Award-winning films from Generation Africa for Durban International Film Festival 2022

The pan-African documentary project Generation Africa, will feature four films at the Durban International Film Festival - a hybrid event this year – with both cinema and virtual screenings from 21 to 31 July, 2022.  Generation Africa is a collection of 25 films produced by Cape-own production company STEPS, and directed and produced by filmmakers from 16 African countries, featuring stories about migration.

The films, which are all in the DIFF’s documentary competition selection, include the winner of the Encounters South African International Documentary Film Festival Programmers’ Choice Award for Best South African/African documentary and the Adiaha Award - No Simple Way Home (Kenya / South Sudan / South Africa) directed by Akuol de Mabior.  

The other films are African Moot (South Africa) directed by Shameela Seedat, No U-turn (South Africa, Nigeria, France, Germany) directed by Ike Nnaebue and Taamaden, The Walking Child (Cameroon / Mali / France / Belgium / South Africa) directed by Seydou Cisse.

No Simple Way Home directed by Akoul de Mabior

De Mabior’s film, No Simple Way Home, which also won the DOK.horizonte prize at DOK.fest München 2022 pays tribute to her parents and her home country – South Sudan where her father was a revolutionary leader whose movement led to the foundation of South Sudan, and her  mother became one of the five vice presidents of the country's so-called unity government in 2020.

No U-turn directed by Ike Nnaebue

The critically acclaimed first documentary film of Nollywood director Ike Nnaebue, No U-turn, won Special mention of the documentary jury at this year’s Berlinale. The film follows the road travelled by the director more than two decades before seeking greener pastures through irregular migration to Europe. Nnaebue turned back when told about the dangers that lay ahead, and now he goes on the route to see why young people still go this route.

Taamaden, the Walking Child directed by Seydou Cisse

Seydou Cisse’s Taamaden, the Walking Child, follows young immigrants from West Africa, who faced the daunting and dangerous crossing of the Mediterranean, thanks to their marabout or spiritual guides who guide them in prayers and rituals.

 African  Moot  directed by Shameela Seedat

Director of the award-winning film Whispering  Truth to Power, Shameela Seedat’s African  Moot delves into the complexities of migration law in Africa, as aspiring lawyers gather to debate in the annual African Human Rights Moot Court Competition. 

For DIFF, Taamaden will have one “in-person” screening at Suncoast CineCentre on Tuesday, 26 July at 2pm. Taamaden and the other 3 films will be screened online from the DIFF digital platform on durbanfilmfest.com. All screenings are free.

For more information on the Durban International Film Festival or to book go to durbanfilmfest.com, and for Generation Africa go to https://steps.co.za/projects/generation-africa/

DIFF Film Karl Marx City has messages for South Africa and the world

A Durban International Film Festival Film - Karl Marx City has messages for South Africa and the world.

By Wanda Hennig

German-born New York film-maker Petra Epperlein was at home in the United States with her co-director husband Michael Tucker when she received the devastating news. Her father was dead. He had hanged himself from an oak tree in the garden of the family home. The home her mom still lived in. The home that for the first 20 years of Epperlein’s life (and for 20 years before that) was in Soviet-controlled East German, the old German Democratic Republic (DDR).

There had been no warning signs that her dad was planning to end his life.

What Epperlein did know, however, was that after the Berllin Wall fell in 1989 and as the process of reunification was beginning, he had been mailed several veiled threats. Notes accusing him of having been in alliance with the sinister, controlling Stasi, the Ministry of State Security “secret police” that had created a society under constant “Big Brother” surveillance and in the grip of fear: even of thinking the wrong thoughts.

So was born the intimate and personal documentary Karl Marx City, the film that has brought Epperlein to the 2017 Durban International Film Festival. It is one of 10 “German Film Focus” films screening: a collaboration between the German Embassy, the Goethe-Institut, German Films and Berlinale Talents, with DIFF 2017. Epperlein, also part of DIFF’s women-led films focus, will share knowledge with aspiring film-makers while here.

