DOK Leipzig - 54th International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film
October 17 - 23, 2011
Leipzig / Germany
DOK Leipzig is one of the leading events in the documentary and animated film industry. Every year DOK Leipzig presents the wide range of the latest film productions from several dozen countries from all continents. The festival is accompanied by various professional events, such as DOK Market, International DOK Leipzig Co-Production Meeting, and Dok Summit. To read more about DOK Leipzig's industry events, please follow this link.
International Competition - Documentary Film
Golden Dove Award / EUR 10,000
Making its international premiere at DOK Leipzig among the 12 competition films, Argentinian Lesson hit the festival trail in May and right away picked up a few awards at the 2011 Krakow Film Festival. Wojciech Staron and Malgorzata Staron attended the 2010 Ex Oriente Film with Brothers. Like Argentinian Lesson, Work Hard - Play Hard is one of 250 documentaries in this year's East Silver Market catalogue. Also appearing in the international competition, the German-Dutch-Argentinian co-production spectacle Vivan las Antipodas! by Russian filmmaker Viktor Kossakovsky had its premiere in Venice last month.
Argentinian Lesson
Argentyńska lekcja , Poland, 2011, 56 min, Digi Beta, Creative, Personal View, Society, Travel
In 1998 Wojciech Staroń made the documentary film The Siberian Lesson. The film told the story of a young teacher who emigrated to the vicinity of Lake Baikal in order to teach Polish deportees’ descendants their native language. Many years later, as a married couple with two children, the director and his wife are leaving for Argentina. For their little son, this trip will not only be an encounter with an unknown language. Influenced by their Argentinian friend, Janek enters the fascinating world of imagination, and is introduced to the bitterness of childhood prematurely contaminated by the problems of grown-ups.
Work Hard - Play Hard
Work Hard - Play Hard , Germany, 2011, 90 min, DVD, HD, Creative, Personal View, Social Issues
A documentary about the removal of boundaries in the workplace. Man, as the most important motor of growth in our highly skilled Western service society, has become the focus of modern management practices. By following these different procedures, the film explores companies’ efforts to motivate their employees so that they give their maximum performance. From innovative office architecture that is supposed to create a whole world of emotions for employees, to the complete digital registration of employees’ personality traits, the workingman has now entered the matrix of a total working world.
International Short Documentary Competition
Golden Dove Award / EUR 5,000
Two Russian documentary shorts - I Will Forget This Day and September 25 - are in this year's short competition lineup that will screen nine films. Last year, Polish filmmaker Marta Minorowicz received DOK Leipzig's Golden Dove for her short doc A Piece of Summer. Minorowicz returns to Leipzig for another chance at a win with Decrescendo. All three films are included in the catalogue of the 2011 East Silver Market.
Decrescendo
Decrescendo , Poland, 2011, 25 min, Digi Beta, Health, Society
Decrescendo tells the story of the blossoming friendships that take place between the young psychologist Tomek and his patients from a retirement house, each of whom has their own touching and tragic story. Each day Tomek's fascination with beauty and youth clashes not only with the aging and the dying but also with their emphatic will to life. In this context the musical term Decrescendo takes on a new meaning.
I Will Forget This Day
Ya zabudu etot den , Russia, 2011, 25 min, 35 mm, Beta SP, Creative, Gender, Social Issues
You can forget. You have to forget. It's impossible to forget... A woman's feelings and thoughts just before having an abortion.
September 25
25 Sentyabrya , Russia, 2010, 30 min, Beta SP, DVD, Portrait, Social Issues, Society
To return to the starting point, it takes only a few stations on the train. The worst childhood memories would show up if you cross the line. The main character of the film, 20-year-old Dima, who grew up in an orphanage, one day decided to find his real family.
International Young Talent Competition - Generation DOK
Talent Dove Award / EUR 10,000
Phnom Penh Lullaby by Pawel Kloc made a splash at the 2011 Hot Docs, and set out to get an Academy Award nomination, an effort that has included the Oscar qualifier IDA's DocuWeeks with theatrical screenings in New York and Los Angeles. Bakhmaro by Georgian filmmaker Salome Jashi was developed at Ex Oriente Film 2009 and earned a distribution deal at the 2009 DOK Leipzig. Ms Jashi will host a case study on Bakhmaro as part of our Industry Programme in Jihlava.
Bakhmaro
Bakhmaro , Georgia, Germany, 2011, 58 min, HD, Social Issues, Society
A journey into a lively but rotting building - a microcosm intruded by the constant anticipation of change. A three-story brick building in a provincial Georgian town. At the center of the building is a restaurant whose walls are covered with bright green and orange plastic foam and where tables are set, waiting for customers - who rarely come. Just like customers, change also comes rarely here. Just like the others in the building, waitress Nana and her boss are waiting… This building, which resembles Noah’s Ark, is a microcosm, a model of this troubled country with its endless demonstrations and opposition rallies. On the backdrop of political events, somehow, all of life is here.
Phnom Penh Lullaby
Kołysanka z Phnom Penh , Poland, 2011, 103 min, HD, Creative, Personal View, Portrait, Social Issues
Everyone holds a secret. The secret of the future. Phnom Penh Lullaby is an intimate story of a man looking for love and acceptance. Ilan Schickman left Israel dreaming of a new life. He now lives in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, with his Khmer girlfriend Saran and daughters Marie, 2 years old, and Jasmine, 6 months, trying to make ends meet as a street fortune teller.
Also, look out for DOK Leipzig's series of Tunisian and Egyptian docs and more East European docs in the out-of-competition programme, for instance:
Doctors (dir. Tomasz Wolski, Poland 2011)
What happens behind the closed doors of surgical wards, treatment rooms and other spaces where specialist medical consultations take place? The film follows the everyday work of doctors in a surgical ward.
Last Day of Summer (dir. Piotr Stasik, Poland 2010)
The Last Day of Summer” is an emotional journey to the times of childhood and a story about difficulties of entering the world of adults. The film consists of 5 parts, each presents a cadet at different age and during his ordinary day.
Our School (dir. Mona Nicoară, Miruna Coca-Cozma, Romania, Switzerland, USA 2011)
Alin, Beniamin, and Dana fighting to overcome racism as they are moved from a dead-end Roma school into a mainstream Romanian school.
Splinters (dir. Viktar Asliuk, Belarus 2011)
Half a dozen men in a Belarusian village, united in work, drink, loneliness and feeling left behind. A microcosm of splinters of a once great empire. [DOK Leipzig]
We Need Happiness (dir. Alexander Sokurov, France, 2011)
Torn apart by history, the Kurdish community comes back to life each year during the Spring festival, an ancient juvenisation rite that predates Islam.
We Will Be Happy One Day (dir. Pawel Wysoczanski, Poland 2011)
Being young in the poorest small town in Poland – and having a grandmother who makes Xanthippe look like a little lamb! But Daniel makes a film about dreams and granny turns out to be its star in the end. [DOK Leipzig]
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