DOKweb Content

www.DOKweb.net is a portal dedicated to East European documentary film. The news section provides up-to-date information on upcoming and just completed films, interviews with filmmakers and other documentary professionals, in-depth articles exploring the state of documentary filmmaking in various parts of the region, as well as insightful texts on current trends, funding, etc. The portal also boasts the largest published databases of completed and upcoming documentary films from Eastern Europe, an industry directory, as well as trailers and original video content. www.DOKweb.net is IDF´s key online project that provides comprehensive details on all IDF´s activities and links them with general information service.

Institute of Documentary Film’s Activities

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Founded in 2001, the INSTITUTE OF DOCUMENTARY FILM (IDF) is a non-profit training and networking centre based in Prague, Czech Republic, focused on the support of East European documentary films and their wider promotion. Our activities support filmmakers through all stages of completion – development, funding, production, post-production, and distribution. We aim at individual filmmakers (tailored consultations), groups of carefully selected professionals with projects or films (Ex Oriente Film, East European Forum, East Silver, Doc Launch, etc.), broader professional community (East Doc Platform), as well as the general public (portal www.DOKweb.net). We closely work with key int. festivals, broadcasters, distributors, sales agents, markets, or training initiatives and serve as the GATEWAY TO EAST EUROPEAN DOCUMENTARY FILM.

Ex Oriente Film

EX ORIENTE BABIES
When: February 8 - 10, 2008
Where: Prague, CZ
Ex Oriente Babies Programme

Ex Oriente Babies is an evaluation workshop of the Ex Oriente Film training program. The three-day session will bring together 8 successful films which were developed and completed over the past years thanks to the Ex Oriente Film workshop.

The aim:
The main aim of the Ex Oriente Babies is to evaluate the program, methods and the general impact of the training program on the participating documentary films. We believe that the feedback that will come out of the session will be used for the development and improvement of the future editions of the Ex Oriente Film Workshop. Directors and producers of the films will meet each other as well as two experts, Tue Steen Müller, a Head of Studies, and Marijke Rawie, AV docexpert, in order to get as much insight as possible from analyzing their own film as well as those by their colleagues. The workshop will consist of screenings of the selected films, followed by case study discussions. The participants will be the director/producer teams for each film. As the two-day session will showcase successful, developed and completed Ex Oriente films, it will also be open to the public.

List of films completed within the Ex Oriente Film workshop:

1 Durban Poison - director: Keith Jones / producer: Jefe Brown
2 Go to Louisa - director: Grzegorz Pacek / producer: Janusz Chodnikiewicz
3 Our Street - director: Marcin Latallo / producer: Blanche Guichou
4 The Art of Selling - director: Jaak Kilmi, Andres Maimik / producer: Kaarle Aho
5 Deconstruction of an Artist - director: Peteris Krilovs / producer: Uldis Cekulis, Jean Francois Le Corre
6 Cash and Marry - director: Atanas Georgiev / producer: Siniša Juričič
7 A Stone Silence - director: Krzysztof Kopczynski / producer: Eureka Media
8 Bahrtalo! Champions of Freedom - director: Robert Lakatos / producer: András Muhi
9 Home - director: Margareta Hrůza / producer: Pavel Strnad, Paul Pauwels

For details of these and other pitched projects, please refer to the Pitching Results on our website.

Examples of questions we would like to get answers to (please add any other questions that come to your mind):

Why did you decide to apply for the Ex Oriente Film workshop? What were your expectations?
Looking back, what would you suggest to change in the training programme?
Have you ever used the contacts and skills acquired at Ex Oriente Film on any other occasion?
What was the most useful part of the workshop program with respect to your later film career and work?
Have you received any support directly at the East European Forum or later thanks to the contacts and skills acquired at the workshop?
Do you intend to participate in any other training activity/workshop in the future?
Which commissioning editors did you get the positive feedback from and how did they react after the Forum when you tried to contact them?
How did you finance your film? (state film funds, co-production gained separately from the pitching forums, etc.)
Did you get a letter of intent or any other commitment from the commissioning editors? If so, from whom?
Do you intend to pitch any of your future documentary projects?
In the end, who provided support for your project? What kind of support was it? (co-production, pre-buy, etc.)
Were there any challenges or difficulties that you had to go through and that would not have occurred had you financed the film in a different way?
What kind of difficulties? Where and when did the premiere take place / is the premiere going to take place?
What was / is your distribution strategy? (What festivals, markets, theatre release, TV)
Did your participation in Ex Oriente Film help the development / research of the film?
Did the meetings with tutors and colleagues give you contacts that helped the development of the film project?
Did you make the film according to your first development plans?
Did the participation in Ex Oriente Film make you a more skilled producer of your film?

Photos: Bahrtalo! Champions of Freedom - Dir.: Robert Lakatos, Deconstruction of an Artist - Dir.: Peteris Krilovs, Cash and Marry - Dir.: Atanas Georgiev