Karl Marx City was the city of Chemnitz before the 40-year DDR period. With the name change came a 40-ton bronze monument of Marx’s head that still looms over the inner city skyline: even though the city is Chemnitz once more.

“My father’s suicide made me question my memories of him. Do we really know who our parents are? You live with them. You see them in a certain way. I had a perception of my father as a warm and loving person.”

But with his suicide she began to question her memories. Could her childhood have been an elaborate fiction? Could her father in fact have been an informant? The Stasi were known to have had neighbour spy on neighbour; children report on parents.

We are chatting at the Elangeni Hotel. Epperlein is just off the plane from New York City. The gaminesque architect turned film-maker is shiny-eyed from jet-lag but alert, curious about Durban (“what mustn’t I miss?) and happy to share both perceptions on her movie and the fact that Karl Marx City—the fourth film she and Tucker have made to premier at the Toronto Film Festival—has received fantastic reviews in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and elsewhere.

Epperlein was an architecture student at university in Dresden when the Berlin Wall fell. The revolution that saw the Cold War unravel started in Dresden. She was in the thick of it. Scenes from the time feature in her film. East Germans were trying to escape to the West in growing numbers. Many had sought refuge in embassies in Budapest and Prague. The DDR regime agreed to give passage to the unsustainably large numbers holed up there. They would be taken by train to (west) Berlin. The train would pass through Dresden. The aim was for Stasi officers to board the train in Dresden and take away passports “so they could never return”.

But riots erupted. You see footage of the riots is in the film. “It was the first riot against the regime. I was there and it was four weeks of true excitement.”

Within a month the wall came down.

Two years later, soon as she completed her degree, Epperlein moved to Berlin. “The city centre didn’t exist. It was unchartered territory,” she says. “There were clubs and parties and excitement. Young people moved in and claimed it as their own—until the capital came in and started claiming it.”

After two years in Berlin, where she worked as an architect, Epperlein booked a ticket to New York City. “The ultimate symbol of freedom. I went to check it out.” She found it lived up to its promises and cliches.

It gave her something else too. She met Michael Tucker, the guy who became her husband. He was a film-maker. They became not only partners but also film collaborators. “Film-making and architecture are pretty similar,” she says. “With both, you have to organize complex structures in time and place.”

Epperlein’s father suicide came shortly before the 2013 Edward Snowden National Security Agency (NSA) leaks in the US. “Inspiration for the film came via the NSA leaks. People started comparing the Stasi to the NSA. This bothered me. They were really not the same. The Stasi were a repressive communist regime. You were not permitted to express your view or dissent. The NSA operates within a democratic society.

“I realised how little people knew about the Stasi or what life was like behind the Iron Curtain. East Germans don’t want to talk about it 27 years after reunification. It hasn’t been processed. Questions, for example about complicity, haven’t been addressed. It’s complex. So many questions.

“I thought, before it slips away and is lost, we should make a film about it. The final decision came after we went to the Stasi archives and discovered the film and video archives. Endless hours of surveillance. Mind-blowing. So much of it banal. The banality of evil. Unsuspecting people unaware they were being watched. Almost perfect documentary material.”

At the start of their quest, to try and find answers via the Stasi files, Epperlein had to convice her mom and her twin brothers that addressing this via a doccie was a good idea. “It was my obsession, to try and find the truth about my father. I imposed it on them. They were at first opposed. But then they went along.” The experience, she says, has brought them closer.

This is a film that will resonate with many South Africans who lived through apartheid. Think Broederbond and the Bureau for State Security (BOSS). Even the recent revelations of the Bell Pottinger secret manipulations... On a more intimate level, the family relationships resonate.

Epperlein and Tucker sponsor their own movies. They make them, then set about selling them. One called Fightville about cage fighting—“some amateur fighters who think their way of fulfilling the American dream is to go into a cage and beat each other up”—made them a bunch of money a couple of years ago.

It supported the current film “about a world that doesn’t exist any more.” Yet has profound lessons in the world we live in now where constant surveillance is a given. “It’s good to be aware of what it feels like to live in a truly oppressive society.”

The Stasi, she laughs, would have loved Facebook.

