DFI-FILMCategory IDFA ISSUE 2013 FILM is published by the Danish Film Institute

Sepideh Jon Bang Carlsen Ai Weiwei A young girl dreams of becoming an Hybrid before there was hybrid astronaut in Berit Madsen’s look at The Fake Case another Iran. Joshua Oppenheimer The Act of Killing comes home Andreas Johnsen got access to Carl & Niels Ai Weiwei when the Chinese dissident Alexander Lind’s graduation film Jesper Jargil artistDFI-FILM was freed | IDFA on Issueparole 2013 in 2011. c aptures the melancholy of breakups. Lars von Trier stripped bare 1 Category

FILM is the Danish Film Institute’s international an inside view Andreas Johnsen is the one-man army who got access to Ai Weiwei. Even as the festival magazine, issued prior to the festivals in Berlin, 08 world-famous Chinese artist and dissident had been banned from talking to the media, Cannes and Amsterdam. FILM includes a comprehensive the Danish documentarian had an inside view of his constant battle with the authorities. catalogue in the reverse section. The resulting film, Ai Weiwei The Fake Case, is intimate, thought-provoking and packed DFI-FILM with action. IDFA ISSUE 2013 Published by the Danish Film Institute FILM Digital Issue is the Danish Film Institute’s web release for your smartphone, tablet or computer. Editors FILM Digital Issue brings articles on new films, Susanna Neimann (SN) Annemarie Hørsman (AH) a catalogue section and useful information about people and companies. Editorial team Lars Fiil-Jensen (LFJ) Anders Budtz-Jørgensen (ABJ) FILM Digital Issue: www.dfi .dk/fi lm Support: Nynne Østergaard (NØ)

DFI Festival team The Danish Film Institute is the national agency Anne Marie Kürstein that supports and encourages Danish film and reaching for the stars to let go of someone you love I’m not out to judge Translations cinema culture. Can a young Iranian woman become In his graduation film Carl & Niels, Jon Bang Carlsen’s Just the Right Amount Glen Garner 14 18 20 an astronaut? Berit Madsen’s first Alexander Lind creates a series of symbolic of Violence, about the difficult relationships feature documentary Sepideh is about a spaces to visualise the painful recognition between parents and children, ended up Design remarkable teenager stubbornly working by two twins that their childhood symbiosis as one of the most hybrid works of the Rasmus Koch Studio towards making her dream come true. is irretrievably lost. 63-year-old filmmaker’s long career. Type Holton, Swift Paper MultiDesign White Printed by adam nielsen, editor carbon trading 04 Editorial Centertryk 13 Director Andreas Johnsen singles out the 36 Tom Heinemann takes a close look at Circulation editor as his most important sparring partner. a lucrative market in Carbon Crooks. 2,000 gifted idiocy weird worlds 04 News & Notes ISSN 1399-2813 (print version) 24 Jesper Jargil’s 1998 film The Humiliated 38 Taming the Quantum World zooms in on ISSN 1903-7511 (online version) strips Lars von Trier bare. the smallest building blocks of the universe. Cover Ai Weiwei The Fake Case dandelion children Q&A: co-producing 41 idfa forum / four projects Photo: Andreas Johnsen 26 Five Afghan children are the heroes of the 40 What kind of funding is available in kids series Faith Hope Afghanistan. Denmark? A few straight answers. Danish Film Institute Gothersgade 55 boy in the dohyo exposing the past DK-1123 Copenhagen K + Catalogue Chikara – The Sumo Wrestler’s Son is The Act of Killing has now been released T +45 3374 3400 28 42 above all a narrative about fathers and sons. for free download by all Indonesians. reverse section www.dfi .dk/english someone to belong with kaspar goes to hollywood 30 A girl’s relationship to her best friend is at 44 Kaspar Astrup Schröder, director of Rent a the heart of Shanne and Her Friends. Family Inc., recounts his tour of Tinseltown.

children give me new hope new danish screen 10 years 32 Erlend E. Mo, director of Four Letters Apart, 46 The Danish Film Institute’s talent scheme deals with tough subjects. celebrates its 10th anniversary.

knowing your history a new world of distribution 34 A single dad tries to get his little family back 48 New digital distribution options have spurred together in Dreaming of a Family. filmmakers to distribute their own films.

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and how the decisions of individuals Wide Access News & Notes Bringing can have big political consequences. What specific devices did you use Indonesians recently got the opportunity to download in your film to bring the past back Joshua Oppenheimer’s groundbreaking documentary the Past to life? The Act of Killing for free. As the filmmaker stresses, the story of the 1965 genocide belongs to the Indonesian Back to Among other things, we take archival footage from the time – shots of people. He wants his film to create a space where the decision-makers, for instance Farmer and the Universe. Framegrab The Indonesians can process their collective trauma to help 7-9-13 Photo: DR Life – and place them in new contexts. them in the fight for justice and reconciliation. We overdub the footage with new UPCOMING. On the phone from dialogue based on old meeting This autumn, scenes from The Act of Killing were Budapest, Burma VJ director protocols and interviews with Anders Østergaard discusses his Németh and others. I have spent the used in a multi-screen installation at Copenhagen’s new project, 1989, an investigative last three months in Budapest mainly Cinematheque. Juxtaposing clips from Oppenheimer’s look at the year the Wall fell. researching and recording the voices film with Danish WWII archival footage, the exhibition of the people who were at the centre investigated ways to activate the cultural heritage of What is 1989 about? of events back then. That way we can cinema for new generations. go behind closed doors and get an It’s about events that took place in experience of what really went on. different married couples from the Hungary as a prelude to the fall of the New digital distribution platforms open up a wealth Till Death moment they say “I do” and over a Berlin Wall, why Hungarian politicians How do the events of 1989 impact of opportunities for bringing both new films and period of several years in their lives decided to open the border to the world we live in today? the documentary film heritage to audiences. In this Do Us Part together for better or for worse. Austria and the battles they had to issue, Danish filmmakers discuss their approaches to Behind the films are such creative fight along the way. 1989 is also When I think back at my early youth, UPCOMING. A new ambitious forces as Janus Metz (Armadillo, The about a married couple, who try to I think about how much that time was the new digital opportunities and the solutions they series of documentaries takes Expedition to the End of the World), escape over the Wall one night. The marked by the fact that we were cut have found for tailoring international distribution to a fresh look at marriage. Kaspar Astrup Schröder (Rent a man is shot and his death directly off from a large part of our European individual films. Family Inc.) and Brian McGinn (The influences the Hungarian politicians’ consciousness, and how we were A record number of Danes chose Record Breaker). decision. That story has not really always living in fear of the bomb. Naturally, the Danish Film Institute is focused on to be married on 7 September, Photography for the first season been told before. We are rid of a lot of that today, and hoping for a sprinkle of the good has wrapped, and the first episode that’s worth celebrating. The mere digital distribution and communication these days. The fortune associated with the number will have its on-air premiere on DR How did you get the information fact that I’m here in Budapest making Film Institute recently established a streaming service combination 7-9-13 in Denmark. in early 2014. 7-9-13 is produced about that story? a film without having to ask anyone giving teachers and students at Danish schools easy 7-9-13 is the title of a new series by Mette Heide (The Queen of for permission is a minor miracle. access to films and materials to inspire them to work of documentaries from national Versailles, Rent a Family Inc., The I have read a pile of literature about Sometimes we need to stop and analytically and creatively with living pictures in the broadcaster DR, supported by Record Breaker) for Plus Pictures. what happened back then, and I think about that. NØ the Danish Film Institute. With the NØ have been to Hungary a lot and classroom. In the spring, the service will expand with a ambition to craft a contemporary encountered the story there, too. 1989 is planned to be released new section that opens the documentary film vaults to portrait of Danes and Denmark in the During the research, when we in September 2014 on the 25th all Danes, while respecting copyright holders’ revenue new millennium, the series tracks five talked with the former Hungarian anniversary of the removal of opportunities on other platforms. Prime Minister Miklós Németh, we Hungary’s border fence with Austria. are threatening to revoke his licence were suddenly able to put two and 1989 is produced by Lise Lense- to keep livestock. His buildings are two together. Sure enough, the Møller for Magic Hour Films. Back to deteriorating, and with no one to take There is much to be happy about and much to look the politician Svend Auken, and man being shot and the Hungarian over from him, Niels risks seeing his forward to. Widespread digitising has already radically Søren The Land of Human Beings – My decision to open the border are life’s work fall apart. transformed the world of documentary film – from Film about Greenland (2006), about connected. There was something to Nature “I first met Niels a year ago when the works themselves to production methods, business Kierkegaard modern Greenland. it, after all. So, it’s also a film about I visited his place with my children, models, distribution, infrastructure and more. Søren Kierkegaard is available at how little things affect big events, UPCOMING. A genial-looking but and I immediately fell in love with on Blu-Ray the Danish Film Institute’s web shop doggedly idealistic farmer and one the caring and sensitive way that at dfi.dk. In Danish, with subtitles in of the world’s best restaurants, Niels and his wife run their farm,” The art for all of us now is to continue to promote In 1994, Anne Regitze Wivel made English, German and French. NØ Copenhagen’s NOMA, play a says director Phie Ambo, whose

diversity in documentary filmmaking and ensure easy the film Søren Kierkegaard, about . Framegrab part in Phie Ambo’s upcoming previous film, Free the Mind, explored the Danish writer and philosopher. documentary The Farmer and the the healing effects of mindfulness and wide access to films on many platforms; films that 1989 move us and provoke us; in the case of The Act of Killing, On the occasion of Kierkegaard’s Universe, about a man fighting meditation. bicentenary, the film has now been for what he truly believes in. “Niels is a great character, films that challenge the world’s prevailing order; released on Blu-ray in cooperation because his jolly Santa Claus facade and in the case of Berit Madsen’s Sepideh and Andreas with the Danish Film Institute. On a farm 50 km north of hides a stubborn anarchist. I want to Johnsen’s Ai Weiwei The Fake Case, films that lend their The film presents Søren Copenhagen lives Niels Stokholm. give the audience who watch my film voice to dreamers and wise people. Kierkegaard (1813-1855), his life, At 79, Niels is one of the last the same profound feeling of being thoughts and works, through a group idealistic farmers in the agricultural alive that I experienced when I first of Kierkegaard experts discussing nation of Denmark. Working from came to his farm.” Henrik Bo Nielsen, CEO the great thinker, adding new life the idea that humans and the earth The Farmer and the Universe is and facets to his philosophy in are fundamentally connected, he produced by Malene Flindt Pedersen conversational form. makes some of the world’s finest for Danish Documentary Production. Anne Regitze Wivel has made farm products, prized alike by The score is by the acclaimed a name for herself with a string consumers and one of the world’s Icelandic composer Jóhann of awardwinning documentaries, best restaurants, NOMA. But Jóhannsson. Expected release including Svend (2011), about Niels’ ways of farming are not very in 2014. NØ the last years of her husband, popular with the authorities, who

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In her upcoming film Mikala Krogh, has cancer. She previously directed A Young Man on a Mission Newspaper whose father was a journalist and Cairo Garbage (2009) and Beth’s Greenland on From a different angle comes Lene editor-in-chief of the high-brow Diary (2006). Avisredaktionen Stæhr’s Eskimo Diva, the story of in Crisis daily Information, uncovers the big (translates as The Newspaper the Big Screen a young man caught in the clash story of the print edition’s future and Editors) is produced by Sigrid between the new and the old UPCOMING. Mikala Krogh got online revenue opportunities, and she Dyekjær for Danish Documentary UPCOMING. 2014 will bring us Greenland. In 2009, Nuka, a gay unprecedented access to the daily zooms in on the details of the daily Production. Expected release in two very different films about teenager from the city of Nuuk, found

Photo: Bullitt Film Agreement The life of a Danish tabloid for her film work in the newsroom from the time 2014. NØ Greenland, the former Danish himself standing on the roof of an about a troubled industry struggling an idea is born until it is splashed colony that gained home rule apartment block intending to commit with declining circulations. across the front page. The filmmaker in 1979 but is still part of the suicide. Instead, he ventured – border talks sits in on editorial meetings, follows Kingdom of Denmark. singlehandedly, at the age of 19 – to The Danish tabloid paper Ekstra journalists as they work on stories organise Greenland’s first gay pride “History is always made in the middle Bladet always defined itself as and tags along with the editors to What Sumé and Eskimo Diva both parade. The film tracks Nuka and of the night. And when it happens, society’s watchdog. But plum­ New York to meet with Huffington do is challenge the idea of Greenland his friend and faithful companion Lu you are so damned tired that you meting print sales have forced the Post CEO Jimmy Maymann, who tells as a tradition-bound society rife with as they take a shocking-pink drag couldn’t care less,” says EU peace newspaper’s management and staff them how his medium has solved the social problems and dependent on show on tour to tiny settlements negotiator Robert Cooper in The to redefine who they and their core challenges of the future. outside help. around Greenland in the dead of Agreement. Since pitching her film at readers are and what they need to Krogh was in competition last Not My Revolution Photo: Fridthjof Film & Dharma If I Can’t Dance – It’s Arctic winter. IDFA Forum 2012, Karen Stokkendal do to hold on to the relatively few year at IDFA with A Normal Life, Revolutionary Rock Band Nuka is a young man on a Poulsen has sold it to 12 countries. readers who still buy the print edition. about a family with a daughter who Director Mikala Photo: Stine Heilmann Krogh Releasing three albums between mission. He doesn’t just want to The documentary, produced by 1973 and 1976, the Inuit rock “make the scene,” he also has a Bullitt Film, tracks the charismatic EU band Sumé changed the course of profound drive to blaze a trail for negotiator and his efforts to end the Greenland’s history. Their political a new, tolerant and progressive conflict between Serbia and Kosovo. songs were the first ever to be Greenland, the filmmaker says. Stæhr Premiering at CPH:DOX, the film If I Can’t Dance revisits moments recorded in Greenlandic Inuit, a calls her film “an odyssey through screens in Beograd and Pristina in The Syrian magical and horrific that the two language that before Sumé didn’t psychedelic Greenlandic scenery, December 2013. NØ women have shared in the last even have words for “revolution” featuring death, a sexual revolution Revolution two and a half years. Through their or “oppression.” After 250 years of and a boy who becomes a man.” eyes and cameras we experience Danish colonization, Sumé sparked a Eskimo Diva is produced by Lene Hijacked their newfound freedom, as well as revival of Inuit culture and identity and Børglum for Space Rocket Nation. the frontlines, the deaths and the paved the way for Greenland’s home Expected release in 2014. NØ UPCOMING. If I Can’t Dance – It’s nightly celebrations where fighters rule government. Not My Revolution is a character- party because they have survived According to director Inuk Silis driven documentary with an another day. Høegh and producer Emilie Hertling inti­mate female perspective that If I Can’t Dance was pitched at Peronard, their new film is not so reconnects us with the Syrian IDFA Forum 2012 and is one of the much a rock documentary as the Days of Hope Photo: Bullitt Film Cathedrals of Culture – Halden Prison Photo: Nikos Dalton people who had their revolution first two grantees to benefit from the story of a people’s fight for cultural hijacked. recently launched European film fund and political freedom. Seeking to Britdoc Circle. redefine the relationship between Sumé Photo: Ebbe Knudsen In If I Can’t Dance we meet two young The film is directed by Marie Greenland and Denmark, which far from home women, a nationally famous radio Skovgaard, her first feature was always presented in too rosy a presenter and her younger friend. documentary, and “O”, and it is light, Sumé is a cinematic account Refugee issues are occupying a lot They are at a crossroads, both in co-produced by Jesper Jack for of a pivotal moment in Greenland’s of Danish directors at the moment. their friendship and in terms of Syria’s Fridthjof Film and David B. Sørensen history, when Greenlanders IDFA veteran Andreas Koefoed is future. They are in exile, troubled. How for Dharma Film. Release is set for discovered they were not Danes.

bringing out a film about refugee did they end up here? Where did it go 2014. NØ Sumé is produced by Ilami A! Film Nuka Photo: Henrik Ipsen children in Denmark, A Home in wrong? What happened to them and with Bullitt Film and Jabfilm. The film the World, produced by Sonntag the non-violent resistance? opens in Greenland in 2014. Pictures. The score is by Efterklang, of Culture, which explores the toughest criminals, the facility has the Danish band featured in Cathedrals of psychology of spaces and how they been called “the world’s most Koefoed’s music documentary affect us. humane prison”, as every part of The Ghost of Piramida. Expected Culture Each of the six directors in the the design is based on principles of Cassellys, as they pursue a union of overlooked issue in Mission Rape, is now faced with a different type finish in 2014. series will portray an architecturally rehabilitation. The idea is that art on films & people the two youngest members of their about rape as a strategy in war. Forty of moral responsibility. Produced Katrine Philp examines the UPCOMING. Six prominent significant building and present their the walls and a panoramic view of families. Pitched at Nordic Forum to fifty thousand women were raped by Made in Copenhagen, release situation of refugees in Denmark, in directors present their vision of a personal interpretation of its “soul”. nature instead of barred windows Jacob Holdt (American Pictures), 2013. Release in May 2014. during the Balkan War 1992-95. But in 2014. Suitable, produced by Bullitt Film. building’s soul in a large-scale 3D In addition to Michael Madsen, etc. actually affect inmates in a a well-known Danish photographer, as the directors show only very few Every year, the Danish government series about architectural spaces. the directors are Austrian Michael positive way. lecturer, vagabond and preacher’s Søren Steen Jespersen is a cases of war crimes involving sexual Signe Byrge Sørensen was cherry-picks those refugees best able Danish director Michael Madsen Glawogger (National Library of The six films are produced in son, in 2014 will be the subject of a journalist juggling many hats. He violence have been investigated and behind one of the most controversial to contribute to society, leaving the wrapped principal shooting in Russia), German Wim Wenders 3D. Wim Wenders, whose Oscar- film by Niels-Ole Rasmussen. Jacob recently produced Carbon Crooks, prosecuted. Produced by Sfinx Film/ documentaries in recent years, weakest behind. The film premiered September on his film about ”the (Berliner Philharmonie), Brazilian nominated dance documentary Pina Holdt looks in on its title character as by Tom Heinemann, about the carbon TV, release in 2014. Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Act of at CPH:DOX. world’s most humane prison” Karim Ainouz (Centre Georges was acclaimed for its innovative he writes a book about his life, which credit system (page 36). Now Killing. Now the Danish producer Ditte Haarløv Johnsen could not in Norway. Pompidou in Paris), Norwegian use of 3D, is initiator and executive forces him to confront the days when he’s sitting in the director’s chair Taking inspiration from the and her company, Final Cut for Real, be more of the moment with her new Margreth Olin (Oslo Opera House) producer of the series. Expected he hitchhiked America’s highways. to make Warriors from the North, suspenseful mood of the Danish are bringing us Last Dreams, in film Days of Hope, a close-up look at In his widely acclaimed Into Eternity, and American Robert Redford (Salk TV release is in the spring 2014. Produced by Copenhagen Film & TV. about young Scandinavian-Somali TV series The Killing, Nanna which the director Estephan Wagner the thoughts, feelings and longings Michael Madsen went underground Institute for Biological Studies in Danish Final Cut for Real is men leaving their homes in the North Frank Møller (Shanghai Space) is follows three women over their of African refugees embarking on to examine the first permanent California). producing Michael Madsen’s film Securing your dynasty is hard to fight in Somalia. Produced by bringing us Embracing the Dead, last month at a hospice, exploring a dangerous journey across the nuclear waste repository ever in In September, Michael Madsen and co-producing the other five in work, even more so when your family Made in Copenhagen, expected a documentary about a forensic their thoughts and fears as they Mediterranean hoping for a better life Finland. Now the Danish director finished principal shooting for his the series, with main producer Neue runs one of Europe’s biggest circuses. finish in spring 2014. pathologist examining a group of Iraqi approach the end of their life. The in Europe. Produced by Bullitt Film. has ventured into Halden Prison film about Halden Prison, designed Road Movies. AH Anders Riis-Hansen’s The Circus civilians who are accusing the Danish film won Special Mention at its world National release in November. NØ in Norway as part of a large-scale by Erik Møller Arkitekter of Denmark. Dynasty follows two prominent Annette Mari Olsen and Katia government of war crimes in Iraq. He premiere at the Camden film festival documentary series, Cathedrals Despite housing some of Norway’s circus families, the Berdinos and the Forbert Petersen take on a serious but is used to examining the dead, but in September.

