POV

POV's series producer Yance Ford interviews Thom Powers, filmmaker, documentary programmer for the Toronto International Film Festival and the founder and curator of the Stranger than Fiction documentary series in New York.

I sat down recently with Thom Powers — filmmaker, documentary programmer for the Toronto International Film Festival and the founder and curator of the immensely popular documentary series Stranger than Fiction, also known as STF. Since 2005, STF has run three 10-week seasons (Spring, Fall and Winter) for an ever increasing audience. Powers and his finely curated series have established Tuesday nights at the IFC Center as the time and place for New York City-based documentary filmmakers and fans to view new and classic work and interact through vibrant Q&A's and post-screening gatherings, where the conversations continue.

The Fall 2009 season opened this week with Ahead of Time, the directorial debut of cinematographer Bob Richman. Richman has shot a laundry list of fine documentaries including Constantine's Sword by Oren Jacoby, Metallica: Some Kind of Monster by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, and recently The September Issue by RJ Cutler. The new STF season also features some other great films — check out the calendar on the STF website.

In part one of my interview with Thom, he breaks down the history of STF, his curatorial approach and what it means to bring folks out from behind their computers and into the theater. Stay tuned for part two next week, when we discuss Toronto and some broader issues like distribution and the documentary landscape.

TAGS: new york events, screening, stf, thom powers, tiff

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POV's series producer Yance Ford interviews Milton Tabbot, senior director of programming at IFP for an inside look at the world of independent filmmaking. IFP's Independent Film Week will run from September 19-24 in New York, and IFP's Filmmaker Conference will run concurrently, from September 19-23.

Yance Ford: What is IFP and what's your mission as an organization? What's your role and how long have you been there?

Milton Tabbot: The nonprofit IFP is the nation's oldest and largest organization of independent filmmakers and also their premier advocate. Currently, IFP represents a network of 10,000 filmmakers in New York City and around the world. Through workshops, seminars, conferences, mentorships and Filmmaker Magazine, IFP schools our members in the art, technology and business of independent filmmaking. IFP believes that independent films, driven by a filmmaker's unique vision, address issues and disseminate stories and points of view that may be too risky for those who are constrained by commercial considerations. Today, to create a truly independent film and make sure it is seen takes more technological sophistication and business acumen than ever before. Having helped build the infrastructure of the independent film movement and long nurtured its community, IFP is committed to addressing the changes and challenges the industry confronts.

I started with IFP as a volunteer in 1995, working at that year's Independent Feature Film Market (now called Independent Film Week), and came on staff in 1996, really jazzed about being at this intersection of the creative and business communities in the independent world. Currently, as senior director of programming, I supervise a number of programs, primarily the documentary components of both the Project Forum of Independent Film Week and our Independent Filmmaker Labs, and also our fiscal sponsorship program and certain components of our annual Gotham Independent Film Awards. Equally important in these and other programmatic areas are my colleagues — IFP Deputy Director Amy Dotson and Program Manager Rose Vincelli.

Read more after the jump...

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TAGS: ifp, independent film week

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Natalia Almada's Sundance Award-winning film, El General, makes its New York City theatrical premiere next week at Lincoln Center's Walter Reade Theater. Presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center, El General will screen as part of the Latinbeat 2009 series. The premiere on Tuesday, September 15 will be followed by a reception with the filmmaker. Visit Lincoln Center's website for more information about the screening.

Natalia, a POV alum (Al Otro Lado, 2006), won the Documentary Director Award at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. El General will be broadcast as a part of POV's 23rd season in 2010.

Natalia will also be participating in a panel discussion titled Latin-O-America tonight, Thursday, September 10, at Walter Reade. The panel features established and emerging directors from across the Latino/Latin American diaspora.

TAGS: latinos, new york events

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POV series producer Yance Ford reports back on a couple of Kim Longinotto events from last week.

If you were in New York City last week, you may have noticed that filmmaker Kim Longinotto was, well, everywhere. On Thursday afternoon she was interviewed by Chris White, POV's Director of Programming, at the studios of Downtown Community Television. (DCTV is the new location for all POV filmmaker interviews this season, and we've updated the look. Check them out at the end of each broadcast once our season begins, and tell us what you think!) Longinotto's MoMA retrospective opened later that evening with the New York premiere of Rough Aunties, and was followed by a full weekend of screenings from her body of work, including Divorce Iranian Style (1998), The Day I Will Never Forget (2002) and Shinjuku Boys (1995).

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TAGS: cinema verite, kim longinotto, moma, women make movies

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POV series producer Yance Ford attended the Cinema Eye Awards on Sunday.

The Cinema Eye Honors were held on Sunday at the stunning Times Center on West 41st Street in Manhattan. Believe it or not, you might have seen the Times Center, or at least the building that it's situated in, before: last summer when two guys scaled the outside New York Times building, it was all over the news. Well, the Times Center is on the ground floor. I half expected Philippe Petit — the daredevil, high wire walker from Man on Wire — to try to scale up the building too, but thankfully he stayed inside the theater.

In fact, the theater was full for the ceremony, the second annual installment of an award that began last year. With straightforward eligibility guidelines and a transparent nominating process, 24 films were nominated for Cinema Eye across all categories, and 5 short films were honored as well. I presented the honored shorts (with kudos to Karen Cirillo for heading up that effort) after taking a stroll across the stage as the queen of the Cinema Eye(with blogger and award co-founder AJ Schnack as my king) for the evening.