Karl Marx City shows tonight ( July 17) at 5pm  (one screening only) at Gateway Sterkinekor during the Durban International Film Festival which runs until Sunday, July 23. Tickets for this screening at box-office or www.sterkinekor.com.  For more information about the DIFF go to www.durbanfilmfest.co.za.

-ends

SOUTH AFRICA’S ‘INXEBA’ BAGS A STRING OF AWARDS AHEAD OF THE DURBAN INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

SOUTH AFRICA’S ‘INXEBA’ BAGS A STRING OF AWARDS AHEAD OF THE DURBAN INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

South African film ‘Inxeba’ (known internationally as ‘The Wound’) has won the Best Film Award in the International New Talent Competition, at the  current Taipei Film Festival ahead of its African premiere at the Durban International Film Festival at The Playhouse next week (14 July).

This is a latest in a string of awards for the film, which explores tradition and masculinity, and the clash between age-old rituals and modernity. Described by Variety magazine as “a milestone in South African cinema”, the film stars musician and novelist Nakhane Touré as Xolani, a lonely factory worker who joins the men of his community in the mountains of the Eastern Cape to initiate a group of teenage boys into manhood. When Kwanda (Niza Jay Ncoyini), a defiant initiate from the city, discovers his mentor’s secret, Xolani's entire existence begins to unravel. 

At Cinema Jove, the Valencia International Film Festival, held in Spain from 23 June to 1 July, ‘Inxeba’ was awarded the Luna de Valencia for Best Feature Film, as well as the Best Actor Award for Nakhane Touré.

At one of the world's longest-running film festivals, the Sydney Film Festival, held from 7 to 18 June, ‘Inxeba’ won the Audience Award for Best Feature, with ScreenDaily describing it as “a measured consideration of class, race, self-loathing and self-assertion”.

At the 41st Frameline, San Francisco’s international film festival, held from 15 to 25 June and where 147 films were screened, ‘Inxeba’ won the First Feature Award. 

Shortly before that, it was awarded the prize for Best Feature Film at the 32nd Lovers Film Festival, an LGBTQI festival held in Turin, Italy from 15 to 20 June.

In April, the film received the Jury Prize for Best Narrative at the 19th annual Sarasota Film Festival in Florida, in the US. The festival is known as a world-class platform for thought-provoking films from some of the best known and emerging independent filmmakers. At the MOOOV International Film held in March 2017, in Belgium, it garnered a Special Mention.

‘Inxeba’, which premiered at this year's Sundance Film Festival and later opened Berlinale Panorama, was a 2014 Durban FilmMart project. This initial pitch enabled the team behind it to obtain funding from a number of international financiers, resulting in a co-production between South Africa, France, Germany and The Netherlands. 

According to a Sundance review, “John Trengove's hard-edged but beautifully wrought study of clashing Xhosa models of masculinity will be an eye-opener to outsiders — and some South Africans too.”

‘Inxeba’ is the first feature from writer-director John Trengove, and is co-written by Trengove, Thando Mgqolozana and Malusi Bengu. The Xhosa initiation ritual which forms the landscape of the film is also the subject of ‘Inxeba’ co-writer Mgqolozana’s novel, ‘A Man Who Is Not a Man’. 

‘Inxeba’ will continue to travel around the world, having been sold to 19 countries for theatrical release thus far, and will be distributed in South Africa by Indigenous Film Distribution. 

“The release strategy for South Africa ensures that the film will qualify as a strong contender to represent the country in the Foreign Language Film nominations for the 2018 Oscars,” says Helen Kuun, MD of Indigenous Film Distribution. “We are excited about ‘Inxeba’ as it is an authentic South African story that has gained traction globally.”

Director John Trengove, lead actor Nakhane Toure, some of the cast as well as co-producer Cait Pansegrouw, will be in attendance at the premiere.