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Andreas Johnsen is the one-man Feature-Length Competition / IDFA 2013 army who got access to Ai Weiwei. Even as the world-famous Chinese artist and dissident had been banned from talking to the media, the Danish documentarian had an inside an view of his constant battle with the authorities. The resulting film, Ai Weiwei The Fake Case, is intimate and thought-provoking and packed inside with action. view By Rune Skyum-Nielsen Ai Weiwei The Fake Case has no dearth of dramatic events. But amongst the myriad car chases, state- sanctioned harassment, a literal rain of money and an exhausted artist who nods off anywhere and anytime at the drop of a hat, one scene sticks out as particularly absurd. Well at least according to Andreas Johnsen, the brains, cameraman and director behind this action-jammed, intimately shot documentary. Johnsen is on hand to capture the situation when the China correspondent of British ITV with increasing desperation tries to wrangle an interview out of Ai Weiwei. The incident occurs when the now 57-year-old artist is released on parole after 82 days of detention on charges of violating tax laws with his company Beijing Fake Cultural Development Ltd. But the authorities – that is, the Communist Party – have put a gag order on the bearish art- world phenomenon and so he legally cannot answer questions from the media. “You can film me while I’m taking a shower,” he proposes. Somewhat surprisingly, the ITV correspondent declines the potential scoop. “It’s a family show, Weiwei,” he says. “It’s evening time, children are watching.” The debacle wraps with the reporter putting in a request for a solo interview once the gag order is lifted, saying, “It would be very good for me … because it’s you.” Johnsen all too well remembers the mixed feelings he had documenting the awkward scene. “The reporter made me cringe so bad, but of course it was hard not to laugh, too, because Weiwei is really taking the piss. He was basically offering ITV an artwork, a performance, and the reporter was dumb enough to decline. He wanted Photo: Andreas Johnsen Fake Case Photo: Andreas The Ai Weiwei to interview Weiwei about censorship, but he was

8 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 9 Interview / Andreas Johnsen / Ai Weiwei The Fake Case Interview / Andreas Johnsen / Ai Weiwei The Fake Case Ai Weiwei The Fake Case . Framegrab The Ai Weiwei Photo: Andreas Johnsen Fake Case Photo: Andreas The Ai Weiwei

politician who gets really offended. Weiwei liked that and told his personal assistant to call me up and give me the go-ahead. A couple of months later I visited for the first time, and after dinner the first night he gave me permission to start filming.” censoring what Weiwei had to offer. The whole “There were two soldiers in Weiwei’s cell round the FLYING MONEY. Ai Weiwei supporters scene was so meta and absurd.” clock. They changed every six hours and marched The Ai Weiwei Test

sent a total of around Fake Case . Framegrab The Ai Weiwei The self-taught Danish filmmaker has been back and forth while he was sleeping. It was 9m yuan (1.1m euros) In his new documentary, Johnsen is not only making documentaries since 2003. In his homeland psychological terror,” Johnsen says. to help the artist pay focusing on Ai Weiwei’s situation, he is also seizing he is seen as a bit of a lone wolf who travels to some a bond enabling him a unique opportunity to gauge what direction China to appeal the tax fine of the least secure regions in the world and, without Persuading a Rebel imposed on him by is moving in right now. a hint of staging, gets close to increasingly big In 2009, with bit of creative thinking and some the authorities. Some “The film is also about the development of the events in increasingly big hotspots. In Ai Weiwei The helpful contacts, the filmmaker got hold of notes were thrown Chinese society over the last decade. I had been over Ai Weiwei’s gate Fake Case, Johnsen got unprecedented access to Ai Ai Weiwei’s Chinese mobile phone number, in the form of paper thinking about how to go about that for a long time. Weiwei, who, while the film was being made, was determined to do a documentary about the artist. aeroplanes or wrapped It would be boring to just show some activist in named the world’s most powerful artist by Art “He wasn’t particularly interested. ‘Everybody around fruit. KIDNAPPING. Director Andreas Johnsen follows front of his computer trying to disseminate material Ai Weiwei as the artist is freed on parole after 82 Review Magazine. always wants to make films about me,’ he said. ‘It days of detention when not even his family could over the Internet. But an artist making monstrous The documentary took shape over three years, would take too much of my time and I’m busy.’ reach him. Ai Weiwei created six dioramas with art and communicating with the world in all kinds as Johnsen made regular trips to Beijing to But that didn’t faze me and I started e-mailing him scenes from his imprisonment, one catching him of different ways – that has some good visuals,” the visit Ai Weiwei in his home, studio, production to explain that it isn’t my style to steal people’s sleeping in his cell (previous page). filmmaker says. space and office. The final product, however, time. I just tag along and hardly ask any questions.” You tracked Ai Weiwei and his large staff in seven stages concentrates on the nerve-wracking year starting In spring 2010, Andreas Johnsen – who has ten over three years. Did that change your view of the Chinese in summer 2011 when the artist was freed on documentaries to his name, counting Ai Weiwei The people? parole, charged with evading millions of dollars in Fake Case – ramped up his efforts to win over the “It’s generally hard to get included in social taxes. The case reeks and is fraught with political famous artist and dissident. Denmark is a small situations when you show up with a camera. Even undertones. As it quickly turns out, Ai Weiwei place where everybody knows everybody in the art “It’s sometimes hard to understand more so in China. But over time, I became part of is systematically being watched and followed. world, and the dogged filmmaker in the trademark why Weiwei is considered such a Weiwei’s entourage. I went out with him often to Anxiety takes root in the temperamental artist flat cap got Ai Weiwei’s Danish dealer to act as dangerous adversary. He is just asking eat and I was never told that I wasn’t welcome. who suffers from insomnia and nightmares, when his courier. But I had to fight to get there. To be accepted.” he finally does sleep – an indelible memory of his “He delivered a package in Beijing containing a the Communist Party to respect the law How did Ai Weiwei test you? detention, or “kidnapping,” as he calls the nearly hand-written letter and my films on DVD. Weiwei and people’s basic right to freedom.” “It was a lot like, if I wanted to make this film, three months when not even his lawyers or family put on Murder (about Nicaragua’s zero-tolerance I just had to keep up on my own. It was up to me could reach him and he was never told why he was abortion laws, ed.) and watched the opening to keep pace. If not, too bad. When you don’t speak being held. sequence where I kind of make an ass out of this Chinese and Weiwei, to boot, is a man of very few

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words, it can get a little problematic. Just keeping track of where he was. When I finally managed to get him on the phone, he would mention the name DIRECTORS ON ADAM NIELSEN of a restaurant in Chinese. And I had to take it from there. You have to prove yourself. He does that all Hovind Photo: Timme ADAM the time with everyone around him.” Andreas Johnsen, Ai Weiwei The Fake Case:

Outfoxing the Authorities I worked with Adam before he got into film Even when Johnsen and Ai Weiwei, with no small school. Even back then he was great about drama, track down two of the agents who are NIELSEN constantly spying on the artist, we never find out sharing his knowledge. Everything I know who is really giving the orders to keep him under about filmmaking, I learned from editors – surveillance. But the invisible enemy has to be high prime among them Adam. He told me how to up in the Communist Party hierarchy. film so he could cut the footage afterwards. “It’s sometimes hard to understand why Weiwei EDITOR is considered such a dangerous adversary,” Johnsen Adam is the one I back-and-forth with most on says. “He has a big following, of course – also Director Andreas Johnsen singles out the a shoot. It was like that making the Ai Weiwei outside China. But he is just asking the Communist skilled editor as his most important sparring film, too. I had a running dialogue with Adam Party to respect the law and people’s basic right partner in his efforts to come up with a hook the whole time. He’s open to all possibilities, to freedom.” ready to try things out – and he often turns Making the film, Johnsen was impressed by how for Ai Weiwei The Fake Case. Ai Weiwei, who remains under a travel ban and obstacles into advantages. Working with can’t leave China, keeps challenging the authorities. Adam is always fun and easy. How he keeps pushing the envelope time and again Uncompromising, versatile, uniquely musical – the film with one sly provocation after the other. Like the editor Adam Nielsen has helped raise the bar for Danish time the heavy-set artist, who is the son of two documentaries for years. Kaspar Astrup Schröder, Rent a Family Inc.: dissidents, installed webcams over his bed and his Since graduating as an editor from the National Film workstation and filmed himself 24-7, rendering the School of Denmark in 2003, Nielsen has put his touch on We listen to music a lot when we edit. Adam state’s surveillance superfluous. documentaries and fiction films alike, freely switching between is really good at working with sound. And he “At his weekly meeting with the police, they the two modes. Story and character development are central to asked him to abandon the project. He is outfoxing the 39-year-old Danish editor. Genre is incidental. shoots from the hip. If he were a cowboy, he’d them. That’s pretty cool. He just can’t help himself. Earlier in the year Nielsen won the prestigious Roos Award, win every shootout. He’s no bullshit. He always Clearly, the urge to rebel is in his genes.” named after the Danish documentary film pioneer Jørgen aims for the heart and hits his mark every Compared to your past documentaries, how hard was Roos. Nielsen was awarded the prize for his ability to reinvent time. this one to make? himself for each new project. No snob by any measure, he picks “This was probably the hardest. Because of his assignments based on the importance of the story and the Weiwei’s gag order, it was illegal for me to film people he will be working with. He has been known to say no Eva Mulvad, The Good Life: him and I had to be very careful not to be found to a project with lots of money and prestige to work on a no- out. Each time I visited him in Beijing, he was under budget project instead. Adam is the best father a film could have. enormous pressure. All that stress gets to you. Nielsen cuts like he is, the Roos Award statement read: loyal, If the director is the mother, the editor is the It was an intense few weeks each time.” Andreas Johnsen forthright, emotional – to the bone. His taste is impeccable, What does Ai Weiwei think about your film? but his films are never overdressed. And there is always more father. Making a film is like making a baby. Director Andreas Johnsen, 39, is a “He is pleasantly surprised. He actually didn’t self-taught filmmaker. Since 2003 he to them than technical finesse. He keeps the focus on the You collaborate on the creative process. The think I would make a good film, considering all the has directed, produced and financed characters’ development and their interpersonal relationships. film finds its form in the editing room. obstacles he put up for me. When he saw the first his films from start to end. Johnson rough cut, he declared that he was so pleased he has made films on social issues in Adam Nielsen would do anything he could to help me in the final the world and how artists, especially Michael Noer, R, Northwest: “It was a lot like, if I wanted in third world countries, manage Editor Adam Nielsen, 39, is an phase. So I asked him to pose for the poster in the to make this film, I just had to produce their art. Man Ooman editing graduate of the National Film nude. That made him a little nervous at first. But, to keep up on my own. It was (2008) is about dancehall dancing School of Denmark, 2003. Nielsen He is my toughest critic. I’m always nervous he had promised to grant my wish.” in Kingston, and A Kind of Paradise Photo: Anne Rasmussen won a GuldDok for Best Editing for about showing Adam footage. He instantly Will the documentary have consequences for Ai Weiwei? up to me to keep pace. If not, (2011) zooms in on contemporary Ghosts of Cité Soleil (Asger Leth, “He can’t tell. None of us can. We’ll just have to too bad.” artists from six African countries. In 2005) and Danish Film Academy picks out what’s bad about it. But conversely Kidd Life (2012), Johnsen follows Awards for the fiction features R wait and see” • Kidd, a young Danish rapper and (Michael Noer and Tobias Lindholm, he’s also good at getting the best out of the YouTube phenomenon. Renowned 2010) and A Hijacking (Tobias footage and unleashing whatever potential Ai Weiwei The Fake Case, selected for IDFA Feature- for Murder (2009), the story of at-risk Lindholm, 2012). it might have. length Competition, is produced by Katrine Sahlstrøm for women suffering under Nicaragua’s Danish Documentary Production and Rosforth Films. For strict ban on abortion. more information, see reverse section.

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Can a young Iranian woman become an Feature-Length Competition / IDFA 2013 astronaut? Berit Madsen’s Sepideh is about a remarkable teenage girl cleverly and stubbornly working towards making her Sepideh Photo: Paul Wilson Reaching dream come true. for the

By Dorte Hygum Sørensen

While other kids her age in her village in southern Iran are in bed sleeping, she is outside under the Stars night sky, mostly among boys, in complete darkness illuminated only by the moon and stars. Ever since she was little, it has been Sepideh’s ambition to excel in physics and astronomy – just like Albert Einstein, her big role model. Sepideh Photo: Mohammad Reza Jahan Panah When Berit Madsen, a filmmaker with an anthropology degree, heard about an astronomy festival held in a far-off Iranian province, she knew she had to know more. “My husband, who is Iranian, happened to show me an article about a physics teacher who was trying to raise funds to build an observatory way out in the country in Iran. It said that boys and girls in the area stargaze at night, and that really piqued my curiosity.” With her husband and their young daughter, the Berit Madsen filmmaker went to southern Iran. When she met Director Berit Madsen, Sepideh, she instantly detected a singular dedication 49, is a graduate and clarity of mind in the young woman, and once from the film school Photo: Mikkel Völcker she heard her story, Madsen knew she had to make Les Ateliers Varan, a film about her. Paris. Madsen has Not a political film about a young Muslim in an taken supplemental studies at the Danish Iran where a woman’s opportunities can be very School of Media limited. The filmmaker first and foremost wanted and Journalism and to portray Sepideh as a person whose story is in ethnography fascinating by any standard, anywhere, and paint a and social anthro­ different and more nuanced picture of Iran that way. pology from Aarhus University. Sepideh is Madsen made seven trips to Iran to get together Madsen’s first feature with Sepideh and her family and film them with the documentary. aid of an Iranian crew. Sepideh is the filmmaker’s most wide-ranging film project to date, a coming- of-age story about a very special young woman fighting against all odds to make her dream come true of becoming an astronaut and probing the secrets of the universe.