You can find a complete breakdown of the films that took home the very sharp statues on the Cinema Eye website. Special congratulations to POV filmmaker Yung Chang, whose film Up the Yangtze, which aired on POV last summer, garnered two awards: Outstanding Debut Feature and the Audience Award.

It was great to see Ellen Kuras and Thavisouk Phrasavath, both looking radiant after completing their 23 year epic, The Betrayal (Nerakhoon), which airs later this summer on POV Christopher Bell, director of Bigger, Strong, Faster, was in attendance, as was Morgan Spurlock, director of Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden. David Polansky was up and down the aisles all night, collecting awards for Ari Folman's animated doc Waltz with Bashir. "I am not Ari Folman," he quipped. "I just did the drawings." Just the drawings, he says!

Sunday night wasn't about winners and losers. It wasn't about me dressing up as a Mardi Gras Queen (a once in a lifetime treat for those in the audience). Yes, some films took home the honors and others did not, but no one lost Sunday night. Up the Yangzte versus Encounters at the End of the World? My Winnepeg versus The Order of Myths? Like all good work, these films are in conversation, rather than competition, with each other. Waltz with Bashir and The Betrayal both plumb the depths of memory; Yangzte and Encounters explore both the force of nature and the forces of man; home, family and identity are the threads connecting Guy Maddin in My Winnepeg and Margaret Brown in The Order of Myths. This is only a smattering of comparisons and doesn't even include the films who weren't eligible for nominations. My point is this: Documentary films aren't made in a vacuum, nor are they made for the echo chamber. They are made for the conversations: the dialogue they invoke, and the questions they ask of us and the men and women who make them. Cheers to everyone who labored so intensely last year to bring their films to the public. Here's to more of the same in 2009.

TAGS: aj schnack, cinema eye, up the yangtze

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POV series producer Yance Ford will be presenting one of the awards at the Cinema Eye Honors ceremony this weekend.

The second annual Cinema Eye Honors ceremony will take place this Sunday, March 29th at the Times Center in Manhattan. Hatched from the brain of filmmaker AJ Schnack, Cinema Eye sprouted up last year in response to an Oscar shortlist that many felt failed to represent the full scope of what the doc world had to offer in 2007. Schnack, IndiePix and Thom Powers joined forces, and Cinema Eye presented its first awards in 2008.

From its inception, Cinema Eye has stressed that craft does, in fact, matter in documentary filmmaking. This may seem really obvious, but “craft” and “documentary” don’t make it into the same sentence in many awards (like the Oscars). Cinema Eye recognizes the artistry and occasional genius of documentary filmmakers in the categories of editing, cinematography, music composition and graphic design & animation. I suspect that Waltz with Bashir, having cracked the code of animated documentary, will do very well in these categories Sunday night. Further showing off its doc credibility, Cinema Eye also recognizes the key contributions made by producers with an Outstanding Achievement in Production award.

Six POV films are up for awards this weekend including: Up the Yangtze by Yung Chang (Outstanding Debut Feature, International Feature, Audience Choice and Cinematography), The English Surgeon by Geoffrey Smith (Outstanding International Feature and Music Composition), The Betrayal (Nerakhoon) by Ellen Kuras and Thavisouk Phrasavath (Outstanding Cinematography), and Life.Support.Music by Eric Daniel Metzgar (Outstanding Music Composition). City of Cranes by Eva Webber is one of five short films being honored as well. Good luck to all the POV nominees! You remind us every day of how lucky we are to work with such talented filmmakers.

The Outstanding Achievement in Non Fiction Feature Filmmaking (think Best Doc at the Oscars) nominees include Waltz with Bashir, the animated documentary by Ari Folman, Man on Wire by James Marsh, The Order of Myths by Margaret Brown, My Winnipeg by Guy Maddin, and Roman Polanski: Wanted and Desired by Marina Zenovich. View a full breakdown of the nominees.

The ceremony is bound to be a great time, as most documentary events in NYC are. The filmmaking community is friendly, supportive and dances very well, so come down to the Times Center if you’re in town! And check back here Monday for a run down of the winners and post-award-goings on.

The Cinema Eye Honors are open to the public and tickets can be purchased (if there are any left) at www.cinemaeyehonors.com.

TAGS: aj schnack, awards, cinema eye, film festivals, thom powers

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POV series producer Yance Ford was in Columbia, Missouri for the 2009 True/False Film Festival.

Watching films in Columbia, Missouri is way nicer than being stranded at the St. Louis airport. So despite the splendid company of filmmaker Esther Robinson and composer T. Griffin while waiting for my flight Monday night, I am glad to be home.

My first impressions of True/False, which I noted here last Friday, were pretty straightforward: friendly, easy to navigate, lacking pretension, etc. There are other aspects to my True/False experience worth noting as well:

The Audiences
The quality of festival Q&As is often a matter of chance. Sometimes the lights come up on movies I loved and not a single meaningful question is asked. Sometimes it's the opposite. At True/False, the audiences engaged film directors in meaningful discussion after every screening. After moderating the Q&A for five films, I can say that the True/False audiences are some of the most engaged on the festival circuit. This kind of audience made the T/F experience richer for directors and a lot of fun for us all.