‘Inxeba’ will be screened at 6pm on Friday, July 14 at The Playhouse, 8pm on Tuesday, July 18 at Sterkinekor Gateway, 2.30pm on Saturday, July 22 at Sterkinekor Gateway. Bookings for the Playhouse are through www.computicket.com, and for Sterkinekor on www.sterkinekor.com. For more information about the Durban International Film festival go to www.durbanfilmfest.co.za

-ENDS

Caption: Poster for Inxeba

For more information:

http://www.urucumedia.com/the-wound

https://www.facebook.com/thewoundthefilm/

Watch the trailer here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubSlj-G4P6I&t=3s

The Durban International Film Festival brings Germany to South Africa

The 38th edition of the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) is set to captivate audiences with a German Focus, which features ten gripping films by some of Germany’s finest directors, a masterclass by German film industry professionals, as well as networking sessions with the cream of the international film industry crop.

 Curated by Alex Moussa Sawadogo, the variety of the films on the lineup is set to keep audiences enthralled. Films such as The People vs Fritz Bauer (which relates to German history after the WWII and the role of the attorney of law Fritz Bauer in confronting the state with its political shortcomings), Paula (which recounts the journey of a well-known early 20th century painter, who discovered her artistic freedom in a more traditional Germany), Goodbye Berlin (a depiction of how the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany merged into one state, taking two young children as the protagonists of a road movie through former East Germany) and Greetings From Fukushima (which breaks the common stereotypes that surround Germans) will leave audiences with a better understanding of German history, culture and people.

 While Goodbye Berlin ties in with this year’s overall festival theme, “Transit Tales”, All of a Sudden, Greetings From Fukushima, Paula and Karl Marx City speak to one of this year’s focus areas – women-led films.

 DIFF audiences will have the chance to meet key people behind the productions. Anand Batbileg and Tristan Göbel, two of the most promising talents in Germany’s film scene and the main actors of Goodbye Berlin will be in Durban for a Q&A following the German Gala screening of Goodbye Berlin at The Playhouse (Drama Theatre) on 16 July (time to be confirmed). The award winning and family friendly film was made by prominent film maker Fatih Akin who recently presented his last film in Cannes. Tickets for the Gala Screening are available at Computicket.

 Another confirmed DIFF guest is Doris Dörrie, director of Greetings From Fukushima. With her unmistakable way of storytelling, she has been one of the towering figures in German cinema since she stirred up the countries’ film scene in 1985 with the gender comedy Men. Christian Schwochow has been awarded for both his cinema and theatre work and will visit DIFF in his capacity as Director of Paula. Petra Epperlein will visit Durban as well to present the extraordinary documentary Karl Marx City, which is a highly personal cinematic journey into her childhood to find the truth about her late father’s suicide and his rumored past in the GDR’s secret service. Furthermore, Directors Karin Steinberger (The Promise) and Stephan Rick (The Dark Side Of The Moon) will be attending DIFF. 

 The German Focus at DIFF 2017 is presented by German Films, the Goethe-Institut and the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in South Africa in cooperation with DIFF. 

Alex Moussa Sawadogo, director of the Afrikamera Festival and curator of the German Film Focus at DIFF elaborates: “Long considered as a highly politicized cinema that placed social and political criticism at the heart of its creation, today, German cinema is dominated by a new generation of directors. From diverse origins, free and gifted, these German directors are at the foreground of the vivacity of the production of German cinema, which is recognized all over the world. They bring the concerns of their generation in an intimate sphere on screen and discuss the tribulations of a new Germany that has opened itself to the world - particularly by receiving many people in distress. The German Film Focus at DIFF 2017 presents itself as a unique platform for the discovery of a program of new, diversified, exciting and engaging German films of all kinds – a cinema that places German people from all origins at the heart of its creation.”

Mariëtte Rissenbeek, German Films Service said: “The majority of the films we are presenting have been very successful at a large number of international film festivals. The kinds of stories they tell and the way in which they are told are relevant for a larger international audience, and the director’s handwriting has both a specific and an international element. The strength of German cinema at present is its diversity. Since the year 2000 a number of German films, about German history and personal stories, have been made which achieved international success.”