A Promise to Her Father Sepideh, who lives with her mother and brother, lost her beloved father at a young age. On his deathbed,

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For Madsen, too, as an adult, there is a lot of inspiration to be drawn from young Sepideh and her conviction that we can change our lives. “The mere fact that she can go outside with boys at night is pretty far removed from what we normally, and quite rightfully, associate with Iran. What she’s doing is very wild and daring. She is a stubborn little mule, and I have great tenderness and respect for her,” Madsen says. Sepideh Photo: Mohammad Reza Jahan Panah Dear Einstein An important theme running through the film is Sepideh’s diary. Every so often, we hear her read from it, describing her experiences, feelings and hopes. Each diary entry starts “Dear Einstein.” “I wanted the audience to share my fascination with this girl who doesn’t have posters of pop stars on her walls but pictures of Albert Einstein with his big, grey, dishevelled head of hair. She even got hold “The mere fact that Sepideh can go outside with boys at night is pretty far removed from what we normally, and quite rightfully, associate with Iran. She is a stubborn little mule, and I have great Facts about Iran’s youth tenderness for her.” of a violin, because she read that Einstein played the violin and thought she should learn how to play, Sepideh is hardly alone in her desire to get an education too, so she could experience the same emotions and be in charge of her own life in a country still he did. She also learned that Einstein was a pretty dominated by a patriarchal social structure. Here are unruly child. For Sepideh there is a lot of support

a few facts about Iran’s young generation: Sepideh Photo: Mohammad Reza Jahan Panah and inspiration to be taken from him,” Madsen says. All in all, it’s a unique experience for the Over 60% of the Iranian population (77 million) are under she promised him that she would make something audience to get a peek into her diary. “It’s written the age of 30. of herself, so he could be proud of his daughter. in a language that’s so articulate and personal that She spent her inheritance from him to buy a small I had to tell Sepideh at one point that if she didn’t In 2012, 60% of university students were women. telescope, and in the film we watch her lug it out become an astrophysicist she could always become into the cool and majestic scenery to scan the sky a writer,” Madsen says. Around 1.5 million young people apply to Iranian at night. “Iranians have a lot of words for the same universities every year. Most of the applicants would like Her mother, however, worries about her daughter phenomenon. Sepideh’s use of words is florid to be among the top 10% who get into the best public running around at late hours with boys. What’s and metaphorical without getting vague and, like universities, which are free. Most aim to study medicine more, Sepideh’s uncles also have something to say everything else she says and does, her diary gives or engineering, studies that offer the best job opportunities about her conduct and her future. They want her Sepideh Photo: Mohammad Reza Jahan Panah you a sense of how deeply she has been affected by in the future. to stay away from astronomy and work in the fields the loss of her father and how important it is for her instead. They even threaten to kill her if she crosses to get over her loss and live up to his hopes that she The two most serious challenges facing Iran’s youth today the line of good moral behaviour – a threat Sepideh would follow her dreams. That’s also the coming-of- are unemployment and brain drain, which has only been has to take very seriously. age story I want to tell, showing how Sepideh grows aggravated by the international sanctions. But Sepideh is just dreaming about floating over the course of the film and gets even stronger” • in space. Neither their threats nor her family’s Iran is experiencing the greatest brain drain in the world. limited means will stop her from becoming a space Sepideh, selected for IDFA Feature-length Competition, Every year tens of thousands of highly educated Iranians researcher. The film shows her fighting back, is produced by Stefan Frost and Henrik Underbjerg for leave for Asia and Europe in the hope of a better life. forming an alliance with the world’s first female Radiator Film. For more information, see reverse section. space tourist, Anousheh Ansari, and shrewdly and doggedly arguing against her uncles. At one DREAMS OF THE UNIVERSE. When Sepideh’s beloved father died, her uncle became head of point, she even has a showdown with the physics the family. He strongly opposes to the young girl’s teacher who taught her so much during her early star gazing. adolescence.

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In Carl & Niels, director orchestrated space. The scene of the baptismal rite Alexander Lind creates was an assignment that Lind gave Carl and Niels. In another, grotto-like set-up, they were asked to symbolic spaces to visualise paint each other’s demons with fluorescent paint on each other’s upper body. Lind also placed them on the painful recognition Letting Go Larsen Photo: Kasia Køhler each side of a 50-percent mirror – half mirror, half by two twins that their translucent – making it clear to the twins and the childhood symbiosis is viewers how much they look like each other. irretrievably lost. Lind is “I wanted to riff on the assumption that twins of Someone are 100 percent identical and show how it really is: a recent graduate of the that they are two different people with two different National Film School’s wills and ways of coping with life,” Lind says. All along, he was hoping the process would help experimental multiple- the twins solve their conflict. camera line under the You Love You Can’t Bring Back the Past documentary programme. “I naively thought that if I put them in this situation, I would open their eyes to how they Student Competition / IDFA 2013 truly felt about each other, that they would be cured when they left the studio after their journey says, describing the thoughts that led into his film of healing.” Alexander Lind Carl & Niels, which has been selected for the Student The 12-hour shoot takes place just one week after Director Alexander Lind, 30, brings Competition at this year’s IDFA. Carl and Niels have had one of their frequent fights. his graduation film Carl & Niels The film centres on the transformation Carl “Over the years, they have argued and fought and to IDFA’s Student Documentary

Carl & Niels . Framegrab and Niels are undergoing as they find out what – yelled and screamed and cried. Conversely, they Competition. if anything – they can be for each other in their have been friends and merged in ways that most adult lives. Putting them in a series of constructed siblings never get to experience. When things are spaces and situations, Lind, who graduated this year bad between them, they’re really bad, and when from the experimental multiple-camera line at the things are good, they’re great. That’s a beautiful National Film School of Denmark, compelled the thing, but it’s also really tough.” twins to relate to each other. So, the mood is tense, when they are placed on While Carl accepts things the way they are and either side of the see-through mirror in the studio. the fact that they are growing apart, Niels is clinging NEW NAMES 2013 to the hope that everything will be the way it used “I got a portrait of two people who are in to be. They may be identical on the outside, but on conflict with each other. No matter how The National Film School of Denmark’s documentary programme, which the inside they are oceans apart. Niels mentions that has existed for 20 years under the direction of Arne Bro, has been hugely it’s been hard for him to like Carl when things were much they want to, they can never go back important to the current success and impact of Danish documentaries. going well for his brother. Carl replies that he never to the way things were.” The programme has two tracks. The multi-camera directors, like Alexander Lind, felt that way. He was never really conscious of any mainly work in the studio, and the documentary directors mainly work in the field. competition between them. Niels misses Carl and wishes they could find each Introducing the 2013 graduates and their films: By Marianne Lentz other again. But Carl can’t promise him that. He’s One Big Tangled Clump having a hard enough time finding himself. Multi-Camera Directors: Frigge Volander Himmelstrup – Follows the Sun Because he was in the middle of a separation At the end of the day, Lind had to admit that his Alexander Lind – Carl & Niels “What I want more than anything is for us to find process himself, Lind recognised the twins’ good intentions would not bear fruit. Theis Mølstrøm Christensen – Dissonance each other again. I want you to be my best friend miscommunication. “I realised that I wasn’t going to get the happy and I want to be your best friend.” “They have so much love for each other, but ending I wanted. On the other hand, I got a portrait Documentary Directors: Niels speaks these words as he holds Carl’s head there is also such distance between them. I could of two people who are in conflict with each other. Julie Bezerra Madsen – Boy Maria Bäck – Mother Is God under water, as if he was baptising him. Maybe he’s tell that they didn’t understand each other and how No matter how much they want to, they can never Laurits Flensted-Jensen – Snow hoping Carl will be reborn as the brother he wishes frustrating it was when one thought the other knew go back to the way things were. Things are in Cille Hannibal – 2.7 he had. how he was feeling. They have tricked themselves constant motion. If they can accept that something Carl Olsson – Blessed Be This Place Carl and Niels are identical twins. They have been into believing they were one individual, one good will come of their lives anyway, but they just Laura Ludmilla Sørensen – 30 inseparable most of their lives as best friends. But thinking mass, because they were seen as one for so have to look for it somewhere else, then they can At this year’s Nordic Talents, the annual pitching and networking platform for Nordic now that they are in their mid-twenties, they are many years. That’s how I felt about my girlfriend at move on with their lives,” the director says, adding, film Schools co-organised by the Danish film school and Nordisk Film & TV Fond, losing the closeness they used to have. the end. We get all tangled up in each other.” “That’s what’s so great about life. You never get Maria Bäck won the main Pitch Prize for her new project I Remember When I Die. “My girlfriend broke up with me just when I was The illusion of a tangled clump was the what you’re after, but you get what you need” • Carl Olsson won the Filmlance Seriously Big Humour Student Film Award for his starting the film. That came as quite a shock and premise of the spaces Lind created for the film. graduation film Blessed Be This Place. I became obsessed with the transformation that Students in the National Film School’s multiple- Carl & Niels is selected for IDFA Student Documentary occurs, the huge sorrow it is, when you have to camera line mainly work in the studio, bringing Competition. For more information, see reverse section. say goodbye to someone you love,” Alexander Lind elements of reality into the framework of a visually

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several facilities (primarily in Utah) where abducted teens are placed, the Danish filmmaker had to face the fact that he had moved into a world this time where cameras are anything but welcome. “The main challenge with this film definitely was getting anyone to be in it,” Bang Carlsen says. “After my more essayistic South African films, where I put myself in the picture, I had imagined that I would now go back to making films where I could quietly disappear behind the camera again. I felt no need to stage anything in this Photo: Jon BangJust the Right Amount of Violence Carlsen context, since the reality itself is already a kind Photo: Jon BangJust the Right Amount of Violence Carlsen of dramatization. I mean, actual abductions are a kind of dramatization. The drama and story were already embedded in the material, and all I had to do was try to capture some of it in a cinematically interesting way. “So, my original idea was simply to track a father and son through the whole sequence of events, from the abduction to the stay at the school and their reunion. But I just could not make that happen, and STAGED. Just the Right Amount of Violence recreates scenes where real “interventionists” enter homes during the night ripping troubled teens from so I had to find another way of doing it. Perhaps, the their beds to transport them to reform schools in Utah. The girl in this scene fact that this story is fundamentally different from is played by an actor. the type of story I normally do has something to do

“I wanted to tell this story because it’s closed his world off to the point that his son – in an example of the eternal and sometimes order to be allowed to define his own world – will Reflecting Images: Masters / IDFA 2013 fatal struggle that goes on in any family.” invariably clash with him. “Once that is said, I should add that most of the schools I visited when I did my research – even if By Lars Movin with it, too. I’m not used to chasing dramatic events they had toned down the religious aspect a bit for with my camera. I’m used to shooting in places commercial reasons – were dominated by big, heavy where nothing happens and the fact that a camera Mormon characters with a way too clear idea of A quiet suburban street in southern California. Families live crew is coming ideally serves as a welcome diversion what life is. Things like doubt and other difficult here, raise their children here. It’s a safe and stable place. from the day-to-day. In that way, most of my films phenomena are totally absent from their worldview. But what’s this? At the crack of dawn a car rolls softly have been a kind of game, both behind and in front And, while I can’t rule out that good schools might I’m Not through the sleeping picture-book streets like a predator of the camera. But you definitely can’t say that about exist, most of the ones I saw were grotesquely harsh. on the prowl. Two men exchange hushed words inside the Just the Right Amount of Violence. On the contrary, it “Nonetheless, I don’t think it was up to me to darkened vehicle. They are looking for an address, find was a struggle to even get anyone to come forward.” judge. I’m not a journalist and I didn’t make my it, park, get out and go to the front door. They have been film to judge one party or the other. I wanted to expected. The man of the house lets them in and takes them As the film makes clear, most of the facilities where the teens tell this story because it’s an example of the eternal to an upstairs bedroom, where his teenage son, Simon, is are placed are located in Utah and run by Mormons. Would and sometimes fatal struggle that goes on in any asleep. The two men overpower the boy and, with his father you say that the whole abduction phenomenon primarily family, that is, being allowed to grow freely within Out to looking passively on, bundle him into the car and drive off. has a religious bent? a context of love that might turn into a jail that Away from the suburbs. Away from safety and security. “No, I wouldn’t say that. The reason why most cripples you. But of course, American realities in Into the desert and beyond, to southern Utah, where they of these schools are based in Mormon-dominated many ways are different from, say, Danish realities. check the kid into a prison-like facility. Utah is that Utah’s state laws give parents more If you’re a father in Los Angeles and you find your legal rights than elsewhere – not least compared to teenage son drifting away and disappearing into Actually, Just the Right Amount of Violence ended California, where many of the clients are from. But places you wouldn’t dare go yourself, you have to do up as a hybrid film more out of necessity than even in Utah there are limits to how far you can something. There’s a real possibility of losing a child Judge choice. Originally, the always imaginative and go. In fact some of the strictest schools have had to like that and, as a father, you can’t just stand idly by experimenting Jon Bang Carlsen had wanted to relocate to Central America, because the things that and watch that happen” • try something else this time, along the lines of a go on there simply aren’t legal in the USA. However, Jon Bang Carlsen originally planned his new film, “real” documentary. The subject – an intervention from the beginning I decided not to go after the Just the Right Amount of Violence, selected for IDFA’s Just the Right Amount of Violence, as a relatively industry specialising in abducting troubled teens toughest places, because it’s not the schools as Masters section, is produced by Helle Ulsteen for Kamoli straight documentary, but the project ended up from their homes and delivering them to rehab such that interest me. What I was looking for was a Films and Jon Bang Carlsen for C&C Productions. Most of centres – already holds so much drama and does father-son relationship, where the father basically Jon Bang Carlsen’s films will be available on a streaming as one of the most genre-blending works of the not immediately seem to call for any special creative loves his son and wants what’s best for him, but app from the beginning of 2014. For more information, 63-year-old filmmaker’s long career. devices. But after years of research and visits to suddenly finds himself in a situation where he has see reverse section and jonbangcarlsen.com.

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Denmark’s North Sea coast. As Jenny’s voiceover relates her life and thoughts, we watch her act in a series of tableaux reconstructing situations from FIVE CLASSICS BY JON BANG CARLSEN Staged Documentarism­ her everyday life. She is, in a way, starring in a cinematic interpretation of her own life. Jenny (1977) At first glance, Jon Bang Carlsen’s Just the By Lars Movin Back in 1977, when Bang Carlsen modelled his version of an actual person, Jenny, the method In this film portrait of Jenny Jespersen, a tough, Right Amount of Violence resonates with windblown 76-year-old from Denmark’s sparsely wasn’t new. Twenty years before, Lionel Rogosin populated North Sea coast, Jon Bang Carlsen took the recent trend of hybrid films, but his The theme of Jon Bang Carlsen’s new film, Just the had done something similar in his Oscar-nominated up an observational documentary mode, where the new documentary is a natural extension Right Amount of Violence, is loss of love. It’s a film classic On the Bowery (1956), inserting a fictional observing preceded the start of shooting. Moving that probes the difficult and often very painful character into a milieu of bums and barflies, whom in with his protagonist, the filmmaker made note of of methods the Danish filmmaker has been relationship between parents and children. he all directed to play themselves, in order to paint things big and small from a day-to-day life without much variation. Only then did he turn on his camera, using since the 1970s. Moreover, it opens up the kind of wounds we a realistic picture of life in the bowels of New reconstructing one by one the most essential and all suffer growing up that have the potential to York City. Like Bang Carlsen, Rogosin was fond of telling moments he had fallen in love with. determine the course of our lives. the pioneering Robert J. Flaherty and the Italian It’s an important and urgent issue, and the story Neorealists who in similar ways made moving and Hotel of the Stars (1981) would appeal to any human-interest documentarian. memorable films by splicing fiction and reality. For staged documentarism to work, the amateurs involved must have the hearts of performers and The only problem is that very few people would However, Bang Carlsen took things a step further not be afraid of the camera. It’s hard to imagine want, or could even stand, to put their despair on in Jenny, and later films like Hotel of the Stars (1981), a better location for a staged documentary than display in such a vulnerable situation. The Phoenix Bird (1984) and Before the Guests Arrive a hotel full of extras and acting hopefuls. That’s True to the method he has refined over four (1986), refining and perfecting the method that he exactly what Jon Bang Carlsen found in the decades, Bang Carlsen, 63, chose to mix reality, dubbed “staged documentarism.” What drove him late ’70s when he checked into the legendary Montecito Hotel on Franklin Street in Los Angeles, fiction and personal reflection. The two men who was the recognition that the reality that is presented smack in the heart of Hollywood. abduct “Simon” in the opening sequence are real- in any kind of film has always been around the

Director Jon Bang Carlsen Photo: Robin Skjoldborg life “interventionists,” but at the end of the film back of the filmmaker’s eyes and so can never be it’s revealed that the sequence is a reconstruction. anything but a subjective interpretation. For Bang It’s Now or Never (1996) Rather than working in the classic, observational Carlsen – and likeminded filmmakers – the camera Jon Bang Carlsen pushed his method further in this “documentary comedy” about James M’evoy, mode, Bang Carlsen asks the abductors to play is never just a surveillance tool. It’s a pen for a lovesick bachelor living in the Burren, a grey- themselves in a situation they know inside and writing poetry based on your perceptions, a brush green limestone landscape on the west coast of out from their working lives. And the character for painting the impressions you get from observing Ireland. It was no longer enough to just have the of “Simon”? He’s played by an actor. the world you’re living in. characters play themselves. He now relocated Later in the film, we meet another young man, Bang Carlsen’s exploration of the possibilities them, furnishing them with new friends and a story that’s only partly their own, while still seeking to Taylor Green, who has actually been through of “staged documentarism” reached a peak in use documentary poetry to say something truthful the system and is now looking back at the It’s Now or Never (1996), portraying a lovesick about the world as it sticks in the narrator’s senses. experience. Meanwhile, in between the fictional and documentary elements, the filmmaker weaves The camera is never just a surveillance How to Invent Reality (1996) another layer, an autobiographical and essayistic Alongside It’s Now or Never, Jon Bang Carlsen tool. It’s a pen for writing poetry based on shot a behind-the-scenes documentary that also frame of explanation, in which he reflects on his your perceptions, a brush for painting the serves as an essay on his method. Reflecting on own experiences as a son and a father, hinting the creation of key scenes, the filmmaker is like at his personal motivation for picking up this impressions you get from observing the a magician revealing his tricks, while stressing particular subject. world you’re living in. that he does not think of his devices as fakery. Accordingly, Just the Right Amount of Violence Rather, it’s a matter of staying true to one’s own observations and impressions. As long as the ties into the recent trend of hybrid films where bachelor, “Jimmy,” from the Burren, a harsh characters can recognize themselves, he maintains, essentially documentary material is put into a limestone landscape on the west coast of Ireland. there is a documentary element there. framework that also questions conventional notions The filmmaker next relocated to South Africa for of reality and truth. Two recent examples are Sarah a number of years, making films like Addicted to Addicted to Solitude (1999) Polley’s Stories We Tell (2012) and Marten Persiel’s Solitude (1999), Portrait of God (2001) and Blinded The first instalment of his South African trilogy has Jon Bang Carlsen turning over a new leaf as a This Ain’t California (2012), which both use fake Angels (2007), and opened up a new, more essayistic filmmaker. The transformation may have come from archival footage and actors – not so much to fool the path in his production. On the back of this group without, but it matched an inner imperative. True to audience as to communicate a deeper, more abstract of films, Bang Carlsen is now returning to staged form, the Danish documentarian travelled to South or subjective truth. documentarism. In Just the Right Amount of Violence, Africa to find faces and landscapes for a story that While hybrid film is a term that has been he visually revisits some of the arch-American he had already outlined in his mind back home. However, his encounter with the harsh realities of applied to a lot of boundary-bending documentaries landscapes of the American Southwest that were South African life pushed him in the direction of a in recent years, the concept is hardly new to his favourite locations in the late 1970s and over more classic documentary form. Bang Carlsen. A grand old man of Danish auteur the next decade. But it is also a film that mixes up documentary film, Bang Carlsen made his debut different expressive elements with a joyful lightness in 1973 and broke through four years later with that recalls the phenomenon that the Danish Jenny, an original and personal short-film portrait painter Per Kirkeby, for one, once labelled “the of a 76-year-old woman in a remote village on arrogance of age” •

