Ji.hlava Documentary Film Festival has revealed to Variety the projects that the participants of its 2024 Emerging Producers program are working on. The producers were asked to deliver an elevator pitch for their projects.
Every year since 2010, the festival has selected 18 up-and-coming producers of documentary films (17 European and one representing a non-European guest country), who are then provided with educational, networking and promotional support.
The Emerging Producers portal features a map with more than 200 profiles of the program’s alumni.
The next cohort of Emerging Producers will be revealed at the Sarajevo Film Festival on Sunday.
Here are the pitches from the 2024 contingent:
“Green Is the Fire’s Tint” (working title)
Producers: Cristina Haneș, Isabella Rinaldi, Arya Rothe for NoCut Film Collective
Directors: Cristina Haneș, Isabella Rinaldi, Arya Rothe
Genre: Creative documentary
Synopsis: Somi (37), an indigenous woman, faces eviction from her land due to the opening of an iron mine.
Every year since 2010, the festival has selected 18 up-and-coming producers of documentary films (17 European and one representing a non-European guest country), who are then provided with educational, networking and promotional support.
The Emerging Producers portal features a map with more than 200 profiles of the program’s alumni.
The next cohort of Emerging Producers will be revealed at the Sarajevo Film Festival on Sunday.
Here are the pitches from the 2024 contingent:
“Green Is the Fire’s Tint” (working title)
Producers: Cristina Haneș, Isabella Rinaldi, Arya Rothe for NoCut Film Collective
Directors: Cristina Haneș, Isabella Rinaldi, Arya Rothe
Genre: Creative documentary
Synopsis: Somi (37), an indigenous woman, faces eviction from her land due to the opening of an iron mine.
- 8/13/2024
- by Leo Barraclough
- Variety Film + TV
The Inside Out 2Slgbtq+ Film Festival on Monday revealed 11 new recipients for its annual Re:Focus Fund, celebrating its fifth year of supporting filmmakers identifying as women, non-binary and/or trans.
This year’s selections come from seven countries — Canada, the U.S., the UK, Chile, Singapore, Brazil and Sweden — and comprise four feature films and seven shorts. See more details about the recipients below.
Since its inception, the fund has been designed to respond to the immediate needs of filmmakers, and works to eliminate barriers to career advancement. It started as a travel grant program recognizing that trans, non-binary and women filmmakers were underrepresented in international festival attendance, and has expanded the number of projects awarded each year. The fund has distributed more than $250,000 in festival travel grants and professional development programs for filmmakers since its creation.
“The 2023 Re:Focus cohort represents an array of voices, each with a unique perspective on the 2Slgbtq+ experience,...
This year’s selections come from seven countries — Canada, the U.S., the UK, Chile, Singapore, Brazil and Sweden — and comprise four feature films and seven shorts. See more details about the recipients below.
Since its inception, the fund has been designed to respond to the immediate needs of filmmakers, and works to eliminate barriers to career advancement. It started as a travel grant program recognizing that trans, non-binary and women filmmakers were underrepresented in international festival attendance, and has expanded the number of projects awarded each year. The fund has distributed more than $250,000 in festival travel grants and professional development programs for filmmakers since its creation.
“The 2023 Re:Focus cohort represents an array of voices, each with a unique perspective on the 2Slgbtq+ experience,...
- 2/26/2024
- by Valerie Complex
- Deadline Film + TV
Exclusive: Fledgling company to invest $8-9m in 10 Arab-language productions a year.
Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawaris’s fledgling film and high-end TV production company iProductions is at the Efm for the first time this year with its debut feature Mawlana [pictured].
The company has also revealed plans to invest around $8m in Arab films.
Amgad Sabry, iProductions CEO, is in Berlin for meetings with festival programmers and potential buyers for the film about a populist Muslim TV preacher plagued with doubts.
“We believe that content can shape the mind of the people. Our aim is to produce films touching on contemporary topics and burning, sometimes controversial issues,” Sabry told Screen.
Based on a novel by Egyptian journalist Ibrahim Issa, it follows Muslim TV preacher Hatem Al Shenawy who is having doubts about the message he is conveying to the millions of spectators who tune into his daily show.
In the backdrop, he is also...
Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawaris’s fledgling film and high-end TV production company iProductions is at the Efm for the first time this year with its debut feature Mawlana [pictured].
The company has also revealed plans to invest around $8m in Arab films.
Amgad Sabry, iProductions CEO, is in Berlin for meetings with festival programmers and potential buyers for the film about a populist Muslim TV preacher plagued with doubts.
“We believe that content can shape the mind of the people. Our aim is to produce films touching on contemporary topics and burning, sometimes controversial issues,” Sabry told Screen.