 Lien Heidenreich-Seleme, Head of Cultural Programmes at the Goethe-Institut, added: “The goals of the Goethe-Institut are to support film within the creative industries and to undo with stereotypes through visual storytelling. We do this with training and networking initiatives, through interdisciplinary and pan-African collaborations, and by increasing access to the variety of German filmmaking. In this light, and after our longstanding relationship with DIFF, we are excited about this year’s German focus.”    

 DIFF, the Goethe-Institut South Africa and Berlinale Talents have a decade-long partnership. This year marks the 10th anniversary of Talents Durban, a programme that began in 2008 as a result of the partnership between DIFF and Berlin International Film Festival’s Berlinale Talents, with the support of the Goethe-Institut and the German Embassy.   

 Talents Durban is an annual five-day training and mentorship programme that runs at DIFF, aimed at empowering emerging 27 African screenwriters and directors working on projects for film, television, web series and content for mobile platforms. The 10th edition will take place from 14-18th of July under the theme “Perspectives: Seeing things differently”, which is derived from the observation that film alone may not change the world but can show the world when it changes. Talents Durban looks to not only highlight the stories of Africa, but create a culture of Africans telling their own stories, and most importantly from their experience and perspective of cutting edge and modern cinematic technology. Talents Durban is happy to welcome the German directors Doris Dörrie, Petra Epperlein and the two main characters of Fatih Akin’s film Goodbye Berlin, Anand Batbileg and Tristan Göbel. As part of Talents Durban and in association with the Goethe-Institut and FIPRESCI (International Association of Film Critics), the Talent Press programme will provide again mentorship and hands-on training in the craft of film criticism to three emerging African journalists. 

Furthermore, the Goethe-Institut will present “New Dimensions – Virtual Reality Africa”, a brand new package of four VR productions from Kenya, Ghana and Senegal. The works were co-produced with Cape Town based Electric South. To be shown at the Durban FilmMart (DFM), they allow a glimpse into the fascinating new opportunities that technology provides for visual storytelling.

DIFF is one of Africa’s leading and longest running festivals, and runs from 13 to 23 July in Durban, South Africa. 

To find out more about the German Focus at DIFF, visit www.durbanfilmfest.co.za, or follow the Festival and the German Film Focus partners on social media: 

Twitter: 

@DIFFest (#DIFF2017) 

@German_Films #germanfilms

@goethejoburg 

@berlin_talents

@GermanEmbassySA

Facebook: 

Durban International Film Festival 

German Films

Goethe-Institut Johannesburg

Talents Durban

German Embassy Pretoria

Instagram:

@durbaninternationalfilmfest

@germanfilms #germanfilms

@goethe_jhb

@berlinaletalents

 -ENDS

2015 Durban FilmMart Award winners

Media Release

2015 Durban FilmMart Award winners

After a packed four day programme of project pitching, industry masterclasses, seminars and workshops, and networking, the 6th Durban FilmMart (DFM) comes to a close with the announcing of the market awards and grants at the awards and closing function sponsored by Videovision Entertainment.

The DFM saw around 550 guests from 26 countries, 32 workshop and panel discussion sessions presented by various local and international industry experts and professionals.

“It has been an extremely productive and pleasing market this year, with over 900 official business meetings documented in the Finance Forum.” says Toni Monty, Head of the Durban Film Office, which partners with the DIFF to present the DFM. “The Durban FilmMart is considered one of Africa’s most important film finance platforms: this is borne out of the fact that we have been able to track the progress of many of the projects which had their beginnings at the market which have successfully made it to the screen. This year the Durban International Film Festival was able to screen six DFM alumni films, a concrete indication that this model is working well.”

“Once again we are honoured to have hosted this important film event, which brings together industry representatives from around the globe.” says Monty. “Besides the many levels of business that is conducted at this market, we are also proud to be able to showcase the City as a film destination on a global level to the hundreds of delegates attending.”

The closing night awards dinner sees key local and international partners of the annual co-production market, award a number of projects with development support through cash grants, invitations to partner markets or business support, to take the projects through the next stages of development.

This year 8 awards were made by an evaluation panel made up of local and international film industry experts. Recipients of the 2015 DFM awards are as follows:

The Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program award for a documentary film project that demonstrates potential for strong storytelling craft, artistic use of visual language, originality, feasibility, and relevance went to The Other Half of The African Sky directed and produced by Tapiwa Chipfupa which receives a cash award of $7000 for further development.