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In other words, the process-oriented method von madness and normality but also came dangerously Trier experimented with when he made The Idiots close – at times almost destructively close – to was ideal material for a documentary. Jargil simply pushing its participants too far. The Humiliated followed von Trier’s lead and went with a nimbly is a loyal documentation of that experiment, a observational style, devoid of interviews and the window into the artistic process, and ultimately director’s narration. highly revealing about the personal psychology of The other obvious reason why The Humiliated the author. While von Trier is most definitely not and The Idiots became such an interesting tandem an idiot – if he is, he is certainly a uniquely gifted is purely technological: neither of the two films one – what Jargil’s film shows is that, of everyone

The Humiliated Photo: Morten ConstantineanuThe Bak would have been possible without the high-end involved in the making of this film, no one was camcorders that had just come on the market. The more humiliated than the person who orchestrated history of mobile video cameras goes as far back the whole thing. Accordingly, The Humiliated is no as the 1960s, but the introduction of high-quality less awkward and transgressive than The Idiots, and recording equipment in the 1990s vastly accelerated every bit as fascinating and entertaining • the breakdown of the old separations between video art, documentary and fiction – and, in turn, helped The Humiliated, selected for IDFA’s curated programme revolutionise the entire field of moving pictures. Paradocs: The Making of Movies, is produced by Vinca For von Trier, the opportunity to shoot on Wiedemann for Jesper Jargil Film. video and then scan to 35mm meant that he could personally take over as camera operator, realising the Nouvelle Vague generation’s dream of using Jesper Jargil

Director, scriptwriter, cinematographer and The Humiliated is a window into the producer Jesper Jargil, 68, treats the theme of Paradocs / IDFA 2013 artistic process, and ultimately highly artistic creation in many of his films. In addition revealing about the personal psychology to his Lars von Trier trilogy, formally entitled The In its transgressive aesthetics and upfront Kingdom of Credibility, Jargil made a film about By Lars Movin of the author. renowned Danish painter Per Kirkeby, Winter’s awkwardness, Lars von Trier’s Dogme film The Idiots Tale (1996). An awardwinner at the Art Film Biennale in Paris, the film charts the making of (1998) hits like a fist in the gut. Jesper Jargil’s Very few making-of documentaries get anywhere the camera as a pen. Jargil, in parallel, also cast a large oil painting. making-of film The Humiliated (1998) peels back near the level of the films they are about. Jesper off the old more labour- and technology-intensive Jargil’s The Humiliated, a behind-the-scenes look production methods and plunged into what another layer, stripping everyone involved bare at Lars von Trier’s contribution to Dogme95, would soon be known as one-man-one-camera – no one more so than von Trier himself – in The Idiots (1998), is a notable exception. While a documentary filmmaking (though assisted by making-of film is usually a polite appendage to several B camera operators). every sense of the word. The film is one of five the actual work, an anonymous promotion tool, In The Humiliated – through Jargil’s optics – we classics selected for IDFA’s curated programme The Humiliated in wondrous ways stands out as a follow von Trier as he goes through the process of of “making-of” documentaries. work in its own right, an unsparing mirror image shaping his concept and his cast into a cinematic of the controversial film it documents. It is as if two narrative. The documentarian observes the director Lars Von Trier Trilogy writers had decided to write, respectively, a report observing the world he is constructing. As narrative and a novel about the same segment of reality. glue, fragments of an unusually candid audio diary The Humiliated (1998) is the first part of Jesper Jargil’s trilogy about There are two likely reasons for that. One, von Trier recorded on a dictaphone during the shoot Lars von Trier and the Dogme project. The Idiots was hardly an ordinary production. The are interspersed throughout the film. film – about a group of people who decide to act The result is a remarkably up-close documen­ The Purified, which came out in 2002, chronicles the four Dogme like they are mentally challenged – had a minimal tation of a process centring on transgression, brothers’ reactions to their 1995 manifesto five years after they script. The idea was that the director, crew and cast rawness and vulnerability. When the story requires made their revolutionary proclamation in Paris. Using footage he would go on a journey together, exploring the fluid the actors to be naked, their puppet master removes captured with his DV camera on the set of the different Dogme boundaries between normality and madness, and his own trousers in solidarity. When the film’s fake films, Jargil confronts the four directors – Lars von Trier (The Idiots), improvise scenes and dialogue along the way. In mentally challenged characters confront a group Thomas Vinterberg (Festen), Søren Kragh-Jacobson (Mifune) and other words, it would be an authentic investigation of real people with Down’s syndrome and get so Kristian Levring (The King Is Alive) with moments when they broke of the fine line between acting and authenticity, flustered that they fall out of character, every bit of their own rules. individual and mask, and not, like most fiction films, awkwardness is minutely documented. And when Gifted simply a realisation of insight given in advance. the moody director slides from professionalism into In The Exhibited, released in 2000, Jargil captures the inner workings Part of the method involved is what you might call self-analysis, the line is dissolved between making-of of von Trier’s 1996 art performance-installation Psychomobile #1: the Borat model: inserting fictional elements into documentary and intimate portrait of an artist as a World Clock. During the two months of the exhibition, 53 actors reality and watching how the world reacts. Such a mix of bashful ironist, two-fisted shrinking violet performed improvisations based on the movements of ants from strategy, of course, comes with all the uncertainties and neurotic therapist. Los Alamos, New Mexico. Mixing notions of reality, fiction, accident and possibilities for things to go wrong that are When The Idiots was shot in summer 1997, it was and originality, the film offers a new perspective on the Dogme 95 some of the most important conditions for loaded a cinematic and social experiment that not only method. documentary moments. challenged the surrounding world’s concepts of

Idiocy24 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 25 INTERVIEW / JENS PEDERSEN / FAITH HOPE AFGHANISTAN INTERVIEW / JENS PEDERSEN / FAITH HOPE AFGHANISTAN

By Katrine Sommer Boysen editor Jesper Osmund. For all four of them, Faith Hope Afghanistan was their first real production for children, so they turned to experienced hands in First came Armadillo, Janus Metz’ award-winning children’s film. “We learned how important it is to documentary about the war in Afghanistan seen develop a clear story for each protagonist in order from the perspective of a squad of Danish soldiers. for a youthful audience to relate to them,” producer Then civilians had a say in Nagieb Khaja’s My Gottschau says. Pedersen & Co. Melody Photo: Pedersen Layla’s Afghanistan, which had ordinary Afghans filming Pedersen adds: “We got some advice from DFI’s everyday life behind the frontlines on their mobile film commissioner Dorte Høeg Brask that stuck: phones. A nation at war in Afghanistan, Denmark ‘What’s important to the subject is important to the has certainly had its share of filmmakers examining film.’ That determined the stories’ development.” the human costs at close range. “I hope we have succeeded in bringing it home Now, the filmmaker Jens Pedersen is bringing to children in every part of the world what day- us Faith Hope Afghanistan, a series of portraits of to-day life is like for kids in a country they mainly Afghan children and the ups and downs of life in hear about as a place where soldiers get killed. the shadow of war. Five stories about children in The children in these films give you a completely Jens Pedersen Taj Mohammad Bakhtari Kabul confronting the vicissitudes of life with a different picture. In their resilience, they hold hope Director, cinematographer and Director and photographer Taj resourcefulness that almost took the filmmaker’s for the country’s future.” producer Jens Pedersen, 54, has Mohammad Bakhtari, 48, has breath away when he first came to Afghanistan with “The film shows children who have perspective directed a number of TV docu­ directed several films from his the intention of making a TV documentary. and goals in the face of adversity,” Gottschau mentaries focusing on global issues, native Afghanistan, including Kabul “We have this notion that children like these are says. “You might say they are Afghanistan’s including Nicaragua – Dictatorship Ambulance (2011), Sahar – The on the bottom of the bottom. I thought children dandelion children: They find a way, they always restored? (2011, Bronze Palm Award Carpet Maker (2008, screened at at Mexico film festival), Cops on a DOK Leipzig and Clermont-Ferrand), who have witnessed war and tragedy at first hand push through” • Mission (2011), From Brothel to and Faramosh Shoodagaan (2006). had to be downtrodden and raggedy,” Pedersen says. Bridehood (2009), The King of Calls The story about Layla’s Melody is selected for IDFA Kids (2008, Silver Palm Award at Mexico Insisting on a Better Life & Docs. The series is produced by Jakob Gottschau for film festival), The Worst Job in the The filmmaker’s preconceived notions were quickly Pedersen & Co. For more information, see reverse section. World (2008, Best Short at Artivist Film Festival). put to shame when he visited a school for street children in Kabul and found a group of competent, focused kids with a surprising abundance of spirit considering what they had been through. “They were so pleasant to be with and, despite their own situation, they asked me how I was. They Faith Hope Afghanistan’s really had their sensitivity turned outward and Afghanistan weren’t at all, as you might expect, consumed with their own fate,” Pedersen says. Dandelion Pedersen’s meeting with the street children resulted in five short films that all have a name in the title: Asadagha’s Heart, Faridullah’s Day Off, Layla’s Children Melody (selected for IDFA Kids & Docs), Wali’s Friend, and Machgan’s Will. Together, they paint a picture of Five Short Films Asadagha’s Heart Faridullah’s Day Off Layla’s Melody Wali’s Friend Machgan’s Will a handful of strong-willed children who have lost IDFA Kids & Docs Five Afghan children are the heroes of their parents or have to support their families by, For more information In 2008, Asadagha’s Faridullah’s family’s Layla hasn’t seen When he’s not going Machgan’s father is a director Jens Pedersen and producer Jakob for instance, making bricks or selling chewing gum see reverse section. parents were killed in house was destroyed her mother for four to school, Wali has drug addict. Machgan to drivers in the streets of Kabul. Meanwhile, they their home by American during the many wars years. Her father was to make money, so and her mother are Gottschau’s series Faith Hope Afghanistan, all dream of getting an education and believe in the soldiers who had been in Afghanistan. His killed in the war and his family can eat and left to take care of possibility of a better life. told that terrorists father had to take out poverty landed Layla pay rent. He dreams themselves, even which follows the determined struggle were living there. Now, a loan for his family to in a Kabul orphanage. of becoming an artist, though Machgan has “I wanted to tell the stories of these kids who of Asadagha, Faridullah, Layla, Wali, Asadagha and his two survive. Now bright, She is happy to be but it’s tough when he an unwavering dream have wound up in an unfair situation as a product younger sisters are ambitious Faridullah is there, because she has to spend most of of going to school and and Machgan to make a dignified life for of the international intervention, which Denmark orphans and homeless. working with his father gets to go to school his time making money. becoming a teacher. themselves amidst the hardships of war. has been a part of for more than 10 years now. But They have been staying at the local brick factory and play music, which With a girl friend, he She thinks it’s unfair the stories should focus on the children’s ability to with their uncle, but to pay off the family’s she loves. When she walks the streets of that she doesn’t get he tells them he can’t debt, and he is not gets a message that Kabul with his scale, to pursue her dreams. make a place for themselves in the world by taking afford to house them afraid to stand up to his her mother is coming because he can’t afford One day, she and charge and refusing to play the obvious victim role.” anymore. It takes more boss when he sees an to visit, Layla is worried to buy gum to sell. her mother make an than this to beat down injustice. that she wants to take important decision A Different Picture of Afghanistan the three brave siblings. her back to the village about her future. Pedersen directed and shot the films with Afghan and marry her off. filmmaker Taj Mohammad Bakhtari, and the two Kids & Docs / IDFA 2013 worked closely with producer Jakob Gottschau and

26 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 INTERVIEW / SIMON LERENG WILMONT / CHIKARA – THE SUMO WRESTLER’S SON INTERVIEW / SIMON LERENG WILMONT / CHIKARA – THE SUMO WRESTLER’S SON

At first glance, the children’s film world. But that’s only on the surface, director Simon Lereng Wilmont Simon Lereng Wilmont says. Chikara – The Sumo Wrestler’s Son Director Simon Lereng Wilmont, “My plan was to make a film that goes behind 38, graduated as a documentary is the story of a small boy in a tough the stereotypical notions we in the West have about film director from the National Film sport, but to director Simon Lereng the Japanese,” he says. This comes out in Chikara Photo: Final Cut for Real School of Denmark in 2009. He and his relationship to his father, Harumitsu. also holds a BA degree in Japanese. Wilmont it is above all a universal Above the Ground, Beneath the BOY Sky (2008) won Best Short at narrative about fathers and sons. Chikara Sticks With It Vision du Réel. Dormitory Master In Japan, a lot of people still continue the tradition (2009) won a Gold Panda award of following in their parents’ footsteps. That’s the at Sichuan TV Festival. His first feature documentary, Travelling with By Per Juul Carlsen case with Chikara, whose name means “strength.” He is a sumo wrestler, like his father before him. Mr. T (2012), was co-directed with Andreas Dalsgaard and selected But Chikara isn’t big or strong for his age, and he for CPH:DOX. IN THE One of the first shots in the 30-minute Chikara – often has problems in the ring. He looks hopelessly The Sumo Wrester’s Son shows a wrestling match small next to his huge father. In a sport whose between two boys. Barely a second goes by before practitioners are supposed to look as imposing as one of the boys is pushed out of the ring, the dohyo, possible, Chikara’s potential is hard to spot. But and lands smack on the floor a foot beyond the he sticks with it, and to the director that’s the perimeter, his face contorted in tears. interesting thing about him. The crying boy isn’t the film’s protagonist. That’s “It makes you think why so many of these sumo DOHYO Chikara, who appears shortly afterwards by himself, kids stick with it, even though sumo is such a tough Beyond the specific grounding in Japan and the lost in thought in the middle of the gym amongst world,” Wilmont says. “It has to do with the concept exotic traditions of sumo, the filmmaker sees the other boys, naked except for the loincloth of ‘ganbaru’ that permeates Japanese society. You his film as a universal story about a father-son Japanese sumo wrestlers wear. should be able to withstand anything, no matter relationship. “Sumo is a means for Chikara to spend At this point, most Westerners’ preconceptions how painful. It will pay off in the end. The Japanese time with his father. And sumo is a way for his are liable to kick in, seeing the boys as victims say that about all sorts of things. It hurts, but if you father to show that he cares about his son.” trapped in weird, millennium-old rituals in a can endure it, it shows that you are made from the Wilmont hopes children who see the film, ideally country that puts undue demands on its citizens right stuff.” with their parents, will think about the choices Kids & Docs / IDFA 2013 and has one of the highest suicide rates in the The filmmaker sees another, more important Chikara makes. reason why Chikara sticks with sumo, even if he, “I would like children to ask themselves or their too, has his doubts about it. father and mother: ‘if it hurts so much, how come Chikara still likes sumo? Why does he keep doing Sumo as a Way of Bonding it?’ A different view of a tough sport will emerge “To me, the film is mainly about a boy who wants that way, if you go beneath the surface” • to be closer to his father. He doesn’t see him all that often, because his father has to work a lot to Chikara – The Sumo Wrestler’s Son is produced keep his family afloat. Sumo is their time together,” by Monica Hellström for Final Cut for Real. For more Wilmont says. information, see reverse section. Chikara – The Sumo Wrestler’s Son . Framegrab Sumo Wrestler’s Chikara – The Sumo A martial art originating in Japan. Two wrestlers, or rikishi, meet in a sand-covered ring called a dohyo. The sport has roots in Japan’s Shinto religion and perpetuates centuries-old Chikara – The Sumo Wrestler’s Son . Framegrab Sumo Wrestler’s Chikara – The purification rituals, such as tossing salt before the match. Sumo matches often last just a few seconds. The loser is the first one who is forced out of the ring or touches the floor with anything but the soles of his feet.