The College Students
I will NEVER understand how so many young women can go out in the freezing cold wearing so little clothing. Really. I fantasized about going around to the local bars passing out True/False postcards with the diptych: "This is your brain. This is your brain on film." Picture on the left: barefoot student walking down East Broadway in 19 degree weather. Picture on the right: student cozy in the Ragtag Theater watching, say, Loot. Get it together, people!

The Marching Band
The March March is the funniest, simplest "parade" I've ever seen. Really, it's a collection of community groups, costume-clad supporters, eight-foot-tall film cameras, green space aliens, filmmakers and a marching band. I LOVE marching bands. I stalked the marching band while they practiced and marched next to them in the parade. Check out the Missouri Drumline in a strictly unauthorized recording of their performance, courtesy of my iPhone.

The Swamis
You've heard of Korla Pandit, right? Me neither. It turns out that Columbia native John Roland Redd created an alter ego for himself: an Indian organist named Korla Pandit. Pandit became a star by gazing into television cameras in the 1940s, reading minds, perhaps, or imparting wisdom through the waves. True/False has continued the tradition by recruiting a team of modern-day Swamis who really can read minds. These documentary professionals are brought in to mentor first-time filmmakers whose work screens at True/False.

The Panels
As a "Ringleader," my schedule made it tough to catch all the panels I wanted to see, but I did get to attend Kim Longinotto and Ollie Huddleston's panel on their director/editor relationship. The "Kim and Ollie Show," as it was called, felt more like a master class than a panel. The nearly two-hour exchange featured clips from Hold Me Tight, Let Me Go (POV 2009), Rough Aunties, and Sisters in Law, with set-up comments from Longinotto and Huddleston. Their collaboration is one built on trust, deepened by a shared sensitivity for the range of human experience and a passion for storytelling. Ollie has a deep and abiding respect for Longinotto's ability to capture brutally honest, brutally human moments on camera, which leads him to put "space" around these moments in his editing process, allowing the audience to absorb their impact.

The excerpt from Rough Aunties was a perfect example of that. The clip begins with the women of Operation Bobbi Bear responding to the scene of a home invasion in Durban, South Africa, where a man has been shot. Huddleston begins the scene with one of the aunties, Jackie, asking seemingly mundane questions of the shooting victims' daughter. With the little girl on her knee, Jackie asks her if she's hungry, if she's scared, if she'd talk to her friend; then a psychologist tells the little girl how brave she's been as she offers her a cup of tea. Only then does the girl recount the break-in: How her father confronted the robbers and was shot, how her mother fought the robbers, and was shot at with an empty gun. It's incredible stuff, made more so because of Longinotto's patience on location and Huddleston's patience with the scene in the edit. Visit the Rougie Aunties website for information on where you can see the film.

Paul Sturtz and David Wilson
At the helm of an army of volunteers and amazing staff (The Inner Core), David and Paul have a created a gem of a festival.

Congratulations, True/False — and see you next year!

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POV series producer Yance Ford is in Columbia, Missouri for the True/False Film Festival.

Film festivals are usually unpleasant experiences on some level. The lines are ridiculous, the crowds are ridiculous or the schedules are impossibly arranged: You say that there's a film you really want to see? Try the 8 a.m. show! Oh, it's too bad you didn't get to bed until 2 a.m. the night before...

But the word in the doc world has been that True/False is the exact opposite of unpleasant. And I'm here to tell you — that's exactly right.

Held in the very walkable city of Columbia, Missouri, True/False is a friendly, relaxed festival staffed by an army of volunteers and headed up by David Wilson and Paul Sturtz This year marks my first time at True/False, and already, I'm having a blast!

I arrived yesterday on a bus full of documentary filmmakers, and honestly, the two-hour ride from St. Louis felt like a field trip. Surrounded by some of my favorite folks in documentary film, I got the chance to catch up with Megan Mylan and hear stories of the Oscar night craziness. I also learned that her amazing red dress was designed by her grandmother in the 1930s. Pretty cool.

I also chatted with Colin Beavan (that's "No Impact Man" to you) whose doc of the same name screens here Saturday morning and Sunday afternoon.

If you come to True/False, you'll quickly realize that it's a festival put together with its audience rather than with industry people in mind. The festival begins on Thursday, but the first screening is at 5 p.m. Got work or class? No problem. You only have to sneak out a few minutes early to see a great doc rather than losing the entire day or skipping the film.

I'm here as a "ringleader" and have a schedule of films to introduce and several post-screening Q&As to conduct. Last night I introduced At the Edge of the World to a full house at the Macklanburg Cinema. Tonight, I'll intro We Live in Public, Ondi Timoner's film about artist Josh Harris and his Big Brother-esque "experiment." The film was a Sundance hit that I missed and I'm looking forward to the screening.

Later today, the main drag of Columbia, Missouri will be overtaken by the True/False parade — a fun, raucous affair with marching bands and puppets! I'll have pictures and more from True/False tomorrow.

Want to hear more about Yance's adventures at True/False? She'll be twittering throughout the weekend, so follow along.

TAGS: film festivals, true/false

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POV series producer Yance Ford checks in from a special event honoring William Greaves in New York City.

