himself and got stuck in it along with his freedom. An experimental documentary about time that explores time as a physical quantity that has a crucial impact on our actions, behaviour, perception, social rituals and our overall outlook on the world.
*Included in the selection as a single project, both films will be released together as part of an omnibus film, along with German short documentaries.
LEFT RIGHT LEFT RIGHT / BAL JOBB BAL JOBB AVAGY VITÉZSÉGEM
Hungary / Germany
Director: Erzsebet Racz
Producer: Kristina Konrad, Weltfilm GmbH Berlin / Viktoria Petranyi, Protoncinema Budapest
Director of Photography: Andras Petrik, Edit Blaumann, Marton Vizkelety
Editor: Szilvia Ruszev
Script Advisor: Anders Ostergaard
Run Time: 80 min
Current Stage of Development: Shooting
Estimated Date of Release: 2010
In 2001 I moved from Budapest to Berlin. I received a package from the family on my father’s side that held letters and papers. The package forced me to confront my family’s legacy: My deceased father (I was 8 when he died), whom I had always taken for a common Hungarian vet, was a young officer in the WW2 and a member of a highly dubious right - wing order, the “Order of the Brave”. I felt betrayed by my father. My father’s siblings demanded that I join the Order to carry on the family dynasty. At first I refused and fled back to Berlin. After seven years, I’m returning to Hungary to confront my roots. I decided to rediscover my own identity. I resolve to enter the Order...
THE LAST DAY OF SUMMER / KONIEC LATA
Poland
Director: Piotr Stasik
Producer: Jacek Naglowski, Agnieszka Janowska, Centrala film
Director of Photography: Piotr Stasik
Editor: Anna Dymek
Sound: Maciej Diduszko
Run Time: 55 min
Current Stage of Development: Shooting/Editing
Estimated Date of Release: April 2010
The film is a poetic, emotional journey to the times of our childhood and a story about difficulties of entering the world of adults. We want to take a closer look at the relations between peers, between children and adults (teachers, parents) to see the stages of growing up. We will observe the process from 7 year old kid who learns how to read to a 17 year old graduate who has to decide about his future. In 50 minutes we will see 10 years from the period in which so many changes occur and in which our personality develops.
METROBRANDING / METROBRANDING
Romania
Director: Ana Vlad, Adrian Voicu
Producer: Aamaria Puiu
Director of Photography: Adrian Voicu
Editor and Sound: Roxana Szel
Run Time: 90 min
Current Stage of Development: Post-production
Estimated Date of Release: October 1, 2009
In the communist Romania we had but a single brand of each basic product: the Relaxa mattress, the Dragasani sneakers, the Pegas bicycle, the Mobra motorcycle, the Fieni bulbs and the Ileana sewing machine were the stars of the Romanian golden era. These six brands had spectacular destinies. They appeared approximately at the same time, along with the socialist industrialization. As overnight towns were built around the factories producing them, they have become the objects of desire for the Romanian daily life and dreams.
HERO OF OUR TIME / HRDINA NAŠICH ČIAS
Slovakia
Director: Zuzana Piussi
Producer: Ultrafilm Ltd., Slovak Film Institute
Director of Photography: Tomáš Staněk
Editor: Janka Vlčková
Sound: Tobiáš Potočný
Run Time: 55 min
Current Stage of Development: Post-production
Estimated Date of Release: October 2009
This film is about an old intellectual and his world which is disappearing now. It is composed of three novellas. The hero meets three different women. The director has intended to show the inner world of a famous Slovak film critic, his attitudes and minds. This man feels lost in our times, watching how the things he believed in his life are vanishing.
VISALESS / VISALESS
Slovenia
Director: Petra Seliškar
Producer: Petra Trampuž, Petra Pan Production
Director of Photography: Brand Ferro
Editor: Blagoja Nedelkovski
Sound: Vladimír Rakič
Run Time: 90 min
Current Stage of Development: Shooting
Estimated Date of Release: End of 2009
The phenomenon that the documentary film deals with is on one hand unification of Europe and on the other the implementation of the Schengen regime closes borders. In other words, the Schengen borders regime is closing borders to the rest of the non-European Union countries, with the help of bureaucratic borders such as visas applications. The film tends to show the frustrations of the past and the fears of the future regarding a safer and better guarded Europe.
About Docu Talents from the East
Marking its 5th edition in 2009, Docu Talents from the East will again be part of the Karlovy Vary IFF industry section to present some of the most remarkable creative documentary projects from Central and Eastern Europe. During a seven-minute presentation, directors and producers of the nine selected projects will introduce their films, along with clips from the completed footage.
The event has been the launching pad for a number of documentaries that, after being completed, successfully attended the festival's documentary competition, e.g., Lost Holiday by Lucie Králová, Other Worlds by Marko Škop, The Mosquito Problem and Other Stories by Andrey Paounov, Blind Loves by Juraj Lehotský, Bahrtalo! Good Luck! by Robert Lakatos, or Jana Boková's Bye Bye Shanghai. The annual event is organized by IDF, Jihlava IDFF and the Karlovy Vary IFF.
The presentation will offer a selection of feature documentary films in development aimed for theatrical release, slated to open in 2009/2010. The goal of the meeting is to draw the attention of important film professionals attending the only A category festival in the region also to some of the best films in the documentary genre. We believe that the promotion of films from the very initial stages of development is one of the most efficient tools within the overall support.
Each year, festival programmers, distributors, buyers and local as well as international journalists are invited to attend the event. Detailed information on each project will be provided in a special brochure distributed at the festival. Following the presentation, filmmakers will be able to meet audiences, festival programmers, distributors and journalist at an informal cocktail party.
For more information, please contact:
Hana Rezková, IDF
hanka@docuinter.net
+420 777 240 005