28 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 29 INTERVIEW / ULLA SØE & SUSSIE WEINOLD / SHANNE AND HER FRIENDS INTERVIEW / ULLA SØE & SUSSIE WEINOLD / SHANNE AND HER FRIENDS

Shanne and Her Friends We get uniquely close to 13-year-old Shanne in this film about having friends and creating your own identity in

. Framegrab Shanne and Her Friends the difficult early teen years. Shanne’s best friend, Emma, has transferred to another school and Shanne misses her in class. There are a lot of cliques and she feels alone, even though she and Emma are staying in touch. After summer vacation, the grade seven kids at her school are mixed up Ulla Søe Sussie Weinold into three new classes, which gives her hope of making Director Ulla Søe, 37, graduated Director and scriptwriter Sussie new friends. Will she maintain her old friendship with from the department of film and Weinold, 54, is a scriptwriter Emma at a time when everything is changing so much? media studies with additional graduate from the National Film The film shows how important friendships are to girls studies in rhetoric at Copenhagen School of Denmark. Has directed but also how sensitive it can be when jealousy and other University. Has directed a number of TV documentary series such as This difficult emotions take over. TV documentary series for national Is Love (2012), The Girls Room broadcasters DR and TV 2, including (2011), The Art of Surviving as Dancing Simon (2010), Our First a Child (2010) and Small Faces Shanne and Her Friends is part of larger universe that also Child (2009) and Mr. Beard (2008). (2006), selected for IDFA. includes a five-part TV series and several three-minute short films for the Web. www.dr.dk/salg

Kids & Docs / IDFA 2013

As told to FILM Shanne, Emma and other girls their age change I think Shanne’s story is a recognisable so quickly. Everything is in motion. What was one. Shanne is like a lot of other girls her age. vital two months ago suddenly isn’t so interesting Enormously vulnerable, but also strong and funny. A lot of girls like Shanne feel a strong need anymore. Nonetheless, when we started filming, it She is not someone you feel sorry for. No way. We Someone to bond with one or more of their friends. was important for us to take the girls’ feelings at didn’t conceive the film as a problem story in the We follow Shanne as she grows into a teenager that moment seriously. Those feelings are so much classic sense, even if we show Shanne having a and her friends gradually become as or even about who the girls are, especially in relation to who tough time. The film is about the difficulty of the more important than her family. It’s a vulnerable they are with, though they can also be about after- everyday, which can be a really big deal for a lot time. Shanne thinks a lot about who she is. She school activities or the clothes they wear. of girls. to Belong is starting to break away from her family and needs someone to hold onto. That someone is her Our experience was that the girls really wanted I was in a symbiotic relationship with a friend Emma. to talk about their feelings. They are perfectly friend when I was Shanne’s age. I remember willing to talk about their relationship conflicts, the security of having someone to belong with and It’s almost like unrequited love! When we if they feel that we are taking them seriously. It’s how we cultivated all the symbols that were tied With first meet Shanne, she is yearning to spend more about us going into their world 100 percent and to our friendship. I also remember the times when time with Emma, but she finds that Emma is taking the time to include every detail, even if we friendship relations between the girls in my class less interested in hanging out with her. Shanne know their priorities the following week may look were not so easy. We were testing each other, and A 13-year-old girl’s relationship to her says being best friends is like having a boyfriend. completely different. there were hierarchies, systems and rotations that best friend is at the heart of Ulla Søe and This is made clear to Sussie (Weinold, ed.) and hurt, too. However, I think girls today are much Sussie Weinold’s Shanne and Her Friends. me as we watch the girls go through the same Shanne is not afraid to open up and tell better at reflecting on all the mechanisms. They are kind of emotions and conflicts as someone in about all the things that hurt. But even that much more aware and articulate about the identity Shanne’s story, Ulla Søe tells us, touches on a relationship. They give each other jewellery changes along the way. When the film opens, her project underlying it all! I hope our film shows the difficulty of the everyday at a time in life and ritually put it on each other. They squabble relationship to her best friend is all consuming. that, too • and get annoyed at each other’s idiosyncrasies, At that point, we found that she has an almost when everything is changing. All the time. and they have big emotional clashes and unlimited interest in letting us into her life and her Shanne and Her Friends, selected for IDFA Kids & Docs, reconciliations. And they get very jealous at other thoughts. Over time, she develops other interests. is produced by Mette Mailand for Plus Pictures. For more girls, who are seen as potential threats to their She gets a different perspective on herself and her information, see reverse section. friendship. It’s almost like they are rehearsing relations, and it becomes correspondingly harder for marriage! for us to get close to her.

30 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 31 interview / ERLEND E. MO / FOUR LETTERS APART interview / ERLEND E. MO / FOUR LETTERS APART

us, as a society, from acting without reflection, “Precisely because children don’t have the same perhaps even causing harm, by opting to medicate filters as adults, filming them is a big responsibility – a solution that can take away a child’s chance – especially when they get into stressful situations,” to develop properly.” Mo says. “You have to know when to leave the room.” Happier around Kids He has a clear understanding with the children The Norwegian-born filmmaker has made and their parents that they can ask him to stop documentaries with child and adult subjects alike, filming at any time. If a scene hits too close to home Four Letters Apart Photo: Magic Hour Films Four Letters but he is happier working with kids. He’s looking in his estimation, he has a talk with his subjects for character drama in his films and that’s easier when the filming is done. Plus, children and parents to get from kids than adults. can raise objections during the editing process. This Erlend E. Mo “Firstly, it’s easier to get into the ‘inner space’ of trust is key, he stresses. Director Erlend E. Mo, children. That’s sometimes possible with adults, but As in several of his other films, Mo spent a 46, has directed Can it can also be really difficult to get through all the long time looking for the right participants for You Die in Heaven? defence mechanisms, like posturing. If something Four Letters Apart. It’s important that the subjects (2005), winner of Best smells like a lie, it loses its fascination to me. have charisma and preferably a sense of humour, Documentary award Children are real in a whole other way. They don’t too. Besides, he has often aimed for the kind of at CPH:DOX, and My Eyes (2006), which have the same filters as adults and they are more coming-of-age stories that he thought would have was honoured with connected to their core being,” Mo says. a happy ending. the IDFA Silver Cub “Secondly, the potential to evolve is so much “I base most of my films on classical dramaturgy, Award, among others. greater for children. They can change so much in that is, on the model of Greek tragedies. At the In 2008 he released just a few months, even weeks. There’s a limit to same time, I’m influenced by American happy Paradise, a feature- length documentary how much adults can change, even when they are endings. I like my films to end on an up note and directed with Sami Saif in a crisis situation. The three children in Four Letters offer some hope. When I started Four Letters Apart, and Jens Loftager. Apart went from being angry and unhappy to being however, I decided it was okay if the ending was much more balanced and having greater self-esteem sad. The film was driven more than anything by in the period in which I tracked them. Working with my curiosity. I wanted to work as authentically as kids is very life-affirming that way.” possible. If things did not turn out well for one of the children, I wanted to tell it the way it was” • Not Afraid of Happy Endings Physical disabilities, cancer, mental health By Liselotte Michelsen Empathy is essential to Mo. He got very close to Four Letters Apart was showcased at CPH:DOX. The film diagnoses – Erlend E. Mo deals with tough the people at the heart of Can You Die in Heaven? and is produced by Lise Lense-Møller for Magic Hour Films. Four Letters Apart, both of which he shot over several For more information, see reverse section. subjects. When he works with children, “I have made films about refugees and neo-Nazis, months, doing most of the camerawork himself. though, even his inner misanthrope sees which I personally thought were provocative, and gotten nothing but positive reactions. Then I make new hope for humankind, the director says, a film about ADHD and get some of the harshest wondering about the many angry reactions criticism I ever saw in my life. I didn’t see that Three Stories about­ ­Children By Erlend E. Mo to his new film, Four Letters Apart. coming!” Erlend E. Mo says. Pippi Longstocking on Ritalin In two previous films, Mo depicted children who had the odds stacked against them: a boy with cancer, in Can You Die in Heaven?, and two blind girls, in My Eyes. His new film, Four Letters Apart, tracks three kids with behavioural problems in a special- Children ed class at a Danish school. They take part in a therapy programme that uses exercises to improve sensorimotor skills instead of medication. “I set out to find the real-world equivalents of Emil of Lönneberga and Pippi Longstocking – the Four Letters Apart (2013) My Eyes (2006) Can You Die in Heaven? (2005) Give Me two legendary protagonists of Astrid Lindgren’s We are introduced to three children struggling A sensuous documentary about two blind girls and A powerful story about Jonathan, an 11-year-old children’s books,” Mo says. “I asked myself, If with behavioural difficulties. Taking his camera blind people’s experience of the world. Aesthetics boy with cancer, and his family. Mo follows the they had lived today, would they have been put everywhere, Mo tracks them at school and at were at the heart of the filmmaking process. Most family over the course of a year of ups and downs. on medication? home. There was no script for the film in general scenes were partially planned in advance in order Placing classified ads in a number of magazines, “Some consider the film a provocation, but I or for individual scenes. With a curious eye and a to get the look Mo was after with the bulky 16mm he picked this particular family because of their New Hope sensitive approach, Mo documents the children’s equipment his crew was using. The production exemplary strength and ability to stick together don’t wish to draw any battle lines for or against development. The film has triggered debate in took a snappy nine weeks, as Mo applied his during their time of crisis. medication. I want to show that progress is always Norway and Denmark about putting children TV experience. possible. My goal is to ask questions and prevent on medication.

32 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 33 INTERVIEW / MIRA JARGIL / DREAMING OF A FAMILY INTERVIEW / MIRA JARGIL / DREAMING OF A FAMILY

By Per Juul Carlsen A Lot at Stake “Being a parent is so challenging,” Jargil says. Jargil decided to tell the story of Per and his project: “Who doesn’t dream of having a perfect family? re-establishing his little family with a mother, father But there are no easy answers. I have only very little Six men sit in a room in a public building. One, and child. His eight-year-old daughter Ilse has been experience as a mother and I do my best according KNOWING Torben, a young man with a determined look, is a placed in a foster home and Per’s big wish is to to my circumstances. I make mistakes, like Per social services family counsellor in Copenhagen’s reunite Ilse with her mother, Christina, who she and most everyone else, but hopefully I will learn notoriously low-rent Nordvest neighbourhood. The hasn’t seen since she was around six months old, from them.” five other men are participating in Torben’s project, and tell Ilse the story of her special family. Another, deeper theme lurks in the film: negative “Gruppen Far”, a father’s group for disadvantaged It’s a tough story. When Christina was a child, social heritage and the possibility of breaking YOUR single dads. she found both her parents dead in the living room with it. This becomes particularly clear in a short “I have been smoking hash for 30 years and and was never told what happened. Like Per, she has sequence where the five men in the fathers’ group drinking like a hole in the ground,” one of them been a long-time substance abuser. When Per kicked talk about what it was like for them growing up. says. Per, 55, is a big guy, with long hair, a short her – and drugs – out of the home they shared, she They all tell the same story of their father coming beard and a mouth that looks like he can only speak moved to the other end of the country. Dreaming of home drunk and beating his wife and kids. HISTORY out of one side of it. “When I went into rehab, I did a Family opens with Christina back in Copenhagen, Memories like these are typical for children in it for my daughter. I have been off drugs for six and drug-free and ready to see her daughter again. foster care. Not that Per’s daughter Ilse shares this a half years now.” “Per had a specific project and he had the exact same story, but hers is no less difficult. A single dad tries to get his little family back “Good for you!” the other group members potential to grow. He had a lot at stake,” Jargil says. “In my experience, very few children in foster together in Dreaming of a Family, Mira respond. “I could tell he had come a long way from where care actually know where they are from,” Jargil “I had never heard about an initiative like he started as a hash addict. And I could sense his says. “They were never told the true story, because Jargil’s first documentary since leaving film Gruppen Far before,” the 32-year-old documentary sincere love for his daughter.” it’s so taboo. Most children who have been neglected school. Following Per who has been drinking filmmaker Mira Jargil says, whose The Time We Have want to know ‘Why did my parents do that to me?’ and smoking hash for a lifetime, the film is was named World’s Best Student Documentary Dad Coming Home Drunk so they can move on and reconcile themselves with by the international film school association Cilect From that premise grew a 90-minute documentary their past. also a story about the difficulty of breaking in 2012. that tracks the little family and the ups and downs “The film shows how necessary it is to tell that with your social heritage. “There are a lot of options for mothers, of their journey together. It’s hard for an eight- story. How Per is struggling to tell Ilse her story and mothers’ groups, that kind of thing, but I think year-old to relate to a new family. And it’s hard for help her break with her social heritage” • it’s interesting to hear the men’s perspective. My two people who have barely been able to take care first idea was to just be in the room and follow the of themselves to take care of a small child. The Dreaming of a Family, which premiered at CPH:DOX, conversations. But I quickly saw there was material challenge of putting children into the world is a is produced by Mette Heide for Plus Pictures. For more in Per for a film.” central theme of Dreaming of a Family. information, see reverse section.

Social Heritage On Film Best Photo: Bente Jæger Dreaming of a Family is the latest in a string of Danish Graduation films dealing with social heritage. Earlier in the year, Christian Sønderby Jepsen and Pernille Bervald Jørgensen Film 2012 brought out Blood Ties, about an alcoholic father trying to raise his 16 children out of the social swamp. Mira Jargil’s graduation film, The Time Sønderby Jepsen (who, incidentally, is married to Mira We Have, was honoured by Cilect, the Jargil) was also behind The Will, which won the Danish film International Association of Film and critics’ Bodil Award for Best Documentary in 2012. The film Television Schools. When Jargil was tells the story of a young man who after a lifetime of neglect preparing her graduation film at the is hoping for a new beginning as he waits to receive a large National Film School of Denmark, her inheritance from his grandfather. grandmother fell seriously ill and she Last year also brought us Mette Korsgaard’s decided to film her grandparents as they A Childhood in Hell, which tracks a former chairman of slowly say goodbye to each other after the children’s welfare council, Lisbeth Zornig Andersen, as 67 intimate and eventful years together. Mira Jargil she seeks out the family members who made her childhood The film, which is produced by Elisabeth Victoria Poulsen, also won awards at a nightmare of neglect, violence and sexual abuse. Director Mira Jargil, 32, has worked CPH:DOX, Full Frame Documentary Thomas Vinterberg likewise explored the subject of as a director and photographer of Film Festival and a Golden Panda at the being a victim of your history in his 2010 feature fiction documentaries and commercials since Sechuan TV Festival. film Submarino, the story of two brothers who are scarred 2003. She graduated as documentary by a traumatic event in their childhood spent with an director from the National Film School alcoholic mother. of Denmark in 2011 with The Time We Have, named Best Graduation Film 2012 by the international film school association Cilect.

34 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 35 Background / TOM HEINEMANN / CARBON CROOKS Background / TOM HEINEMANN / CARBON CROOKS

one project or another. The problem lies with the skipping town, pocketed – not paid – at least financial system of carbon trading itself. five billion euros of VAT. A French carbon fraud In Carbon Crooks, Heinemann ventures into rarely expert estimates that the schemes so far have cost investigated terrain: the European Trading System, European taxpayers at least 15 billion euros. in which companies are supposed to purchase The effect is that of a financial thriller – but, alas, Carbon Crooks . Framegrab allowances and offsets for their greenhouse gases. it’s a real story. What’s being scammed is the single The system was conjured out of the negotiations most significant initiative the world has yet come over the Kyoto Protocol in 1997 and is a largely up with to try and curb the emission of greenhouse American creation that, Heinemann demonstrates, gases into the atmosphere. The film is about a the Europeans were left to implement after the US white-collar crime with the highest possible stakes: pulled out of the global accord in 2001. the stolen funds were among the precious billions Carbon Crooks is an investigation into this multi- that Europe was supposed to commit to help steer billion dollar carbon market – a huge amount us away from fossil fuels • of funds flowing around the world that few understand and even the international police agency Carbon Crooks had its national release in September Interpol describes as a “legal fiction” because of the and is produced by Søren Steen Jespersen for Larm Film. counter-intuitive nature of investing in a commodity For more information, see reverse section. in order to make it disappear. Heinemann opted to present the story like multiple chapters of a crime story, with ominous atmospherics by cinematographer Bo Tengberg, known for his work on The Killing and other high- end dramas. Creating the mood of a noir mystery, Heinemann’s interviews with participants in

Heinemann’s main inspiration was Carbon Crooks . Framegrab Charles Ferguson’s Inside Job, which probed the equally opaque machinations of the 2008 global financial crisis. Known for prodding sacred cows, director Tom Heinemann takes a close look at the the Kyoto negotiations are filmed like they are crime witnesses coolly recollecting Europe’s 200 billion dollar market that is the world’s surrender to the United States as if it had just The most significant effort to date to curb happened yesterday. The filmmaker’s main inspiration was Charles SMORGASBORD. Carbon Crooks introduces us greenhouse gas emissions. His evidence to Bo Elkjær. Over two years, the Danish journalist Ferguson’s Inside Job, which probed the equally uncovered the authorities’ sloppy registration of in Carbon Crooks points to the real victim: opaque machinations of the 2008 global financial carbon credits in the Danish carbon registry, the crisis. Seeking to uncover the mysteries of the centre of a scam estimated to have cost European the climate. taxpayers billions of euros. Chilling carbon market, Heinemann found many corollaries between Ferguson’s probe into the perverse financial mechanisms and the weirdly ingenious By Mark Schapiro ways that traders and criminals have devised to manipulate the imaginary commodity at the Tom Heinemann Effects heart of the carbon markets – which despite being In his last film, The Micro Debt, documentary called “carbon” is actually traded as a digit on a Director and journalist Tom Heinemann, 54, has been a runner- filmmaker Tom Heinemann uncovered deep flaws computer screen. up three times for the journalism in the micro-credit system set up by Mohammed First, there are the traders. Heinemann elicits award Cavling. He won the Prix Italia Yunis’ Grameen Bank. statements from several who are remarkably candid for A Killer Bargain (2006), about of This time, Heinemann sets out to follow the trail about the ease with which huge profits can be made the manufacturing of textiles in India. of money from the carbon markets to the distant from gambling on carbon prices – which have been In The Bitter Taste of Tea (2009), winner of the Freedom award at the locales where European polluters attempt to “offset” in steady decline, undermining the market’s very Al Jazeera doc festival, Heinemann their greenhouse gas emissions. He visits projects reason for existing. Second, there are the criminals examines the fairness of Fairtrade. in Bangladesh, where we see a supposedly “smoke- who profit from mastering the highly complex and His film on the potential dark side of Carbon free” brick factory belching greenhouse gases into obscure machinations of the market. Heinemann the microcredit phenomenon, The the atmosphere, and China, where Heinemann looks into the hackers who looted the Czech Micro Debt (2011), won the Lorenzo Natali Journalism Prize awarded by discovers that carbon credits were issued for a Republic’s central register of emission allowances the European Commission. wind farm that was never connected to the power and the fly-by-night traders who basically took carboncrooks.tv and Trading grid. That’s when he realizes it’s not just about over the Danish trading exchange and, before tomheinemann.dk.