There is nothing quite as exciting as watching a master at work. For me, attending the Stranger than Fiction (STF) tribute to filmmaker William Greaves this past Tuesday was, indeed, a thrill. Stranger than Fiction, the documentary film series curated by Thom Powers, presents a dynamic range of films throughout the year at the IFC Center in New York City. The Greaves tribute was sold out and fire codes being what they are in NYC, the "No Standing!" rule meant many people were turned away. Fortunately, I had bought my ticket early, and I'm glad I did. It was an inspiring night.

The evening opened with a stunning letter from Sidney Poitier praising Greaves' contribution to his and many other careers and calling us all to "reach beyond our grasp." Read an excerpt and see more pictures from the tribute (including one of yours truly) at the Stranger than Fiction website.

Greaves' career spans more than 40 years; during that time, he produced both narrative and documentary films. STF's tribute to Greaves treated the audience to clips from many of the filmmakers seminal works, including Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One, The First World Festival of Negro Arts, The Fight, Still a Brother and the first public screening of his work in progress, Once Upon a Time in Harlem. Greaves is often referred to as the dean of African American filmmakers, and the scope of his work is breathtaking; it's clear that he is dean to us all.

Not only has Greaves produced a prolific body of work, he has also mentored generations of African American filmmakers, the late St. Claire Bourne among them. The panel that joined Thom Powers on stage after the screening discussed the Greaves' influence. Film critic Elvis Mitchell, director Thomas Allen Harris (Twelve Disciples of Nelson Mandela, POV 2006), Orlando Bagwell of the Ford Foundation, and Editor/Director Sam Pollard dissected Greaves' work, not solely within the context of black cinema, but within the continuum of cinema as a whole. Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One, for example, isn't important because of its name (though it is a pretty amazing title). It's important because it does so many things at once: it destroys the "fourth wall," bringing audiences, both onlookers in Central Park during filming, and those in the theater, into the film within a film within a film; it is a hybrid documentary, combining scathing social commentary (the break-up scene) with absurd drama (the conspiring crew). The human interactions in Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One make the film, and they arose from the environment that Greaves created. Scene by scene it is a mastery of filmmaking. If you haven't seen this and other work of William Greaves, get thee to a library RIGHT NOW!

The evening wrapped up with Greaves addressing the audience after a standing ovation. Slowed by age but no less insightful, Greaves' was wryly surprised at the continuing interest and admiration of his work. He also expressed his concern for the state of our nation. Implicit in that concern is a call to the filmmakers in the room and beyond to keep telling the stories that need to be told.

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POV series producer Yance Ford attended the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. She wraps up her experience by completing the Sundance meme.

Agnes Varnum, blogger extraordinaire, tagged me in a Sundance blog meme. After I figured out what a meme was, I started to compose mine, post-Sundance '09. Here goes:

The rules are as follows:

1. Players start with listing their Sundance favorites, separated into 8 categories.
2. People who are tagged write their own blog post about their 8 favorites and include these rules.
3. At the end of your blog, you need to choose 8 people to get tagged and list their names. Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them they're tagged and that they should read your blog.

1. Favorite feature: For me, it's a tie between Push, in which Gabourey Sidibe gives a devastating performance as Precious Jones (Note to critics, try writing about Sidibe's performance, not just her size. She's so much more than that.) and the hilarious (if a little long) blaxploitation pic Black Dynamite.

2. Most problematic/interesting/ thought-provoking feature: Again, that would be Push. It would have been tough for anyone to adapt Push — an amazing but wrenching novel by Sapphire — for the screen, and I think director Lee Daniels made interesting choices, particularly with Precious' fantasies. In my view, some of them work and some do not, but they are definitely provocative directorial choices.

3. Favorite Short Film: Four-way tie between Before the Wind Blows it All Away by Annie Waldman, The Archive by Sean Donne, Steel Homes by Eva Webber and Utopia Part 3: The World's Largest Shopping Mall by Sam Greene and Carrie Lozano. Has anyone seen Utopia Parts 1 and 2? Somehow I missed them.

4. Film Most Regrettably Missed: We Live in Public

5. Most Fun Party: Chicken & Egg Pictures reception.

6. Best Post-screening Q & A: William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe — seeing Yusef Salaam in person was pretty great.

7. Favorite Nonfiction Character(s): William Kunstler

8. Most Memorable Moment: Filmmaker Lodge on Inauguration Day.

Now I have to tag fellow bloggers. Let's hear it, Joel Heller and Ingrid Kopp!

TAGS: film festivals, inauguration, sundance, william kunstler

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POV series producer Yance Ford has been at the Sundance Film Festival all week. She files one last report from Park City.

Sundance '09 has come to an end for me. It's 6 a.m. and I'm sitting at the Salt Lake City airport, exhausted but exhilarated from the past seven days. Oscar nominations will be announced shortly and I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the POV film on the list: The Betrayal (Nerakhoon) by Ellen Kuras and Thavisouk Phrasavath, which will air on POV during our 2009 season.

I know that the blogosphere will have a lot to say on how "quiet" Sundance was this year. In this context, "quiet" means the lack of high-profile bidding contests for films and the requisite buzz they generate. Despite that, distribution deals for several narrative films were made at Sundance this year. If you're interested, you can check out the wonderfully revamped Indiewire.com for more information.