Based on a novel by Egyptian journalist Ibrahim Issa, it follows Muslim TV preacher Hatem Al Shenawy who is having doubts about the message he is conveying to the millions of spectators who tune into his daily show.
In the backdrop, he is also...
- 2/15/2016
- ScreenDaily
Winter of Discontent, Egypt's Submission for the Academy Award Nomination for Best Foreign Language Film. U.S. : None Yet. International Sales Agent: Double Dutch International
Merely two years after the Arab Spring brought down several North African and Middle Eastern regimes, including that of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, it is astonishing to see films about these events already being made. After decades of violent oppression their existence is a miraculous triumph and powerful use of its citizens’ newly found freedom of speech. Highlighting the prominent role technology and the media played for both sides, Ibrahim El-Batout’s Winter of Discontent, is a tribute to the brave youth of the country and also serves as an artistic vehicle to expose the atrocities committed by those in power and at least symbolically hold them accountable.
Alternating between 2009 and 2011, the year the defining events took place, the film focuses on two characters who experience a transformation through their personal suffering, but who also get inspired by the courage of their compatriots protesting on the streets. Seemingly comfortable working from his apartment in Cairo, Amr (Amr Waked) is an educated man who doesn’t leave his house much anymore. Despite keeping a low profile and appearing disconnected to what surrounds him, he intuitively knows something big is happening in Egypt. The state-run media outlets won’t talk about it, but the turmoil in the historic Tahrir Square is undeniable. Working as a news anchor for one of those outlets is Farah (Farah Youssef), who is forced to misinform on the regime’s behalf in order to keep her status. However, the façade of normality she is supposed to sustain soon starts to crumble as the moral implications of her actions weight on her.
Unjustifiably imprisoned like thousands of others by Mubarak’s secret police two years before the uproar began, Amr was subjected to their horrific interrogation tactics with no other aim than to break him into submission. After finally being freed by his impunity-protected captors he returns home as a fractured man to find out that his mother has died during his absence, an event that strips him of his will to keep fighting. It is only in January 2011, that he once again is able to believe the country’s circumstances can change. Unable to continue with the despicable cover-ups that prevent people from knowing the truth, Farah quits her job and also joins the ranks of those seeking justice.
Meditative and economical in its depiction of the chaos, Winter of Discontent evokes with great solemnity the uncertainty and fear that defined the last days of the regime. El Batout is not fixated with showcasing explicit violence, but rather seeks to exalt the spirit of his people by showing their relentless devotion to create a better future for their youth. He proves that through unity fear vanishes. Amr is imprisoned once again for uploading a heroic video of Farah denouncing the tyrannical government. This time around however, he is no longer afraid as the fury of millions can no longer be contained. There is a certain melancholic poetry in El Batout’s narrative that assertively addresses the loss of hope and sad acceptance that people underwent, and which is the same emotions that pushes them into action. In her heartbreaking speech, which is the most riveting scene of Youssef's great performance, Farah mourns for her unborn children, regrets being complacent, and accepts that dying for her convictions is more valuable than a life in chains.
It is hard to tell how these events will shape the future of the Egyptian nation, but they surely are an example that when united, people are truly unstoppable. The film includes statistics of the casualties, the crimes, and the aftermath, but despite those alarming numbers it offers hope. Winter of Discontent will not only become the defining film for a generation of Egyptians born in the technology age, but it also symbolizes the rebirth of the country’s cinema now fully free to say, and film, what they feel without fear. Talk about cinema as a tool for change, this film embodies that.
Read more about all the 76 Best Foreign Language Film Submission for the 2014 Academy Awards...
Merely two years after the Arab Spring brought down several North African and Middle Eastern regimes, including that of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, it is astonishing to see films about these events already being made. After decades of violent oppression their existence is a miraculous triumph and powerful use of its citizens’ newly found freedom of speech. Highlighting the prominent role technology and the media played for both sides, Ibrahim El-Batout’s Winter of Discontent, is a tribute to the brave youth of the country and also serves as an artistic vehicle to expose the atrocities committed by those in power and at least symbolically hold them accountable.
Alternating between 2009 and 2011, the year the defining events took place, the film focuses on two characters who experience a transformation through their personal suffering, but who also get inspired by the courage of their compatriots protesting on the streets. Seemingly comfortable working from his apartment in Cairo, Amr (Amr Waked) is an educated man who doesn’t leave his house much anymore. Despite keeping a low profile and appearing disconnected to what surrounds him, he intuitively knows something big is happening in Egypt. The state-run media outlets won’t talk about it, but the turmoil in the historic Tahrir Square is undeniable. Working as a news anchor for one of those outlets is Farah (Farah Youssef), who is forced to misinform on the regime’s behalf in order to keep her status. However, the façade of normality she is supposed to sustain soon starts to crumble as the moral implications of her actions weight on her.
