Working primarily in documentary film production, I decided it is time to explore New Media, Transmedia, Cross Media and Serious Games to inquire if and how these relate to documentary filmmaking and what the future holds in store for all of them. And so I attended the opening day of the Games for Change Festival 2014. Now in its eleventh edition, Games for Change Festival partnered this year with the Tribeca Film Festival. This new partnership allows the Tribeca festival to explore new and alternative forms of storytelling. Jane Rosenthal, co-founder of the Tribeca Film Festival supported this wholeheartedly when…
Author: Tanja Meding
Gerhard Richter, one of Germany’s leading artists, knows when a painting is done, just good enough and there is nothing more for him to do. When the art historian Benjamin Buchloh questions this further, Richter explains that good also means truthful – truthful to the artist and the viewer. And Richter’s assistant elaborates that once a painting completed, it has to stay hanging in Richter’s studio for a couple of weeks, without the artist touching it again – and only then the painting has “made it” and is ready for the world to see it. In her documentary Gerhard Richter…
The enormous success of Michael Flatley’s LORD OF THE DANCE show has brought Irish dancing onto the world stage. Earlier this year, a 3D-documentary revolving around this energy-filled dance company hit the movie screen and, if you missed it, is now available on DVD. If you were a fan of LORD OF THE DANCE and would like to take a peek behind the scenes to meet some of the next generation Michael Flatley’s, then Sue Bourne’s documentary JIG may just be the right film for you. In JIG, Bourne follows a number of young dancers as they prepare for the…
Gerhard Richter, one of Germany’s leading artists, knows when a painting is done, just good enough and there is nothing more for him to do. When the art historian Benjamin Buchloh questions this further, Richter explains that good also means truthful – truthful to the artist and the viewer. And Richter’s assistant elaborates that once a painting completed, it has to stay hanging in Richter’s studio for a couple of weeks, without the artist touching it again – and only then the painting has “made it” and is ready for the world to see it. In her documentary Gerhard Richter…
German filmmaker Angelina Maccarone has made a name for herself writing and directing films featuring powerful women. Her most recent features, the 2005 Unveiled (about a Iranian lesbian translator who immigrates to Germany after being prosecuted in her own country) and 2007’s Vivere (a road movie about three generations of women and their accidental friendship) were both theatrically released in the US and are available on DVD. The Look is Maccarone’s first foray into documentary filmmaking, and she has chosen to portray yet another strong female character: the enigmatic, mysterious and consummated actress Charlotte Rampling.After growing up in a bilingual…
Another subtitle for this documentary could simply be, “Filmmaker in Progress”. From the start of the documentary, we see British composer Michael Nyman with a camera ready to take pictures, whether in London, Poland or on tour throughout the world. Probably best-know around the world for his film compositions, Nyman wrote his first film score in 1967 for British filmmaker Peter Greenaway’s black & white short film “5 Postcards From Capital Cities” and, since then, has contributed to many of Greenaway’s films, including the critically acclaimed 1982 feature, “The Draughtman’s Contract”, as well as 1989’s “The Cook, the Thief, His…
Gabriela Dumitrescu holds a BA in dance from the London Contemporary Dance School in London After graduating from LCDS, Gabriela worked as a dancer, very soon beginning to choreograph her first pieces. She moved to Berlin and began working as assistant director for a number of theater and opera directors at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden and other prestigious theaters. In addition to other projects, she choreographed “Geschichten aus dem Wiener Wald” at Stadttheater Basel for renowned director Fred Berndt. In 2005, Dumitrescu choreographed dance scenes for Gabriela Tscherniak’s independent feature BERLIN NIGHTS. Since 2007, she has owned and directed…
Britta Wauer is an award winning Berlin based filmmaker with a number of noteworthy documentaries to her credit. These include her 2008 feature documentary Gerda’s Silence about the life and times of Holocaust survivor Gerda Schrage; the 2005 TV documentary Berlin: A Square, a Murder and a Famous Communist, about Berlin’s famous theater Die Volksbuehne; her collaboration with Sissi Huetlin titled The Rapoports – Our Three Lives, about the German Jewish émigré family who went to live in East Germany after being prosecuted during the McCarthy era in the US; and her 2001 debut documentary A Hero’s Death, in which…
Happy Birthday, Tribeca! 2011 marks the 10th anniversary of the Tribeca Film Festival. After premiering in 2002, a decade later the Tribeca Film Festival is firmly established, strongly focusing on discovering new international and local talent. In addition to its fiction and documentary competition, the festival also presents a number of noteworthy sidebars, amongst them “Spotlight”, a mix of best-of-fests and works about celebrated subjects and characters. This year’s selection screens 33 films—17 narratives and 16 docs—including the German co-production MAMA AFRICA, a documentary about the late South African singer-songwriter-and civil rights activist Miriam Makeba, by Mika Kaurismaeki. Audiences will…
Kino! 2011 brings us New Films from Germany at New York’s Museum of Modern Art. Organized by MoMA’s Senior Curator Laurence Kardish and NY’s representative of German Films, Oliver Mahrdt, the event is now in its 32nd year. Presenting another annual work-show of noteworthy German fiction, documentary and short films,Kino! opened with Tom Tykwer’s award winning Berlin-based, threesome-relationship drama THREE (Drei, 2010). In addition, this year’s cream of the crop also included producer Regina Ziegler’s TV special The Weissensee Saga: A Berlin Love Story, (Weissensee, 2010) directed by Friedmann Fromm. Germany’s new and emerging talent was represented by two filmmakers:…