I'm leaving Sundance felling good about the state of documentaries. Distribution challenges and persistent struggles for funding aside, I saw some amazing work this week. I've already mentioned El General and William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe — both of which POV has acquired — as highlights of the first week. The Reckoning was another film that stood out for me. Docs that I wanted to see, but missed, included The Cove, We Live in Public and No Impact Man, because the Park City Screenings were all sold out. I'll reserve my analysis of those films until I see them. I would also point to Boy Interrupted by Dana Perry and Art & Copy by Doug Pray as standouts in the Feature Docs lineup. The Short Documentary category was also outstanding. Among my favorites were Steel Homes by Eva Weber, So the Wind Won't Blow It All Away by Annie P. Waldman and Utopia Part 3: The World's Largest Mall in China by Sam Green and Carrie Lozano. Many of the short films from this years' festival are available on Itunes for free for a limited time. Don't miss them!

The doc lineup at Sundance '09 was aesthetically varied (Lunch Break/Exit), topical (Reporter) and revealing of international struggles for justice (Burma VJ and Tibet in Song). Even though it was quiet, Sundance has jump-started the 2009 festival season with a thoughtful, provocative bang. Next up are the film festivals True/False, South by South West and others. See you there!

NOTE: It's 7:25 a.m. mountain time, and The Betrayal (Nerakhoon) has been nominated for Best Feature Documentary! Smile Pinky by POV alum Megan Mylan (The Lost Boys of Sudan, POV 2004) has been nominated for Best Documentary Short. Congratulations to all the nominees.

TAGS: film festivals, sundance

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POV series producer Yance Ford has been attending screenings and panels all week at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. She checks in on another busy day in Park City.

After watching the inauguration from the Sundance Filmmakers Lodge yesterday, I thought I was off to see We Live in Public. Unfortunately, it turns out that I had actually bought tickets for the screening in Salt Lake City! All of the Park City screenings have been sold out, and while I'm excited for the filmmakers, I am sorely disappointed. Oh well. At least I know I have tickets to Art & Copy in Park City, thanks to Josh Braun at Submarine.

There is a panel at the Filmmaker Lodge titled "Truth or Consequences" that I'm looking forward to as well. Moderated by theorist and professor B. Ruby Rich, the panel will examine the risks and rewards of speaking truth to power in this modern age. I'll blog more about the panel later.

At 6 p.m., I'm off to the Documentary Spotlight, where several short films, including Eva Weber's new film, Steel Homes, will be featured (another one of Eva's short films, City of Cranes, is streaming in its entirety on the POV website). And to stretch my last day as far as I can, I'll be at the 9:15 p.m. screening of Lunch Break. Lunch Break is a part of Sundance's New Frontier strand here, curated by Sundance Senior Programmer Shari Frilot, which showcases film and multimedia work that you won't see anywhere else.

For now, away I go! I'll blog (and twitter) more later about my final day here at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival.

TAGS: city of cranes, eva weber, sundance

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POV series producer Yance Ford writes in on Inauguration Day from the Sundance Film Festival in Park City.

It's a bright, chilly day here in Park City, and the mood on the streets, buses and in the coffee shops at Sundance is buoyant. Dozens of filmmakers have gathered here at the Sundance Documentary Fund's filmmaker lounge to watch the inauguration taking place in Washington, D.C. Cara Mertes (the director of the Sundance Institute Documentary Program, who also happens to be the former executive director of POV) and her staff have a jumbo projection screen at one end of the room and a flat screen TV at the other. I was among the early arrivals at the lounge, and helped rearrange the furniture so all the couches were facing the television — nothing like making yourself at home.

There are more Emmy, Oscar and Sundance Audience Award winners in this room than you can shake a stick at. Filmmakers Pamela Yates, Rahdi Taylor and Paco de Onis, POV alums Laura Poitras (My Country, My Country and Flag Wars) and Anne Makepeace (Rain in a Dry Land and Baby, It's You), Women Make Movies Executive Director Debbie Zimmerman, former director of the Human Rights Watch International Film Festival and current executive producer at the International Center for Transitional Justice Productions Bruni Burres, film editor Mary Lampson, blogger and Austin Film Society communications manager Agnes Varnum, Shooting People's Ingrid Koop...the list goes on and on. It's great to be in the company of so many filmmakers and documentary industry forces on this historic day!

Heading into the second week of the Festival, the documentaries have generated a fair amount of excitement among audiences. The Reckoning premiere yesterday was packed; POV alum Eric Daniel Metzgar's film, Reporter, also played to a full house, a doc titled The Cove has been the talk of the last 24 hours and The Yes Men Save the World has sold out every screening. Go docs!

Today I'm off to see the doc We Live in Public, as well as a few panels at the filmmaker lodge. Happy Inauguration Day, everyone!

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POV series producer Yance Ford writes in with a report on the screenings and parties from the Sundance Film Festival in Park City.

William Kunstler: Distrurbing the Universe had its premiere tonight at the new Sundance venue, Temple Theater. The Temple, now one of the largest venues at the festival, was filled to capacity for the world premiere of Sarah and Emily Kunstler's portrait of their father, attorney William Kunstler.