36 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 37 Background / LARS BECKER-LARSEN / TAMING THE QUANTUM WORLD Background / LARS BECKER-LARSEN / TAMING THE QUANTUM WORLD

harnessed some of the weird forces of quantum physics and used them to build new and utterly incredible machines. In the Canary Islands, Becker-Larsen tracks two Hooked on Wacky teams of physicists as they set up equipment on the islands of La Palma and Tenerife and successfully carry out a “quantum teleportation” over 144 Quantum Physics

. Framegrab the Quantum World Taming kilometres of open sea between the two islands. Next, we go into the workshop of an Austrian Says director Lars Becker-Larsen physicist who is building one of the world’s first quantum computers, which will eventually be infinitely faster than computers as we know them “I have always made films about science. I moved into today. We go to Geneva, where a company has the lunchroom at the Niels Bohr Institute early on and started selling quantum cryptography to casinos, basically never left. “Film is an amazing way to communicate complex “Several of my films have revolved issues and make them come alive. I also find working around quantum physics. I keep being with scientists fascinating. A lot of them have amazing fascinated by this completely absurd storytelling skills once you get them started. “Several of my films have revolved around quantum reality. It’s beautiful, freaky, surreal physics. I keep being fascinated by this completely absurd and poetic at once.” reality. It’s beautiful, freaky, surreal and poetic at once. “My first film, Atomic Physics and Reality, was about banks and many other customers that they cannot perhaps the most absurd of all quantum phenomena: mention. And we hear about a global partnership entanglement – the fact that there is still this strange between scientists in China, Japan and Europe to connection between two particles even when they are turn satellites into a global quantum internet. separated over astronomical distances. Einstein called We also hear about the dark side of the new it ‘spooky action at a distance.’ No wonder! technology and its unpredictable consequences. One “The Copenhagen Interpretation takes a step back to the scientist compares the effect of quantum computing two founding fathers, Niels Bohr and Albert Einstein. to the recent financial crisis, only much worse. Though they disagreed about a general cosmology, they In Frankfurt, two scientists show how the laws still outlined the two central phenomena of quantum of quantum physics help determine the routes of physics, one of which is entanglement. The other is migrating birds. There is every indication that similar superposition, which states that a particle, oddly, can be strange properties are at work in humans, as well. in two places at once. Like if I was at home now but also When the film is over, you believe Becker-Larsen. at the corner bar simultaneously. By Markus Bernsen Nature is, in fact, wondrous, fantastic and a little “My new film, Taming the Quantum World, shows the bit disturbing • theories being put to use right now. These utterly nutty quantum phenomena that physicists used to regard as At the quantum level, nature starts behaving oddly Taming the Quantum World is produced by curiosities are now being applied to making practical and unpredictably. It’s a world ruled by entirely Gitte Randløv for Masto Media. Danish premiere is technology. Indeed, they are the very foundation for different laws than the world we know. Particles can set for 7 December. Follow the film at facebook.com/ the future of information technology. be in two places at once or connected by mysterious Weird TamingTheQuantumWorld “I’ll probably hang around that lunchroom for forces over great distances. In his new film, Taming a while longer ...” the Quantum World, director Lars Becker-Larsen travels around Europe talking to physicists trying to harness the power of the weird quantum world Lars Becker-Larsen that is revealed when we get down to the smallest Director Lars Becker-Larsen, 56, building blocks of the universe. made his debut as a director in 1985 Bohr’s atom turns 100 Albert Einstein never bought into Niels Bohr’s Worlds with Atomic Physics and Reality. Has colourful description of quantum mechanics. In directed numerous popular-science 2013 marks the 100th anniversary of Niels Bohr’s the 1920s, quantum mechanics was the reason for “Nature is wondrous and much more fantastic documentaries, including several on revolutionary atomic model which formed the basis for a dispute between the two physicists that would quantum physics. The Copenhagen our understanding of atoms and quantum physics. Lars than we could ever imagine” goes the opening Interpretation (2004), about Niels go on for the rest of their lives. As a physicist says Bohr and Albert Einstein’s dispute Becker-Larsen’s Taming the Quantum World is the director’s in Taming the Quantum World, everything points to line of Lars Becker-Larsen’s documentary over the quantum world, won contribution to the anniversary which is being celebrated Bohr being right: the laws of quantum physics are Taming the Quantum World. several awards at international film throughout the year with a series of events, exhibitions, precisely as wacky as the Danish physicist predicted. festivals. The new cosmology of the new books, films and school projects. Back in the day of Einstein and Bohr, these were Renaissance was the subject of his last film, the award-winning The wild theories, but today they are becoming reality. Moving Earth (2009). In recent years, physicists have successfully

38 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 39 FaQ / INTERNATIONAL CO-PRODUCTIONS IDFA FORUM 2013 FAQ: HOW TO FOUR DANISH CO-PRODUCE Photo: Robin Skjoldborg PROJECTS Afghan Justice Photo: Henrik Bohn Ipsen WITH Introducing four titles pitching at IDFA Forum 2013.

DENMARK A Modern Man Charlie Siem, 27, is a “rock star” classical musician with three critically acclaimed albums to his name. He is part of the international jet set and an established solo violinist, but not too snobbish to play stadium

concerts with pop stars such as A Modern Man Photo: Bruce Webber As head of the Short & ­Documentary unit, Ane What kind of funding is available in Denmark Cliff Richard and Bryan Adams, and Afghan Justice system. But time is running out. Mandrup oversees the ­Danish Film Institute’s work to attend private parties at Lady Nobody knows what will happen in for documentary co-productions, and how do with international documentary ­co-productions. Kimberley Motley has left her Afghanistan when the international See contact info in reverse section. Gaga’s residence, in order to reach I find a Danish co-producer? Here are a few an audience far beyond those who husband and three kids in the US in troops leave. Or when the risk will already know their Brahms and order to work as a defence lawyer be too high for Kimberley to stay and straight answers. Schubert by heart. A style that has in Kabul, Afghanistan. She is the continue her work for justice? given him a lot of publicity but also only foreign lawyer, not to mention made him a controversial figure in the the only woman, who has a license Director Nicole Nielsen Horanyi conservative world of classical music. to work in Afghan courts. What was (Au Pair) initially a financially driven personal Producer Helle Faber for Made Director Eva Mulvad (The Good Life) decision has quickly developed in Copenhagen Producer Sigrid Dyekjær for Danish into an obligation towards the IDFA Forum Central Pitch Q: What kind of funding is available Q: What are the requirements for Q: How do I find a Danish Documentary Production underdeveloped Afghan legal in Denmark for documentary applying for funding? ­co-producer? IDFA Forum Central Pitch co-productions? A: If you have a project you would like A: These are good places to start: A: The Danish Film Institute (DFI) can to co-produce with Denmark, the first Our online trade directory DFI-Bogen fund international co-productions of step is to find a Danish co-producer. contains contact info on people, School of Democracy tipped the balance between left and right and Grillo’s movement gained documentaries of any length plus short The Danish co-producer can then apply companies and institutions in the Danish For many years, Italy has suffered a potentially crucial role in relation fiction and trans-media projects that to the DFI. Also, there must be Danish film industry. You can find the directory from a dysfunctional government and to the future of Italy and Europe. But have a non-Danish delegate producer. creative or technical participation in the in an English version: dfibogen.dk/ widespread corruption. Enter Italian what happens when ideals meet production plus a distribution deal for english. Also try Filmkontakt Nord comedian, Beppe Grillo. His protest political reality? Q: What is the purpose of supporting theatrical distribution in Denmark or who promote international networking movement, Movimento, sets out to revolutionize the political system from Director Lise Birk Pedersen international co-productions? broadcast on national Danish television in documentary and short filmmaking. within. In February 2013, he won (Putin’s Kiss) A: The purpose of funding co-productions or for another approved platform. The office can give you an idea as to Cosmic Top Secret Experience . Framegrab Cosmic Top 25% of the Italian vote and sent 163 Producer Lise Lense-Møller for is to strengthen partnerships and whom it might be interesting to contact: new and completely inexperienced Magic Hour Films creative exchange between Danish and Q: When are the deadlines for filmkontakt.com. Finally, MEDIA Desk senators to Parliament. The vote IDFA Forum Round Table international producers. DFI highly applying? Denmark offers general guidance about values the opportunities that co- A: There are three minor co-production the Danish film, TV and game industry. producing can provide for the Danish submission deadlines per year. See more The MEDIA Desk has a large Danish and industry (international financing, at dfi.dk/english under Funding. international network and can mediate cultural and business exchange and contacts to co-production partners: distribution, etc.). Q: What amounts are we talking mediadeskdenmark.eu. Cosmic Top Secret narrative with game elements for tablets and accompanying material about? Experience

in the form of apps and webisodes. School of democracy . Framegrab Q: How many projects can the DFI A: Documentaries are typically subsidized See more at dfi.dk/english under Funding. The focal point in this animated The project is based on the director’s support? with grants of up to 55,000 euros. autobiographical documentary game 2012 graduation project from the A: The DFI may support 4-6 minors in However, there are no fixed budgets and is the character ”T” who is searching National Film School of Denmark. short and documentary films a year. no fixed maximum or minimum grants. for answers about her father and his work for the Danish intelligence Director Trine Laier Each project is evaluated individually. during the Cold War. Finally she Producer Lise Saxtrup for wants to know the hidden truth about Klassefilm her own family history. The project IDFA Forum Round Table is being developed as an interactive

40 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 41 FOCUS / JOSHUA OPPENHEIMER / THE ACT OF KILLING FOCUS / JOSHUA OPPENHEIMER / THE ACT OF KILLING

Indonesians Say Sorry for ’65 The Act of Killing has helped start a large-scale petition called Say Sorry for ‘65 demanding an official apology from President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, popularly are Coming of killing Photo: Anonymous Act The known as SBY, for the massacres in 1965-66. The campaign was started on the initiative of the Indonesian human rights organisation TAPOL and is supported by the East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN). to Grips with Read more at www.change.org/petitions/ Their Past president-sby-say-sorry-for-65

Since its premiere, Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Act Joshua Oppenheimer Especially among young Indonesians, Oppenheimer recognises a need to confront the past. of Killing has shaken audiences worldwide. But it Joshua Oppenheimer has directed award-winning films such as The “I see a younger generation who are hungry has had a different effect on Indonesians, whose Globalization Tapes (2003, co- for this, coming into their careers and wanting to reality the film exposes: it says out loud what directed with Christine Cynn), The raise their children in a democracy where people Entire History of the Louisiana are not intimidated by the wealthiest. They see the everyone knows but has been afraid to talk about Purchase (1998), These Places perpetrators unmasking themselves in the film and We’ve Learned to Call Home (1996), for decades. The film has now been released for and numerous shorts. The Act of now they have a language to start talking about free download by all Indonesians. Killing (2012) is produced by Signe these things,” he says. Byrge Sørensen and Anne Köhncke But, to what extent can the film lead to real for Denmark-based Final Cut for Real. change in Indonesia?

National Apology “The film cannot change the political system, but what it can do is open a space to articulate By Marianne Lentz a year later, its impact on the public debate in the problem and enable Indonesians to demand Indonesia is clear. a struggle to change the conditions, to demand Before The Act of Killing, the media, on the “The story of the 1965 genocide belongs reconciliation and the establishment of a truth “The film has created a space where Indonesians anniversary of the start of the genocide, used to the Indonesian people. It was always commission as recommended by the National can discuss this without fear,” Joshua Oppenheimer to discuss the “horrible communists” and the the intention of me and my crew to give Human Rights Commission. says, describing the effect of The Act of Killing military’s heroic deeds. Today, the rhetoric has all Indonesians access to the film.” “Other demands could be a national apology, in the country whose history it lays bare. The completely changed. It is no longer acceptable for which would be a first step towards justice – and documentary was recently released online for free former death patrol members to brag about the towards rewriting the nation’s school curriculum,” download by every Indonesian with Internet access. murders they committed. For the first time ever, Oppenheimer says, adding, “Those are the easiest “The story of the 1965 genocide belongs to the the many executions are called by their real name: demands.” Indonesian people. It was always the intention of genocide. Among the more complicated and long-term me and my crew to give all Indonesians access to the A documentary of the imagination requirements for change is a movement against film,” Oppenheimer says. Like the Child in The Emperor’s New Clothes corruption among Indonesian politicians and a “We worked for seven years to create a space When Oppenheimer was in Indonesia shooting Mesmerizing, edifying, overpowering – accolades have rained down redistribution of wealth to benefit families that have where Indonesians could finally discuss without the first footage for what would become The Act on Joshua Oppenheimer’s film since its world premiere in 2012 at been systematically impoverished and oppressed fear how their nation’s traumatic past underpins of Killing, survivors of the genocide urged him to the festivals in Telluride and Toronto. Since then, the films has been since the genocide took place. These demands are a regime of corruption and exemption from look up former death patrol leaders and get their shown at more than 100 festivals worldwide and won more than 30 altogether harder to push through, Oppenheimer punishment. We hope the film will help them in the testimonies. Many of the survivors and descendants awards. In October, the movie website Indiewire ranked the film first admits. struggle for truth, reconciliation and justice.” of the victims were living, as they still do, next door among the best reviewed documentaries in 2013 so far. “The film can’t change all that, but it can pierce Before The Act of Killing opened, the Indonesian to the killers. Back then they were afraid to openly The Act of Killing is provocative, fascinating and shocking in its the hermetic container of moral value so that people authorities did not recognise the execution of up discuss the crimes that had been committed against unusual method. Instead of making a film about the victims of the can finally discuss this without being fearful,” to a million supposed leftists as a genocide, and the them and their families. But Oppenheimer’s project atrocities in 1965-66, Oppenheimer elected to focus on the winners, he says • perpetrators have never been tried or in other ways gave them new hope. the killers, who, without an ounce of shame but driven by vanity held responsible for the crimes they committed. “They said: ‘When Indonesians see this, they will and pride, re-enact their “heroic” deeds in sometimes extravagant, The Act of Killing is produced by Signe Byrge Sørensen Instead, they have been represented as heroes who recognize what they already know. We need a film kitschy tableaus in front of Oppenheimer’s camera. The result is and Anne Köhncke for Final Cut for Real. saved Indonesian society from the communists. like the child in the Emperor’s New Clothes who a “documentary of the imagination,” as Oppenheimer has dubbed Since its world premiere in 2012, the film has can point to the emperor and say what everybody his film. been shown numerous times in more than 100 already knows, but say it out loud.’ And that’s what towns and cities across Indonesia. Today, roughly the film has done,” Oppenheimer says.

42 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 43 The next morning I had my second meeting – at Samuel Goldwyn, which has produced so many films I love. A well-established company with lots of hits. It was scorching hot, but I wore my jacket anyway. No tie, though. Samuel Goldwyn is more centrally located in Hollywood than XYZ, but as it turned out, they, too, had relatively small offices, in an old redbrick building on one of LA’s many boulevards. I took the elevator to the fourth floor. There was a lobby and KASPAR GOES a small open-plan office with small dividing walls between the desks. The place was pretty empty, but I was seen to their small conference room, which was packed with all the awards they have won over the years. The producer was a very nice youngish woman, TO HOLLYWOOD who also very quickly cut to the chase. It was super inspiring to hear how she saw the project as a Earlier in the year, after his documentary Rent fiction film within their framework. We discussed how rewriting the story into a fictional piece set in a Family Inc. was nominated for a Golden Gate LA would be a challenge and, in particular, what kind of writer could do that. We also talked about Rent a Family Inc. Award, Kaspar Astrup Schröder heard from three the big interest in TV series and she thought the major Hollywood studios about adapting his project was an obvious fit for something like Six Kaspar Astrup Schröder’s film from 2012 My first meeting was with a relatively new studio, Feet Under. I was all ears. Nothing concrete came For my third meeting, I did not intend to dress up, about Mr. Ryuichi Ichinokawa and his unusual film into fiction. Read the self-taught Danish XYZ Film, which I read up on. They have quickly of the meeting and we decided to stay in touch. because the producer just wanted to meet at a life grew out of the director’s longstanding and very successfully established themselves on The evening was spent getting drunk and Coffee Bean café. But I had brought so many shirts fascination with Japan where he has travelled filmmaker’s account of his whirlwind tour of the indie film scene. swimming half naked in the rooftop pool at anyway, so I wore a casual one. I had recently read widely. On the surface Ryuichi looks like an Tinseltown. I imagined they would have an office in a the Standard. that Starbucks in LA had banned screenwriters ordinary Japanese man: 44, married, has two building with a gate and guard. I wore a shirt and from hanging out all day writing, because they boys and a nine-to-five job. However, there is was even considering a suit and a tie, but it was basically set up small office spaces for themselves a hidden side to Ryuichi unknown to most – By Kaspar Astrup Schröder, director simply too hot and I didn’t want to make a negative and apparently don’t buy enough coffee. even to his family. He runs a small company impression because of BO. So I rolled up to the Anyway, the producer I was meeting seemed to called I Want to Cheer You Up Ltd. that rents address in a white sports car and a white shirt. go there often for meetings. David Klawans is an out fake family members, friends, colleagues, I couldn’t find the place, though. All I saw was independent producer who recently won an Oscar even spouses, played by Ryuichi and his Shooting my documentary Rent a Family Inc., I had a warehouse. So I parked and realised that the for Argo, a really good film that’s also based on a employees, to customers who need a stand-in so many problems with the participants that I often building contained a lot of small offices. No gate, true story. I arrived before he did and had no idea at an event or special occasion. The film is toyed with the idea of making a fiction film instead. no guard. XYZ, it said outside of one of the offices. what he looked like, so I did an image search for a tale about identity told through a man who Nothing ever came of it, until I suddenly got I knocked and inside was this guy on a sofa. him. The first picture that popped up was of him assumes so many he can’t remember his own. e-mails from Hollywood the week after my He was my guy. Because I had already told him holding an Oscar statuette. “Perfect!” I thought. Schröder also directed the Japanese-themed documentary was nominated for a Golden Gate I had meetings with two other studios, he gave I was still looking at the picture, when there he The Invention of Dr. Nakamats (2009), Award. Holy moly! I had made a documentary that me a sales pitch, arguing why I should go with was. He started by telling me how much he liked selected for IDFA. Hollywood liked and I had three different studios to him. Awesome! No needless sweat for me at my other films. I was overwhelmed that he had choose from! that meeting. seen them. He seemed ready to start right away I have found that meetings in Denmark can and he, too, was convinced that my documentary After a couple of days of sold-out screenings have hidden agendas. In Hollywood, things are should be adapted into a TV series. at the San Francisco Film Festival, I left for Los very transparent and people quickly cut to the He had excellent energy. We had a lot in Angeles with my composer Jonas Colstrup. We chase. Not a lot of BS, just pretty straight talk common and he was very focused on true stories. rented a cool Camaro SS and took Highway One about wishes and possibilities. We contributed our fair share to the café’s turnover all the way. A stunning drive. I had been in LA three No promises were made, but I left with a feeling and ended the meeting by agreeing to talk a years before, so we crashed with a friend in the that “I could work here,” whereas I used to think lot more. hip Silverlake neighbourhood. LA was totally superficial and identity deficient. And so we did. I have signed a contract with But this lack of identity suddenly made sense, him, and he now has 18 months to shop around because the possibilities seem much greater when and is in full swing getting together some great no identity or proclivity to keep each other down talent that I unfortunately can’t reveal at this time. gets in the way. That evening, we went to the local strip club.