Afridocs, the broadcast stream that sees African and other international documentaries screened across 49 countries of sub-Saharan Africa on a weekly basis, awarded a €3000 grant for an outstanding documentary project to Truck Mamadirected and produced by Zipporah Nyaruri and co-directed by Peggy Mbiyu.

The CineMart Award, sponsored by the co-production market of the International Film Festival Rotterdam, awarded the fiction project Sunflowers Behind a Dirty Fence directed by Simon Mukali and produced by Nathan Magoola, with an opportunity to attend the Rotterdam Lab, a five-day training and networking event bringing together producers from all over the world.

The International Documentary Film Festival of Amsterdam (IDFA) awarded the most promising documentary project at the DFM, Truck Mama directed and produced by Zipporah Nyaruri and co-directed by Peggy Mbiyu, with an opportunity to attend the  IDFA Forum, the largest and most influential meeting place for documentary filmmakers, producers, commissioning editors, funds, private financiers and other documentary stakeholders in Europe, from November 23 to 25.

The New Cinema Network awarded Riot Waif directed by Zinaid Meeran and produced by Jean Meeran an opportunity to attend the 10th edition NCN in Rome, where the producer/director will be able to present the project to film companies at an international level.

Produire au Sud of Festival des 3 Continents (Nantes), awarded the fiction project Inkabi "The Hitman" directed by Norman Maake and produced by Peter Pohorsky with an opportunity to attend its developmental workshop program, PAS, where they will be given tools, expertise, and opportunities to develop European networks.

The Restless Pitch awarded, a one-on-one consultation with Restless Talent Management co-founder Tendeka Matatu, to two projects: Brace Yourself by Thati Peele, and Lucky by Jacobus van Heerden. The company will provide development services such as image-building and positioning, project packaging, PR, and advice on film sales, distribution and promotion. Restless Talent Management also made a special mention of Mark Waambui forHeterophobe for an edgy and challenging concept.

Durban’s Videovision Entertainment, awarded the “Best South African Film Project” Inkabi “The Hit Man” directed by Norman Maake and produced by Peter Pohorsky a prize which guarantees the films release once it is completed. The prize includes marketing and distribution support from Videovision Entertainment and is valued at R75 000.

Five of these projects have emanated from film-makers that are either Durban- or Berlin Talents alumni – the industry development programme of the Berlin International Film Festival, with which DIFF is a partner. These are Tapiwa Chipfupa (The Other Half of the African Sky) - Talents Durban (2013) and Talents Berlin (2015); Truck Mama filmmakers - Zipporah Nyaruri – Talents Berlin and Talents Durban (2011) and Peggy Mbiyu Talents Durban (2011) and Talents Berlin (2012), Nathan Magoola (Sunflowers Behind a Dirty Fence) Talents Durban (2013) and Talents Berlin (2012) and Jacobus van Heerden (Lucky) Talents Durban (2013).

“We had a very strong line up of projects this year,” says Monty. “We were pleased with the diverse topics and themes that have been explored in both the fiction and documentary sections, and with strong representation of filmmakers collaborating across the continent. The DFM has been placing emphasis on the telling of African narratives, and in doing so hope to continue to discover new African projects.”

 “We have seen numerous filmmakers pitching projects at the DFM over the past 6 years go from strength to strength. They are engaging more confidently with the many financiers, funders, sales and distribution agents, showing a maturing of the market.”

“We would like to thank our new and old sponsors and partners who have supported the DFM. It is through their continued interest and support that we are able to assist African filmmakers develop the industry and access the local and international market.” says Monty.

For more information on the Durban FimMart visit www.durbanfilmmart.com

-ends

Issued on behalf of the DFM by:

Sharlene Versfeld

Versfeld & Associates

083 326 3235

July 20, 2015

NOTE TO MEDIA 

We have individual images of the awardees - which we will email independently .