A lively Q&A followed the screening. Joining the filmmakers for the session were Yusef Salaam and George Johnson, both former clients of Kunstler's, and Michael Ratner, a former co-council of Kuntsler's who is also the Executive Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

Yusef Salaam was convicted of rape in the Central Park Jogger case as a teenager, despite Kunstler's vigorous defense. He was exonerated of the crime more than a decade later. Salaam recited a poem titled "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" at the Q&A. The film's producers, Jesse Moss, Susan Korda and Vanessa Wanger, also joined the filmmakers at the screening. Margaret Ratner Kunstler, mother to Sarah and Emily and Kunstler's second wife, was also there. A highlight of the Q&A occurred when an attorney in the audience commented that the film reminded him of the ideals that first compelled him to study the law. William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe will air on POV in 2009 or 2010.

The opening night party at the Legacy Lodge was a packed affair, teeming with excited filmmakers, festival-goers and the casts of many narrative films at the festival. I managed to spot producer, director and editor Sam Pollard from a distance. Pollard, editor of the upcoming documentary on Barack Obama, is one of the documentary jury members. Now I'm off to the PBS/ITVS party, and then I'll head to a screening of Push, the adaptation of the novel by Sapphire, directed by Lee Daniels. I'll check back in later with more from the festival!

TAGS: sarah and emily kunstler, sundance, william kunstler

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The Full Frame Documentary Film Festival came to a close on Sunday, April 6th with the traditional North Carolina barbeque awards ceremony. The first Full Frame since Nancy Buirski stepped down as director featured a streamlined, more user-friendly ticketing process, new venues and a greater diversity of student fellows from colleges and universities around the U.S.

Despite the persistent drizzle, spirits were high and many of the festival's screenings sold out. There was a general sense of camaraderie as natives and visitors alike soaked up a year's worth of docs in just four days. Some of the standouts from my perspective were: Life. Support. Music., an intense portrait of what it takes to bring a loved one back from brain injury by POV alum Eric Metzgar (Chances of the World Changing, POV 2007); City of Cranes by Eva Weber; and My Olympic Summer, a short film by Daniel Robin. My Olympic Summer pushes the boundaries of documentary pretty far. I'll discuss the film and the issues it raises in a later post.

There's quite a bit in the blogosphere already about Full Frame '08. To get a 360-degree picture of the festival, supplement your reading with a visit to All These Wonderful Things and Still in Motion. AJ Schnack and Pamela Cohen both offer incisive takes on many of the discussions around the films that were screened in Durham over the weekend. I especially think the discussion around the credits on Trouble the Water that began on these blogs ought to be continued.

One thing that hasn't received as much attention in the days since the festival wrapped up is the Full Frame Career Award presented to William Greaves (read Rachel Hall's essay here). Greaves is among the pioneers of cinema in the U.S., and one of the most accomplished African American directors of his generation. Full Frame was punctuated by screenings of his films Symbiopsychotaxiplasm: Take One and Take 2½, as well as The Fight, and The First World Festival of Negro Arts. The First World, which screened just prior to the awards ceremony, is a masterful display of cinematic prowess and just shows what a brilliant cinematographer Greaves is. His camera follows the explosive dances from around Africa as if he knew what moves were coming next. Unfortunately, The First World is not currently in distribution. The festival also screened a work-in-progress sample of his current project, Once Upon a Time in Harlem, which looks back at the Harlem Renaissance and the evolution of black culture. During his remarks, Greaves shared that the project had recently received major foundation support — good news for documentary fans everywhere.

TAGS: africa, ethics, film festivals, hurricane katrina

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Yance Ford is in Durham, North Carolina this weekend, where she's blogging from the 2008 Full Frame Documentary Film Festival.

The 2008 Full Frame Film Festival got off to an enthusiastic start in Durham last night. Elizabeth Edwards, wife of former presidential candidate John Edwards, addressed the crowd at Fletcher Hall. She spoke about the peril our democracy faces from increasing media consolidation and lauded the independent filmmakers whose documentaries offer us a glimpse into the world obscured by media monoliths. The crowd gave Edwards, a native daughter, a warm welcome.

She was followed by Ariel Dorfman, professor, author and subject of Peter Raymont's 2007 film A Promise to the Dead. Dorfman introduced Nancy Buirski, founder of Full Frame and the festival's former artistic director, who received a standing ovation and an award in honor of her vision and dedication over the past ten years. Nancy was eloquent — as always — in her remarks. Not only did she thank the staff and volunteers, but she also made special mention of St. Claire Bourne, who died suddenly last December. A mentor and teacher to many, Bourne also curated a sidebar at Full Frame last year. She also announced that the 2009 Career Award will be presented to Bourne, and a program of his work will be curated by Sam Pollard at next year's festival.

The opening night film Trumbo was a portrait of the prolific screenwriter Dalton Trumbo. The film follows Trumbo's career before he was blacklisted during the McCarthy era, and recounts his unwavering belief in freedom of thought even as his career was devastated. Trumbo is conventional in its structure, mixing interviews with archival footage. What I enjoyed most about the film was its liberal use of his own personal letters to friends and family, performed dramatically by well-known actors. I usually find this technique distracting, but Trumbo's words are so alive, and so energized by his convictions and his love for his family and friends that the device works. Donald Sutherland and Paul Giammatti are particularly good, and Nathan Lane's rendition of the letter Trumbo wrote to his son about masturbation brought the house down.