44 New Danish Screen / 10 Years New Danish Screen / 10 Years

By Jakob Kirstein Høgel New Danish Screen has the same application process When Everything for fiction and documentary. There are no special quotas for fiction and documentary. They are both New Danish Screen New Danish Screen came into being in 2003 after in the same pool. Seems to Be Working a run of successful years for Danish fiction. The More than anything, this has meant that the Dogme wave had come to an end and some anxiety traditional definitions of what is documentary and New Danish Screen mentors and supports Just Fine, That’s the was starting to spread: Will Danish cinema slowly what is fiction have yielded to experimentation in emerging film talents and supports innovative lose its teeth and its quality? New Danish Screen’s the field between the two, what in many places is projects of fiction, documentary, series and Time for Change mandate was to boost a new generation of fiction known as hybrid films. trans-media based in Denmark. Since 2007, directors. Many other new aesthetic directions in New Danish Screen has supported the production Danish documentary experienced a wave of documentary have been explored, and many of 30 docs and 8 hybrids, plus 1 interactive doc. success some years after fiction. Again, the thinking emerging talents have gained a foothold on the New Danish Screen is founded on a partnership The New Danish Screen talent development was the same: When everything seems to be Danish and international documentary scenes with between the national broadcasters, DR and TV 2, working just fine, that’s the best time to start taking the aid of funding from New Danish Screen. At the and the Danish Film Institute. Funds of roughly scheme is celebrating its 10th anniversary. even more risks and thinking about new approaches end of the day, the bedrock principle of New Danish 15 million euros have been allocated to the Artistic director Jakob Kirstein Høgel gives to filmmaking. Screen is: The interests and sensitivities of rising scheme over a four-year period 2011-14. In 2007, New Danish Screen started funding filmmakers guide what films we fund. us his take on what the scheme has meant documentary talent on a par with fiction. Unlike for Danish documentaries. most other funding bodies and institutions,

SIX DOCUMENTARIES FROM NEW DANISH SCREEN:

48 Hour Games (2012) The Ambassador (2011) Ballroom Dancer (2011) The Invention of Dr. Nakamats (2009) Out of Love (2009) Side by Side (2009) Directed by Suvi Andrea Helminen Directed by Mads Brügger Directed by Christian Bonke & Andreas Koefoed Directed by Kaspar Astrup Schröder Directed by Birgitte Stærmose Directed by Christian Sønderby Jepsen

The team behind the project consisted Mads Brügger, the enfant terrible of The two directors started out with a Schröder came into filmmaking Stærmose had previously worked in Many documentary talents in Denmark of a documentary director, a game Danish documentary and journalism, grand ambition of making a feature- by performing many functions, both documentary and fiction. This come out of the National Film School. designer and producers working in film had worked in documentary intervention length drama, even a melodrama, set including editing and graphic design. project combined the two: a sincere care The school has two documentary tracks, and game development. The worlds of before, in films like Danes for Bush and in the world of Latin dance. Their goal In Dr. Nakamats he proved himself as a for the lives of Kosovo-Albanian street one for single-camera and one for documentary and games merge, not The Red Chapel. Making the Ambassador, was articulated before it was clear who director, and he has gone on to make kids and an interest in experimenting multiple-camera directing. Coming from only in the audience’s/user’s experience he took his method a step further. the main characters or the main drama more films with international funding. with personal testimonies on film. the latter, Jepsen mainly had experience but also in terms of the subject matter. The film was written with a strong would be. The process of filming was a Making Dr. Nakamats, he went to Japan The children address the camera in studio shoots. In Side by Side he takes We follow a number of game designers focus on the title character played by dedicated effort, not only in observing on just a development grant and single- directly with stories of their lives. Some his method into the open landscape at Game Jam, an event pitting groups Brügger himself. In the writing process the ups and downs of a couple combining handedly shot all the footage for the whisper, others get excited as they to tell a story about a “war” between of game developers against each other he cooked up all the colonial desires their professional and private interests film. The title character has invented speak. Only, the stories they tell are two neighbours in rural Denmark. The to create playable games within a and fantasies that usually never make but in filmically getting to the emotional numerous technical devices, some very not their personal stories but scripted conflict is beautifully visualized in bird’s- period of 48 hours. As we gain deeper it into documentaries. Once the actual core of a stormy relationship. useful and others obviously less so. narratives drawn from a pool of life eye shots of the huge hedges separating understanding of how games are made, filming began, the script was jettisoned, The director depicts his character in stories gleaned during the research. the two families, while the interviews we also witness the personal and creative mainly for security reasons. The result a lightly humorous but sincere vein, The effect is one of alienation, as the in the gardens are highly structured conflicts that are part of the process. was a true hybrid: a made-up, fantastical which only makes him more fascinating audience identifies with the life of a and meticulously lit with for drama- Users can choose which developers character playing himself in the very and enigmatic. street kid in Pristina while questioning heightening effect. to follow and play some of the games real world of diplomacy, smuggling documentary conventions and concepts that are being developed. The director and politics. of authenticity. is currently at MIT developing new interactive documentaries.

46 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 47 DIY DISTRIBUTION / TRENDSPOTTING DIY DISTRIBUTION / TRENDSPOTTING

Standard models Think distribution Digital were not the from the outset distribution opens solution up interesting Sigrid Dyekjær opportunities Michael Haslund- Producer A New World Christensen / Danish Documentary Lars Langballe Producer Head of Promotion of Distribution / Haslund Film / Danish Film Institute For The Expedition to the End of the World, Sigrid Dyekjær and Danish Documentary used The Danish Film Institute provides funding and Michael Haslund-Christensen handled the their experience from the Danish release of Free sparring in connection with the distribution of the Mind By Nynne Østergaard financing and distribution without the use of sales , which involved screenings to selected Danish documentaries. As head of promotion, Lars New digital distribution options and widespread dissatisfaction with standard agents. Broadcast sales in the financing phase interest groups, to position the film and make it Langballe keeps close tabs on developments in solutions that fail to accommodate the potential of individual films have spurred came from the BBC, WDR in Germany, and attractive to international distribution partners. So distribution. Danish directors and producers to take personal charge of the international Scandinavia, while distribution is currently planned far, the film has had a theatrical release, as self distribution of their films. It’s a matter of dividing rights among several distributors for the US, Canada, Benelux and Germany in distribution, in Canada, Germany, Sweden, Norway What is the Danish Film Institute’s role in the new while keeping some for yourself, distribution strategist Peter Broderick says. FILM 2014. Platforms include semi-theatrical, non- and the USA, and educational, VOD and DVD world of distribution? exclusive VOD, television and a special educational rights are sold to Holland, USA, Canada, Germany So much is going on in digital distribution also talked with four documentary filmmakers about their experiences distributing platform. – to name a few achievements. these days. Interesting opportunities are opening their films internationally and with the DFI’s head of promotion, who offers his view up for new and more lucrative segments, of the Danish Film Institute’s role in the future of film distribution. Why did you decide to distribute The Expedition to How did you use your experience to sell Free the domestically and internationally. Documentaries the End of the World yourself? Mind abroad? are typically independent of traditional window After pitching last year at CPH:DOX and IDFA How do you sell a science film internationally, structures, making it uniquely possible to – especially after the first screening at CPH:DOX when people have 10,000 other awesome films to adapt their distribution according to a film’s The opportunities The app is like a Private-public – we received a lot of offers from sales agents. choose from? You do that by putting a big effort individual strengths and needs. Because the have grown for business card screenings are a They saw potential in the film but also voiced some into analysing what your film can do, what it should producers are on the frontlines, they are most direct distribution good match for reservations about our choice of genre. They all do and who it speaks to, right from the outset of knowledgeable about the market. Our role, working Andreas Johnsen offered relatively similar standard models, which the film’s creation. It was hardly a coincidence that in close cooperation with producers, is to gather films with specific included a demand for worldwide rights on all 15,000 people saw the film in Danish cinemas. information about market developments, support Peter Broderick Director and Producer audiences platforms. I didn’t think that was the right solution After the Danish campaign, we made a marketing with international experience and communicate the Distribution Strategist / Rosforth Film for our film, which is this odd hybrid of science, and promotion package that I mailed out to results for the benefit of the industry as a whole. / Paradigm Consulting Andreas Koefoed environment, art and adventure. To cultivate international distributors as inspiration. That made What does the future of documentary film Director and Producer the film’s potential and gain insight into what is the film palatable to them and helped them see distribution look like? / Koefoed Film actually possible in the landscape between old what the film could do. As a result, a lot of people In our view, direct access to international and new distribution options, we made our own who would otherwise have passed on the film audiences combined with new distribution models push to get the film into a lot of festivals and find ended up taking it. is a big opportunity for the industry. We are still at Peter Broderick helps filmmakers design and As part of his distribution strategy, documentary In spring 2013, fans of the Danish band Efterklang local distributors there who knew their particular How should a producer handle distribution a very early stage, though. The distribution market implement financing, distribution and outreach filmmaker Andreas Johnsen put his catalogue, were invited to host “private-public screenings” of territories well. today? still needs to mature and business models need to strategies, and has long been a leading advocate including Kidd Life and Murder, into an app that Andreas Koefoed’s music documentary The Ghost What is your take-away from this experience? Already in the financing phase, we as producers take shape. When that happens, the international of hybrid distribution and crowdfunding. can be downloaded from the App Store. of Piramida. Anyone was welcome to organise Usually, selling a film is not particularly lucrative, should define to whom our film is communicating, perspective for documentaries, in particular, will a screening. The only requirements were that so I had nothing to lose besides the time I spent. and how, since the film’s financing partners look brighter than ever. What is the future of distribution? Why did you decide to distribute your films via an the screening had to be public, free and provide Travelling around and getting in touch with various in actuality are also its distribution partners. Giving one company total control of your app? seating for at least five. From February to March, distributors was a lot of work, but now I am a few Distribution and promotion should be constructed distribution is no longer the best approach for I am mainly trying to get my films out in as many the film was shown at no fewer than 800-900 experiences richer and have built up a network and on an ongoing basis throughout a film’s creation. documentaries. Therefore, hybrid distribution places as possible. The app works really well as private-public screenings across the world, mainly knowledge of our target group, which can be put That gives you a much better platform for knowing should be Plan A. This means splitting distribution a kind of business card. When I go around the in private homes. to good use for the film’s various releases in 2014 where your audience is. rights among several partners and retaining world with popular films like Kidd Life and soon and in future projects. certain rights, including the fundamental right to Ai Weiwei The Fake Case, I can use the attention How did you come up with the idea to use private- sell directly from your website. I don’t recommend those films get to introduce people to my app and public screenings for The Ghost of Piramida? filmmakers to do everything themselves. They need keep my back catalogue alive. Efterklang came up with the concept for their distribution partners and their own distribution What opportunities do you see in doing your documentary An Island, which they made with the teams to maximise revenues, audience and impact. own distribution? French director Vincent Moon, and it worked very What are the challenges and opportunities I always produced my own films at my own well for them, so continuing down that path feels for the international distribution of foreign company, so it’s only natural for me to have the like a no-brainer. language films? freedom to decide about the films I produce. The When do private-public screenings work best? Watch Danish Documentaries Online There are definitely challenges for foreign opportunities are boundless right now, and that’s I think the concept is best suited for language films in the US, particularly on television, what’s so cool and exciting about it. It’s a matter of documentaries that appeal to specific audiences and in many other countries where networks trying out a lot of things and getting smarter about or have a specific theme. Where natural demand Doc Alliance Films DanishDox and digital platforms require dubbing in the what pays and where to apply your biggest effort. exists. It also makes a big difference that it’s not local language. But while the barriers for foreign about making a buck. For Efterklang, it was like DAfilms is a VOD platform by DocAlliance, a creative The new DanishDox streaming service gives you language films have increased in traditional a gift to their fans. For me, it was an easy way to partnership between seven European documentary access, for a fee, to Danish documentaries, not only distribution avenues, the opportunities have grown create awareness about my film and about me as festivals, including CPH:DOX of Denmark. The in Denmark but all over the world. The catalogue for direct distribution globally. There are large a filmmaker. site provides access to over 800 recent and includes recent and more vintage titles. The Find films and more information audiences of documentary lovers around the world classic documentaries that can be legally streamed production companies decide what countries they about the filmmakers at for whom subtitles are fine. Translations can be or downloaded for a fee. The catalogue has an want their films to be accessible in. First films on rosforth.com, crowd-sourced for little or no cost and subtitled emphasis on European filmmakers, including Danes the marquee include The Expedition to the End of andreaskoefoed.com, versions can be easily and affordably distributed Jørgen Leth, Michael Noer, Pernille Rose Grønkjær the World and The Human Scale about the Danish expeditionthemovie.dk, worldwide via digital downloads directly from a and Anders Østergaard. dafilms.com architect Jan Gehl. danishdox.com danishdocumentary.com. film’s website. 48 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 49 Category

The Visit

How would we humans react if we got visitors from outer space?

Michael Madsen explores the answers to that question in his next film, The Visit, which investigates the hypothetical scenario of an Alien visit. Hypothetical, but also very real, as it involves actual experts with obscure competencies who have spent their professional lives contemplating such an event.

Produced by Lise Lense-Møller for Magic Hour Films. Expected release in late 2014.

The Visit. Framegrab 50 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 Catalogue: Catalogue: Short Films Short Films

A film about two girls’ reunion after a traumatic Category / Short fi ction Dennis, 10, longs to be reunited with his father, Category / Short fi ction – Children’s near-death experience. It’s a short film that strikes Danish release / 2013 whom he misses terribly. Dennis and his older animation down in the central 10 minutes of 24-year-old Julie’s Running time / 13 min. brother Johnny share a tiny magical creature known Danish release / 2013 life as she tries to face the unbearable injustice and Director & Screenplay / Jens Dahl as the “Shadow Animal” who also happens to be Running time / 19 min. adversity she has been a victim of. A portrait of a Appearances / Sara Hjort Ditlevsen, Dennis’ closest friend. The two brothers live in a Director & Screenplay / Dorte young woman’s attempt to pick up the pieces and Amalie Lindegård tough neighbourhood. Together, Dennis and the Bengtson move on. Producer / Kamilla Hancke Rosado Shadow Animal follow Johnny down to the local Producer / Thomas Borch Nielsen Production & international sales / park where Johnny’s gang hangs out. When Dennis Production & International sales / Director debut by screenwriter Jens Dahl – co-writer Blenkov & Schønnemann Pictures learns that the rival gang is planning to execute his Nice Ninja ApS of several TV series and films, including Nicolas / +45 3333 7525 brother, Dennis faces a terrible dilemma: Should he / [email protected] Winding Refn’s Pusher. / [email protected] continue looking for his missing father or try and / www.niceninja.com / www.blenkovschonnemann.dk prevent Johnny from being shot?