Unjustifiably imprisoned like thousands of others by Mubarak’s secret police two years before the uproar began, Amr was subjected to their horrific interrogation tactics with no other aim than to break him into submission. After finally being freed by his impunity-protected captors he returns home as a fractured man to find out that his mother has died during his absence, an event that strips him of his will to keep fighting. It is only in January 2011, that he once again is able to believe the country’s circumstances can change. Unable to continue with the despicable cover-ups that prevent people from knowing the truth, Farah quits her job and also joins the ranks of those seeking justice.
Meditative and economical in its depiction of the chaos, Winter of Discontent evokes with great solemnity the uncertainty and fear that defined the last days of the regime. El Batout is not fixated with showcasing explicit violence, but rather seeks to exalt the spirit of his people by showing their relentless devotion to create a better future for their youth. He proves that through unity fear vanishes. Amr is imprisoned once again for uploading a heroic video of Farah denouncing the tyrannical government. This time around however, he is no longer afraid as the fury of millions can no longer be contained. There is a certain melancholic poetry in El Batout’s narrative that assertively addresses the loss of hope and sad acceptance that people underwent, and which is the same emotions that pushes them into action. In her heartbreaking speech, which is the most riveting scene of Youssef's great performance, Farah mourns for her unborn children, regrets being complacent, and accepts that dying for her convictions is more valuable than a life in chains.
It is hard to tell how these events will shape the future of the Egyptian nation, but they surely are an example that when united, people are truly unstoppable. The film includes statistics of the casualties, the crimes, and the aftermath, but despite those alarming numbers it offers hope. Winter of Discontent will not only become the defining film for a generation of Egyptians born in the technology age, but it also symbolizes the rebirth of the country’s cinema now fully free to say, and film, what they feel without fear. Talk about cinema as a tool for change, this film embodies that.
Read more about all the 76 Best Foreign Language Film Submission for the 2014 Academy Awards...
- 11/9/2013
- by Carlos Aguilar
- Sydney's Buzz
Egypt has put forward gritty revolutionary drama Winter of Discontent as its official contender for the best foreign language film Oscar at the 86th Academy Awards. Directed by Ibrahim al-Batout, the film stars Amr Waked (Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, Syriana), Farah Youssef and Salah Al Hanafy as it focuses on an activist, a journalist and a state security officer and their entangled lives during the tumultuous events of January 2011 in Cairo’s Tahrir Square. It has been noted for its unflinching look at the brutality of Hosni Mubarak's regime as it tried desperately to forestall the revolution. Waked and Al
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- 9/30/2013
- by Patrick Brzeski
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
This fascinating film shows the 2011 Egyptian uprising through its participants – a dissident, a secret policeman, a journalist and more
There is a compressed and concentrated anger in this new film from Egyptian director Ibrahim el-Batout. These are his scenes from the revolution, with glimpses of the home lives of the revolutionaries and the counter-revolutionaries alike. We see the participants in the 2011 Egyptian uprising: a formerly tortured dissident, a government-stooge TV news presenter, a secret policeman, a journalist tormented by scruples. Salah Hanafy is the icily detached agent of the repressive state, applying the electrodes to a detainee's naked body by day, and by night negligently answering his wife's questions over the dinner table in their comfortable family home. Amr Waked is the campaigner and activist, his face etched with pain. After protests and outcry in Tahrir Square, two officials are interviewed on an oleaginous TV show to protest that such...
There is a compressed and concentrated anger in this new film from Egyptian director Ibrahim el-Batout. These are his scenes from the revolution, with glimpses of the home lives of the revolutionaries and the counter-revolutionaries alike. We see the participants in the 2011 Egyptian uprising: a formerly tortured dissident, a government-stooge TV news presenter, a secret policeman, a journalist tormented by scruples. Salah Hanafy is the icily detached agent of the repressive state, applying the electrodes to a detainee's naked body by day, and by night negligently answering his wife's questions over the dinner table in their comfortable family home. Amr Waked is the campaigner and activist, his face etched with pain. After protests and outcry in Tahrir Square, two officials are interviewed on an oleaginous TV show to protest that such...
- 8/22/2013
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
While still fighting for independence and global recognition, Palestinians had a big reason to celebrate Saturday when one of their own, 23-year-old Mohammed Assaf of the Khan Younis refugee camp, won the second season of Arab Idol. The show, which airs live from Lebanon, is a pan-Middle Eastern edition of the American mothership, broadcast on the region’s Mbc network. Assaf went up against Syrian Farah Youssef and Egyptian Ahmad Jamal, and feared he might be at a disadvantage, as his opponents were from well-established Arab countries whose residents could rally support for their representatives for the
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- 6/23/2013
- by David Caspi
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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