On my schedule today is Full Battle Rattle, by POV alum Jesse Moss (Speedo, POV 2004) and his co-director Tony Gerber; Trouble the Water by Tia Lessin and Carl Deal, which played to raves at Sundance this year; and Be Like Others, another Sundance favorite by Tanaz Eshaghian. The screening of Up the Yangtze (POV 2008) nearly sold out yesterday, and filmmaker Yung Chang took questions from the audience afterwards. The Last Conquistador (POV 2008) also screened yesterday, as did Complaints of a Dutiful Daughter (POV 1995).

I'll report some more from rainy Durham soon (it's ok though, there's been a drought).

TAGS: china, film festivals, hurricane katrina, sundance

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Yance Ford, POV's series producer, muses on Tongues Untied, a landmark POV film — and one of the most controversial. The film has just been released on DVD by Strand Releasing.

Brother to Brother. Brother to Brother.
Brother to Brother. Brother to Brother.

Five men recite this phrase in staccato rhythm during the hypnotic opening of the film Tongues Untied (POV 1991) by Marlon Riggs, which is being released this week on DVD. I watched the film for the umpteenth time as I prepared to write this post and found myself nostalgic (again) for the days when black men of all orientations addressed each other as "brother" — rather than "nigger" or "nigga" — or however you spell it. Riggs ends the film with the statement "Black men loving black men is the revolutionary act." He was right then and he remains so. But I digress.

If, on July 16th, 1991, you were living in a market where your local PBS station hadn't refused to air the program, you would have witnessed what is still the most sage analysis of blackness, gay identity and racism ever captured on film. Tongues Untied aired during the vitriolic culture wars of the 90s (as opposed to the Internet-fuelled semi-polite culture wars of the new century) and quickly became the whipping boy of the late Senator Jesse Helms. Helms infamously called the film "Tongues United" while ranting against it, PBS, the NEA and homosexuals from the Senate floor.

Riggs never backed down from these and the many other attacks he faced, and defended not only his right to make his work and have it aired on PBS, but to have the tax dollars of gay Americans (no pun intended) considered in the discussion of what deserves public funding. A month after the broadcast, Riggs wrote in Current Magazine:

Paradoxically, the Tongues Untied censorship hysteria has helped re-kindle an essential public debate: who is to have access to so-called "public" media and on what terms? Who should represent "minority" perspectives and experience? Above all, who has the authority to draw the thin line between innocuous "diversity" and unacceptable "deviance"?

Sixteen years and two wars later, we still haven't answered these questions, and Riggs' landmark film remains a relevant as ever.

Riggs' essay for Current can be read in its entirety here. The dvd is available at Strand Releasing. It's also part of the POV 20th Anniversary Collection.

TAGS: african american, lgbt, pbs

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Yance Ford, POV's series producer, attended the inaugural Cinema Eye Awards on March 18th. She writes in with some of her thoughts on what she liked and didn't like about the awards. For a complete list of winners, visit the website of the Cinema Eye Honors.

Gathered in decidedly more casual attire than the Academy Awards, the docuratti (the non-profit version of the gliterratti) celebrated the inaugural Cinema Eye Honors on Tuesday night at the IFC Center in NYC. Launched by filmmaker AJ Schnack and documentary programmer Thom Powers this past year, and sponsored by distributor Indie Pix, the Cinema Eye Honors were born out of frustration over many industry awards (like the Oscars) giving short shrift to documentary films that pushed the craft envelope.

Thom Powers strode to the podium to the Jackson Five to open the evening's festivities. He was followed shortly by AJ Schnack singing a brief song about Manda Bala, one of the nominated films, to the tune of Oklahoma by Rodgers and Hammerstein. Powers and Schnack, co-chairs of the Cinema Eye Honors, were ebullient as they welcomed many of documentary films' greatest names to the virgin outing of Cinema Eye. Working in partnership with the folks at Indie Pix and producer Pamela Cohn, Schnack and Powers pulled off a minor miracle (they planned the event in just a few months), and our congratulations go out to them.

The ceremony was energetic and punctuated by tributes to St. Claire Bourne and Tony Silver, documentary pioneers who died unexpectedly in recent months. The pre-ceremony gathering was jovial (and smartly lacked alcohol) as documentary folk from far and wide turned out in an enormous show of support for the new awards. The knowledge and experience in the IFC theater last night was incredible. Presenters included Sam Pollard, Barbara Koppel, Ross Kauffman, Molly Thompson, Joe Berlinger, Bruce Sinofsky, Marshall Curry, Alex Gibney and Alan Berliner; the groundbreaking documentaries represented by those names are astounding, never mind the rest of the audience.

For its first time out, Cinema Eye has done a tremendous service to the documentary community in the same do-it-yourself spirit that gets films made. I overheard the phrase "well, next year" often, and I'm sure that in the coming months, AJ, Thom and Indie Pix (with lots of input, no doubt) will improve upon their model for the 2009 Cinema Eye Awards. My personal suggestion would include a discussion about how films with a limited festival life that go straight to TV might be included in the awards. I'd also like to see the list of craft categories expanded to include composition, writing and sound. I know that these questions and others are on the minds of everyone at Cinema Eye, and I look forward to hearing and contributing to the coming conversations.

