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Top docs at Encounters
Wed, 17 Jun 2009
A record 14 South African films will have their World Premieres at the Encounters South African International Documentary Festival, which takes place from 2 to 19 July at Nu Metro V&A Waterfront in Cape Town. Another two South African films will have their local premieres at Encounters.
A fixture on the international documentary festival calendar for the past 11 years, Encounters was the first platform to showcase major feature documentary films. This year the programme comprises 40 films, with work from Afghanistan, UK, USA, Canada, Cuba, Senegal, France, Egypt, Denmark, Germany, Israel, Austria, Sweden, Switzerland, Cameroon and Belgium.
Award-winning films include Oscar nominated and Golden Globe Award Winner 2009 Best Foreign Language film Waltz with Bashir, the animated documentary about the dreams that plague Israeli Army Conscripts. There is also the 2009 Oscar-nominated film by legendary director Werner Herzog, which captures the beauty of Antarctica in Encounters at the End of the World.
Three winners of Sundance 2009 will be shown. Afghan Star looks at the return of pop culture in Afghanistan and the risks for those involved. The film won the Audience and Directing Awards. The Grand Jury World Cinema Documentary Award winner Rough Aunties is about a group of brave compassionate Durbanites who fight for the rights of abused children. The winner of IDFA's Joris Ivens award and Sundance's Best World Cinema Documentary Editing, as well as the 2009 Berlinale Human Rights Award, is Burma VJ – Reporting from a Closed Country which shows the perils of reporting form a closed and repressed country.
Who Killed Maggie? charts the last two weeks of Margaret Thatcher’s Political life. The Queen and I is a portrait of the glamorous Queen of Persia in exile in Paris; and Tyson is a mesmerising study of the bad boy of boxing.
Films with an African focus are Sacred Places which looks at St Leon, a community in the city of Ouagadougou that lives and breathes film; Youssou N’Dour: I Bring What I Love is a cinematic journey about one man’s voice to inspire change; and Yande Codou, Griot of Senghor takes us into the world of one of Africa’s famed griots, an accomplished practitioner of polyphonic praise singing.
The short films include Bronx Princess - Rocky Otto, a teenager from the Bronx, is also a Ghanaian Princess; Slaves is a powerful animated documentary about Abuk enslaved at age five by the Sudanese government sponsored militia and looks at other children in difficult situations; Freddy Ilanga: Che’s Swahili Translator is a World Première and tells of a 15 year old who in 1965 was ordered to work as Che’s Swahili translator during a secret Congo mission to train anti-Mobuto rebels.
In The Age of Stupid Franny Armstrong sets her film in 2055 where a lone archivist compiles footage of the warning signs that we collectively chose to ignore. Four Wings and a Prayer is Nick de Pencier’s study of the Monarch butterfly.
The Champagne Spy concerns the complicated web of deceit and the high-life of a Mossad spy posing as a German in Egypt in the 1960s and is directed by Nadav Schirman. Israeli Yoav Shamir’s Defamation has the chutzpah to unpack anti-Semitism. Shamir is a guest of the Festival.
Fierce Light: when spirit meets action is Velcrow Ripper’s highly personal film which questions his life as a social activist and asks can spirituality and action converge? Ripper is a guest of the Festival.
Music from the Inside Out is a portrait of the world famous Philadelphia Orchestra through the personal tales of some of the musicians and RIP –A Remix Manifesto examines copyright and promotes a ‘fair use’ in the reworking of art and music to create new works.
The Festival opens with South African director Liza Key’s Rewind, a film about the making of Philip Miller’s TRC inspired Rewind: A Cantata for Voice, Tape and Testimony.
Other World Premieres include The Invincibles, Mark Kaplan’s rugby film which centres on the 1974 South Africa tour by the British and Irish Lions who broke the boycott and trounced the Boks. For Which I am Prepared to Die tis he story of Hermanus born Roger Bushell, the mastermind behind many escapes from WWII POW camps, including the Great Escape celebrated in a film of the same name. The film is made by Bushell’s niece, Lindy Wilson. In Tribes and Clans is an examination by radical thinkers of the colonial power’s socio-political constructs of tribes and clans. The director is Ntokozo Mahlalela.
Soap Star Dawn Matthews and rap artist HHP (Hip Hop Pantsula) search for their ancestors in the series Who Do You Think You Are? They are directed respectively by Tim Greene and Ernie Vosloo.
Two giants from the art world Kentridge and Dumas in conversation is directed by Catherine Meyburg.
From the music world Fokofpolisiekar “forgive them for they know not what they do” Bryan Little’s film about the in your face punk rock band Bellville band and the short Jitsvinger: maak it aan! uncovers the world of poet guitarist and hip hopster Quinton Goliath.
The Pioneer of Paraguay a short film about -a South African stranded in South America.
The Last Voyage director Genadendal born, Riaan Hendricks makes a personal journey at the time of his father’s death.
Craig and Damon Foster look at climate change from an African perspective in Nature of Life. Two short films under the banner of Healing Power of Nature are Liz Fish’s Deep Friends set in a chimpanzee Sanctuary in Zambia and River Of Ashes Emma Bestall’s film about the River Ganges, abused holy mother.
Encounters has partnered with the prestigious Goodman Gallery in showcasing the best of films made by South African artists, this will include a special screening entitled Artslot and a screening of select shorts prior some of the feature films.
Two South African Premieres are Sea Point Days, Emmy Award winning director Francois Verster’s impressionistic look at life on the promenade and in the pools.
Zola Maseko explores the wealth of 900 years of African Intellectual output in a library in The Manuscripts of Timbuktu.
Other South African films are Lunchbox Bullies which explores why bullies bully, and Daughter of Spirits Mother of Mine shows that the call of the ancestors is not always a gift and the short film Soul Train looks at the church coaches on the commuter trains from Soweto to Jozi.Master Classes at Encounters: Velcrow Ripper - creating soundscape; and Yoav Shamir - how to gain access to subjects when dealing with sensitive issues.
Panel Discussions: Defamation Q&A with Yoav Shamir (moderated Nathan Geffen, and Shelagh Gastrow)
Waltz with Bashir and Slaves - Caught Up in the Machine
With Prof Schabbir Ahmed Wadee, Prof Sebastian van As, Shirley
Gunn, Haroon Gunn-Salie, Andries Botha.
Daughter of Spirits Mother of Mine – Ubizo- Blessing or Curse
with Tebogo Nkoana, Annelie Zanemvula De Wet and others.
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