Director Dorte Bengtson’s graduation film The Sylpphid premiered at Cinéfondation at Cannes. 2 Girls 1 Cake The Shadow Animal 2 piger 1 kage Skyggedyret

Nora lives a perfect life in her perfect home, with Category / Short fi ction The string ’P’ finds out that he can squirm and bend Category / Short fi ction – Children’s perfect husband Helmer. Nora knows she ought to Danish release / 23.04.2013 just as he wants to, thereby turning into all sorts animation feel excited about an upcoming party. But something Running time / 26 min. of figures. A mischievous little animation based on Danish release / 11.09.2013 within her feels very wrong. Uncomfortable Director / Tobias Gundorff Boesen scribblings by iconic Danish children’s book writer Running time / 8 min. delusions and a nagging doubt she cannot place have Screenplay / Sissel Dalsgaard and illustrator Ole Lund Kirkegaard. Director / Karsten Kiilerich started to haunt her. Unable to recognize herself as Thomsen Screenplay / Mads Juhl of late, she has started longing for something she Appearances / Camille-Cathrine Director Karsten Kiilerich was Oscar nominated in Producer / Tivi Magnusson cannot quite name. Fortunately, her beloved Helmer Rommedahl, Thomas Levin, Ella Louise 1997 for When Life Departs. Kiilerich is co-founder of Production & International sales / is by her side to keep her calm. However, not all is Bertelsen, Martin Hestbæk animation company A-Film and co-writer on several M&M Productions what it seems, and outside the safe walls of the doll Producer / Anders Wøldike animation films. / t +45 7020 3080 house, a disillusioned little girl struggles to make Production & international sales / / [email protected] sense of her parent’s relationship. Zentropa Stormtroopers / www.mmproductions.dk / t +45 2275 6551 The film combines animation techniques and layers / anders.woeldike@fi lmbyen.dk in a modern paraphrase of Henrik Ibsen’s classical A Doll’s House story about Nora and Helmer. Tale of a String Et dukkehjem Historien om en snor

Erik rules his wife and kids like a tyrant king. Category / Short fi ction Set on an isolated farm in Iceland, the film follows Category / Short fi ction One day his teenage son, Lasse, is pushed too far Danish release / 2013 a seven-year-old boy who accidentally interrupts his Danish release / 2013 and he puts Erik in the hospital for two weeks. In the Running time / 31 min. older brother’s suicide attempt. His brother makes Running time / 15 min. meantime, the father’s absence transforms daily life Director / Lars Mikkelsen him promise not to tell their parents, and the film Director & Screenplay / Gudmundur A. around the house, allowing the other members of Screenplay / Lars C. Detlefsen, examines the relationship between the two brothers Gudmundsson the family to breathe more freely. Lasse gets involved Lars Mikkelsen in the aftermath using images of rugged scenery to Appearances / Áugúst Örn B. Wigum, with Daniella, a girl from his school, whom he was Appearances / Morten Kirkskov, express the young boys’ inner turmoil and feelings Einar Jóhann Valsson previously banned from seeing. Lone, the mother of Anne Louise Hassing, Lars Knutzon, of isolation. Producer / Gudmundur A. the family, allows herself to take Erik’s fancy car out Ulla Henningsen Gudmundsson, Anton Máni Svansson for a spin. Everything comes to a head at a dramatic Producer / Carsten Holst, Jesper Jarl Premiered at Cannes in the Short Films Competition Production / Fourhands Film, Fræ Films dinner party with Erik’s parents, as we are shown Becker and has won a string of awards. Guðmundur Arnar International sales / Fourhands Film ApS just how violence runs in the family. Production / Mica Productions, Globus Guðmundsson graduated from Iceland Academy of / t +45 2629 8389 Film A/S the Arts in 2006. / info@fourhandsfi lm.dk A hard hitting short film about domestic violence. International sales / MICA / www.fourhandsfi lm.dk Second short film by director and cinematografer Productions ApS Lars Mikkelsen. / t+45 6618 7718 Home Sweet Home / [email protected] Whale Valley Den perfekte middag / www.micaproductions.dk Hvalfjord

8 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 9 Catalogue: Catalogue: Documentary Films Documentary Films

The film follows three children at odds with Category / Documentary 19-year-old Bert sits in the shades of a tree in Category / Documentary themselves and the world around them, at a time Danish release / 27.05.2013 Yo Park. Cassandra Warrior feeds her daughter Danish release / 08.11.2013 when more and more are being diagnosed with Running time / 87 min. Diamond Rose. Daniel Runs Close sweats under the Running time / 76 min. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Victor is 7. Director / Erlend E. Mo sun at Wounded Knee Memorial site. Kassel Sky Director & Screenplay / Anna Eborn He hates ADHD, believing it’s something to do with Producer / Lise Lense-Møller Little puts his boots on at the Waters Rodeo. Vanessa Producer / Katja Adomeit his club feet. Martine is quick to become withdrawn Production and international sales / Piper is alone in the middle of Badlands. Lance Red Production / Adomeit Film ApS and struggles with uncontrollable rage. For the most Magic Hour Films Cloud hangs out behind the gas station at night. It International sales / Film Republic part, Marino keeps to himself, but easily becomes / t +45 3964 2284 is summer and they all live here – at the Pine Ridge International Sales aggressive. Victor, Martine and Marino are in a / post@magichourfi lms.dk Reservation in South Dakota, USA. / t +44 7835 999 112 special class in a normal school. The teachers and / www.magichourfi lms.dk / info@fi lmrepublic.biz the parents decide to take part in an alternative The film premiered at La Biennale di Venezia 2013. treatment project focusing on the individual child’s It is Anna Eborn’s feature debut as a director. challenges and possibilities, rather than relying on medical diagnosis. The film shows how the children make great strides over the course of a year, as the adults around them start to see each child Four Letters Apart in a new light. Pine Ridge – Children in the age of ADHD Director Erlend E. Mo won the IDFA Silver Cub Pine Ridge Jeg hader ADHD – børn i en diagnosetid Award for My Eyes in 2006.

Lars von Trier is celebrated for the out-and-out Category / Documentary Sepideh wants to become an astronaut. She spends Category / Documentary staging of events – not least of himself. He is Danish release / 1998 her nights exploring the secrets of the Universe, Danish release / 2013 notorious for his temperamental relationship with Running time / 79 min. while her family will do anything to keep her on the Running time / 90 min. his cast, whom he loves and despises alternately. Director & Screenplay / Jesper Jargil ground. The expectations for a young Iranian woman Director & Screenplay / Berit Madsen The Humiliated follows the birth of the Dogma film Appearances / Jens Albinus, Iris are very different from Sepideh’s ambitions, and her Producer / Stefan Frost, Henrik The Idiots (1998) at close quarters. The director, Jesper Albøge, Lars Bjarke, Louise B. Clausen plans to go to university are in danger. But Sepideh Underbjerg Jargil, captures the vulnerable, stormy creative Producer / Vinca Wiedemann holds on to her dream. She takes up the fight and Production / Radiator Film ApS process which Trier himself called “a whipped-up Production / Jesper Jargil Film teams up with the world’s first female space tourist, International sales / LevelK state of emotion that is the technique of the film International sales / TrustNordisk Anousheh Ansari. / t +45 4844 3072 itself”. The result is a portrait of Lars von Trier and / t +45 3686 8788 / [email protected] his method. / f +45 3677 4448 Feature debut by Berit Madsen giving a unique view / www.levelk.dk / [email protected] into the life of a girl with extraordinary ambitions. Paradocs / IDFA 2013 The Humiliated is the first part of Jesper Jargil’s / www.trustnordisk.com Feature-Length Competition / IDFA 2013 trilogy about Lars von Trier and the Dogme project, followed by The Exhibited (2000) and The Purifi ed (2002). Selected by Barbara Visser for The Making of The Humiliated Movies at IDFA 2013. Sepideh De ydmygede Sepideh – Drømmen om stjernerne

For many families in the sprawling suburbs of Category / Documentary Shanne is 13. Her best friend Emma has moved Category / Documentary Los Angeles, their peaceful middle-class existence is Danish release / 05.12.2013 to another school and Shanne misses having her Danish release / 2013 just a facade. What lies beneath is sheer domestic Running time / 83 min. around, as her class is very cliquey and Shanne feels Running time / 38 min. turmoil: Teens addicted to drugs, breaking the law Director & Screenplay / Jon Bang alone. Fortunately she is still in touch with Emma, Director & Screenplay / Ulla Søe & and engaging in violent outbursts, and parents at Carlsen but Shanne feels jealous of Emma’s other friends, Sussie Weinold their wits’ end. Interventionists, like Evan “Bullet” Producer / Helle Ulsteen and she struggles to keep her status as Emma’s best Appearances / Shanne Vega, Emma James and Dana “Hodges” Goller, specialize in Production / C&C Productions, Kamoli friend. After the summer holidays, Shanne hopes Just Kroll, Daniela Bruhn Lau entering these suburban homes during the night Films she will make new friends. But is she even capable Producer / Mette Mailand ripping troubled teens from their beds to transport International sales / C&C Productions of having more than one friend? And will she be Production / Plus Pictures Aps them, against their will, to a reform school in Utah. / t +45 2559 9929 able to sustain her old friendship with Emma in a International sales / Plus Pictures ApS Crafted in the director’s signature hybrid style, the / [email protected] time when everything is changing? We get uniquely / t +45 3311 1210 film is about the complicated relationships between close to Shanne in this film about having friends / [email protected] Refl ecting Images: Masters / IDFA 2013 parents and children and how the wounds we incur Kids & Docs / IDFA 2013 and creating your own identity in the difficult early / www.pluspictures.dk within our families can seem the hardest ones teen years. to heal. A 13-year-old girl’s relationship to her best friend Just the Right Amount Directed by IDFA regular Jon Bang Carlsen, the Shanne and Her Friends is at the heart of Ulla Søe and Sussie Weinold’s film grand old man of Danish auteur documentary about Shanne and her friends. The film is also made of Violence film, who has explored the possibilities of “staged Shanne og veninderne into a TV series. Just the Right Amount of documentarism” in many of his films. Violence

6 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 7 Catalogue: Catalogue: Documentary Films Documentary Films

After 81 days of solitary detention world famous Category / Documentary Chikara – The Sumo Wrestler’s Son follows the 10 -year- Category / Documentary Chinese artist Ai Weiwei is put under house arrest. Danish release / 30.11.2013 old Japanese boy Chikara and his struggle to become Danish release / 2014 He suffers from sleeping disorder and memory loss, Running time / 86 min. a sumo wrestler. His father, Harumitsu, was a Running time / 32 min. 18 cameras are monitoring his studio and home, Director / Andreas Johnsen professional sumo wrestler from one of Tokyo’s most Director & screenplay / Simon Lereng police agents follow his every move, and heavy Appearances / Ai Weiwei successful sumo club, so expectations surrounding Wilmont restrictions from the Kafkaesque Chinese authorities Producer / Katrine Sahlstrøm Chikara are extremely high. Today his father owns Appearances / Chikara, Harumitsu, weigh him down. Journalists, the art world and Production / Rosforth Films, Danish a noodle shop where he works a lot. Their only time Akane, Ifu Sasaki & Koki Iwai his family all want a piece of him and on top of Documentary Production together is when they train Sumo wrestling. It’s a Producer / Monica Hellström that he is met with a gigantic lawsuit from the International sales / DR International very valuable time for Chikara. Chikara wants to Production & international sales / Chinese government, soon to be named ”The Fake Sales impress his father, but when he’s there Chikara Final Cut for Real ApS Case”. Ai Weiwei is shaken, but during the year on / t +45 3520 3040 get’s really nervous and everything seems to go / t +45 3543 6043 probation he steadily finds new ways to provoke / [email protected] wrong. The annual national Sumo Championship / monica@fi nal-cut.dk Feature-Length Competition / IDFA 2013 and challenge the mighty powers of the Chinese / www.drsales.dk Kids & Docs / IDFA 2013 is approaching and it means everything to Chikara / www.fi nal-cut.dk authorities in his fight for human rights. to do well, so his father will be proud of him.

Director Andreas Johnsen had exclusive access to The film is a story of a small boy in a tough sport, Ai Weiwei The Fake Case the Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei under Chikara – The Sumo parental pressure and expectations, but it is above house arrest. all a universal narrative about the relationship Ai Weiwei The Fake Case Wrestler’s Son between a father and son. Chikara – Sumobryderens Søn

The EU’s first carbon credit was put on sale in 2005. Category / Documentary Per is part of a father’s group for disadvantaged Category / Documentary The idea was that the trading of carbon would Danish release / 2013 single dads at the social services department. Per has Danish release / 07.11.2013 reduce CO2 emissions and thereby curb global Running time / 57 min. been drinking and smoking hash for a lifetime, but Running time / 85 min. warming. But the system has collapsed and instead Director / Tom Heinemann is now clean in his seventh year. His eight-year-old Director / Mira Jargil Denmark became the centre of one of the world’s Appearances / Rob Wainwright, Martin daughter Ilse has been placed in a foster home and Producer / Mette Heide fastest growing scams. Experts and Europol estimate Lidegaard, Connie Hedegaard Per’s big wish is to reunite Ilse with her mother, Production & International sales / that the European treasuries lost some 10 billion Producer / Søren Steen Jespersen Christina, who she hasn’t seen since she was around +plus pictures euros to hackers and VAT fraudsters from around Production / Larm Film six months old. Like Per, Christina has been a long- / t +45 3311 1210 the world. The carbon credit system has collapsed – International sales / DR International time substance abuser. The documentary tracks the / [email protected] and prices have dropped by 90%. It has never been Sales little family and the ups and downs of their journey / www.pluspictures.dk cheaper to pollute than today and carbon emissions / t +45 3520 3040 together. It’s hard for an eight-year-old to relate to a have never been higher in the history of mankind. / [email protected] new family. And it’s hard for two people who have / www.drsales.dk barely been able to take care of themselves to take Tom Heinemann has twice been awarded care of a small child. “Outstanding Investigative Journalist” by the association on investigative journalism in Denmark. First film by Mira Jargil after her graduation The Carbon Crooks In 2007 he won the Prix Italia in the current Dreaming of a Family from the National Film School of Denmark. Her affairs selection. graduation film The Time We Have was named Best Varm luft for milliarder Drømmen om en familie Graduation Film 2012 by Cilect, the International Association of Film and Television Schools.

Carl and Niels are identical twins. They have been Category / Documentary In the shadow of conflict the children in Kabul Category / Documentary inseparable most of their lives as best friends. Danish release / 19.06.2013 continue life for better or worse. Money is tight Danish release / 2014 But now that they are in their mid-twenties, they Running time / 29 min. and many of them spend much of their time in Running time / 5 x 16 min. are losing the closeness they used to have. The film Director / Alexander Lind the streets selling chewing gum, collecting paper Director / Jens Pedersen centres on the transformation Carl and Niels are Appearances / Carl Plum, Niels Plum and washing cars for the survival of their families. Screenplay / Jens Pedersen, Taj undergoing as they find out what – if anything Production & International sales / The five-film series portrays five children, who Mohammad Bakhtari – they can be for each other in their adult lives. National Film School of Denmark commute between work, family and a street school Producer / Jakob Gottschau Putting them in a series of constructed spaces and / t +45 3368 6400 where they meet their friends. They share a happy- Production / Pedersen & Co situations, the director compels the twins to relate / infoz@fi lmskolen.dk go-lucky attitude to the challenges of life and a International sales / DR International to each other. / www.fi lmskolen.dk desire to become someone. Sales / t +45 3520 3040 Alexander Lind’s graduation film from the National The five films in the series give us unique access to / [email protected] Student Competition / IDFA 2013 Film School of Denmark. Kids & Docs / IDFA 2013 the lives of children in war-torn Afghanistan − told / www.drsales.dk from their point of view. Layla’s Melody is selected for IDFA Kids & Docs. Carl & Niels Faith – Hope – Afghanistan Carl & Niels Tro Håb Afghanistan

4 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 5 CATALOGUEDanish Industry Contacts / IDFA Issue 2013 Catalogue

A. Film Production ApS +45 3582 7060 info@afi lm.dk www.afi lm.com

Blenkov & Schønnemann Pictures +45 3333 7525 [email protected] www.blenkovschonnemann.dk

Bullitt Film DANISH +45 2612 5001 info@bullittfi lm.dk www.bullittfi lm.dk

C&C Productions +45 2559 9929 [email protected] www.jonbangcarlsen.com Danish Documentary Production +45 2616 2535 [email protected] www.danishdocumentary.com DOCUMeNTARy DR International Sales +45 3520 3040 [email protected] www.drsales.dk Final Cut for Real ApS +45 3543 6043 byrge@fi nal-cut.dk www.fi nal-cut.dk short Fourhands Film ApS +45 2629 8389 info@fourhandsfi lm.dk www.fourhandsfi lm.dk Fridthjof Film +45 3618 0880 mail@f-fi lm.com www.f-fi lm.com Film CATALOGUE Globus Film +45 2213 8828 [email protected] Hansen & Pedersen +45 2744 2567 [email protected] 2013 House of Real +45 2256 7034 jesper@f-fi lm.com

Kaspar Works +45 2692 4585 [email protected] www.kasparworks.com

Klassefi lm +45 2026 7440 info@klassefi lm.dk www.klassefi lm.dk

Larm Film +45 2092 2314 ssj@larmfi lm.dk www.larmfi lm.dk

LevelK +45 4844 3072 [email protected] www.levelk.dk

M&M Productions +45 7020 3080 [email protected] www.mmproductions.dk

Made in Copenhagen +45 2751 5112 [email protected] www.madeincopenhagen.dk

Magic Hour Films ApS +45 3964 2284 post@magichourfi lms.dk www.magichourfi lms.dk

Masto Media +45 2814 8590 [email protected] www.mastomedia.dk

Mica Productions +45 6618 7718 [email protected] www.micaproductions.dk

Moving Documentary +45 2744 2567 [email protected]

Nice Ninja ApS [email protected] www.niceninja.com DFI Key Contacts / IDFA 2013

Pedersen & Co +45 4075 7172 [email protected] www.pedersenogco.dk

Plus Pictures ApS +45 3311 1210 [email protected] www.pluspictures.dk Claus Ladegaard Helle Hansen Steffen Andersen- Head of Department, Film Commissioner Møller Radiator Film ApS +45 2215 7022 henrik@radiatorfi lm.com www.radiatorfi lm.com Production Head of Department, & Development helleh@dfi .dk Audience & Promotion Rosforth Films [email protected] www.rosforth.com Cell +45 5096 6725 clausl@dfi .dk sam@dfi .dk The National Film School of Denmark +45 3268 6400 elr@fi lmskolen.dk www.fi lmskolen.dk Cell +45 4032 6212 Cell + 45 2023 9103 TrustNordisk +45 3686 8788 [email protected] www.trustnordisk.com

Zentropa Stormtroopers +45 2275 6551 anders.woeldike@fi lmbyen.dk www.fi lmbyen.dk Ane Mandrup Klara Grunning-Harris Lars Langballe Head of Unit, Film Commissioner Head of Marketing Development of Short & Festival & Documentary Films klaragh@dfi .dk Cell +45 2250 5835 larsl@dfi .dk anem@dfi .dk Cell +45 2126 5250 Cell +45 2027 7872

Marie Schmidt Olesen Dorte Høeg Brask Anne Marie Küstrein Commissioning Editor, Film Commissioner Festival Consultant, New Danish Screen Shorts & Documentaries dortehb@dfi .dk marieo@dfi .dk Cell +45 2546 4295 kurstein@dfi .dk Cell +45 4078 8021 Cell +45 4041 4697

DFI-FILM | IDFA Issue 2013 3 DANISH DOCUMeNTARY short FILM CATALOGUE