I know Thom Powers to be a thoughtful, passionate programmer and a great filmmaker in his own right. But his opening remarks included a remark that I found troubling. He said that "distributors don't get it, critics don't get it and the general public doesn't get it. We wanted to fill [this auditorium] with people who get it." I'll be the first to agree that independent documentary does not get the recognition it deserves, but I don't think that the problem is the fact that the general public doesn't "get it." The problem is that the general public doesn't get to see it. And as long as the documentary community prioritizes theatrical release and festival runs over broadcast, the public will continue to miss a large and dynamic body of work. I say this not just because POV is a broadcast outlet. I say this because when I looked around the IFC last night and saw the amazing collection of people in that theater, I wanted to ask everyone, what comes next? What do you do after tonight? How to you capture this energy and turn it into something sustainable?

More after the jump...

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TAGS: awards, craft, film festivals, filmmaker

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Now that the big dance is over, I thought I'd take a moment to wrap things up. Once again, the biggest buzz at Sundance was generated by the documentary lineup. Nanette Burstein's American Teen was the rare exception in an otherwise sedate year for film buyers. What's nice about this of course, is that we can "focus on film," as the festival encourages — and for me, that means looking back on a few films that really stood out.

Patti Smith: Dream of Life (POV 2008-2009), Steven Sebring's hypnotic ten-year collaboration with the singer herself would land at the top of my list of films that I wish I had seen at Sundance. Yesterday, Sebring and Phillip Hunt Watch won a much-deserved Excellence in Cinematography Award for Dream of Life, with Grand Jury prizes in the doc category going to Man on Wire (World Cinema) and Trouble the Water. (A complete list of award winners is available here.)

Other docs from the festival that I'm anxious to see also got enthusiastic responses from Sundance-goers as well. I'm looking forward to catching American Teen, I.O.U.S.A., Bigger, Stronger Faster, Fields of Fuel, The Recruiter, and The Greatest Silence. Luckily, I live in New York City and will probably be able to catch these films at any of several theatres that screen indy docs. But since we're not all within arm's reach of that kind of venue, I'd like to remind you that you can see at least three of the docs from this year's Sundance Film Festival on POV — you can catch Nerakhoon, Patti Smith: Dream of Life and Traces of the Trade on your local PBS station in 2008 and 2009. Sign up for the POV newsletter for broadcast reminders and to connect to your local station.

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I finally saw the much hyped, wildly-acclaimed independent fictional film Once last weekend. Once, which follows an Irish musician and a Czech immigrant around Dublin as they meet, make music, record an album and maybe fall in love, was one of the hot tickets of Sundance '07, and ended up on many best-of lists at the year's end. Though I was at Sundance in '07, I didn't make it to a single screening of this or any other narrative film. Now, I can finally watch it on my own couch! Another reason why I love Netflix.

I liked the film. I liked the characters and the scenes where the female lead pulls a Hoover vacuum around the streets of Dublin, but it took me a while to get into the film. I spent the first thirty minutes begging the DP to keep the camera steady.

I'm not the first to take note of the shooting style of Once, and it has been noted by many critics that the film was shot in "documentary style." I suppose "documentary style" refers to uber-handheld shooting and shaky framing. In Once, I found this shooting style very distracting — especially when the two lead characters are singing together for the first time in a music store. The camera is in constant motion around the piano, and when the camera finally keeps still and fixes on lead actor Glen Hansard's face, I shouted "Finally - a tripod!"

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One of the questions we're asked most often here at POV is: "What do you look for in a POV film anyway?" Every year, more than 1,000 films compete for 12-15 slots on the POV broadcast schedule, so what's a documentary filmmaker to do if she wants to fill one of those coveted slots?

Yance Ford, POV's series producer, has been working at POV since 2002. Since then, she's screened thousands of documentaries and given input on the programming for 6 seasons of POV We asked Yance to talk a little about what she's looking for when she watches a documentary film, and solicited her advice for filmmakers hoping to place their films on POV

As a series presenting documentaries on PBS, POV holds a yearly open call, welcoming any filmmaker who is interested to submit their film for possible broadcast. And when I talk to filmmakers interested in submitting, the question I am asked most often is "What type of film does POV look for?" Thankfully, the answer is a lot less complicated than most people fear.

First of all, your film should be a documentary. We get our share of dramas and comedies and performances, but we only broadcast non-fiction film. We look for films to acquire as well as select projects where we can provide co-production support.

Strong Aesthetics, Solid Craft

Considering that documentary has evolved so much since 1988, it is important to understand that POV does not look for a single aesthetic approach to non-fiction filmmaking. POV has broadcast more than 250 films, each as varied as fingerprints, and all equally a "POV" Be it the wry comic persona of Ross McElwee (Bright Leaves), the iconic images of Lourdes Portillo (Señorita Extraviada), the observational elegance of Jennifer Dworkin (Love & Diane) or the master craft of Frederick Wiseman (High School) — scroll through our online film archive and you'll see that POV embraces a diversity of approaches to filmmaking. We've aired the giants of direct cinema, experimental films, vérité films, hyrbrid docs, weird films and more; you name it, we've done it. What do these films have in common? A solid command of craft, a director with a vision for their film and a unique approach to storytelling brought together by skilled editing that brings out the best in the material. The craft standards at POV are high, and for your film to have a shot at one of the 15 available slots, it has to rise above the ordinary.

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TAGS: filmmaker, frederick wiseman, p.o.v.

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