Jyoti Mistry's grisly new thriller Impunity to screen at Durban Internationsl Film Festival

MEDIA RELEASE

JYOTI MISTRY’S GRISLY NEW THRILLER IMPUNITY TO SCREEN AT DURBAN INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL

Noir thriller “Impunity”, the latest film by celebrated South African director Jyoti Mistry, will be screened at the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF), which opens on Thursday, 16 July, giving audiences a sneak preview prior to the film’s release in August. This follows the screening of the film in the Contemporary World Cinema section at the 2014 Toronto International Film Festival.

The film tells the story of a Special Crimes Unit investigator Dingande Fakude (Desmond Dube) and a local police detective and trained psychologist Naveed Khan (Vaneshran Arumugam), who find themselves caught up in political corruption and conspiracy when they investigate the gruesome murder of a cabinet minister's daughter, found in an exclusive African safari resort after a party celebrating her engagement to a rising political star.

A young couple, Derren (Bjorn Steinbach) and Echo (Alex McGregor), who were working as waiters at the engagement party, are taken in for questioning by the two lawmen. As they begin to piece events together, it becomes clear that there is much more to the high-profile murder case than first imagined. The two uncover a trail of murders and are faced with a moral dilemma involving the new political elite.

With the themes of corruption and brutality at its centre, Impunity is a profound investigation into contemporary South Africa and the seat of power. The film has been lauded for it rich visual language, which features picturesque beachfronts and bushveld, intercut with harsh CCTV footage. The Toronto Film Festival organisers described “Impunity” as “an eye-opening jolt, casting an unwavering gaze on South Africa's increasingly troubling surrender to the banality of violence.”

Mistry studied filmmaking and cinema studies at New York University. Her short films include “We Remember Differently” (2005) and “I Mike What I Like” (2006). “Impunity” is her second feature film, after “The Bull on the Roof” (2010). “Impunity” is produced by Shadowy Meadows Productions and Bioskope Pictures, with cinematography by Eran Tahor.

Impunity is being released by Indigenous Film Distribution at selected cinemas on 28 August.

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david alex wilson

cell: 27 83 629 2587 / e-mail: davidalex@madmoth.co.za

Dis Ek, Anna to Debut at DIFF 2015

Media Release

DIS EK, ANNA TO DEBUT AT DIFF 2015

Palama Productions will debut their latest feature film Dis ek, Anna at the Durban International Film Festival this year.  Based on the fictionalised autobiographical best-sellers Dis ek, Anna and Die Staat teen Anna Bruwer by Anchien Troskie, written under the pseudonym Elbie Lötter, and adapted for screen by Tertius Kapp, the film is produced by Niel van Deventer (Suurlemoen, Anderkant Gister) and directed by Sara Blecher (Ayanda, Otelo Burning). 

The film is a harrowing, but ultimately uplifting story of a young woman who finds the strength to pick up the pieces of her shattered world and forge a new life.  Anna Bruwer is sexually abused by her stepfather over a period of 8 years.  Unable confide in anyone, she is rendered voiceless and inhabits a shadow world of shame, foreboding and secrecy, until she is finally able to break free from her tormentor.

Dis ek, Anna stars Charlenè Brouwer (Vrou Soek Boer, Erfsondes, Binnelanders) in the title role with Marius Weyers (Faan se Trein, Die Wonderwerker), Nicola Hanekom (Hollywood in My Huis, Faan se Trein), Izel Bezuidenhout (Agent 2000), Morné Visser (Long Walk to Freedom, Skoonheid), Eduan van Jaarsveldt (Fanie Fourie’s Lobola,Long Walk to Freedom) and Drikus Volschenk (Long Walk to Freedom, Skoonheid).  Rounding out the cast is Dawid Minnaar, Elize Cawood, Hykie Berg, Kara van der Merwe and Fezile Mpela.

“Bringing this film to screen has been a labour of love,” says producer Niel van Deventer.  “It is very important to me to find projects that have the potential to become films that transcend the borders of our language and country.  Anna is certainly such a story.”

“We are thrilled to have Dis ek, Anna as part of our slate of films for 2015.  It is a remarkable film that raises the bar in terms of quality and performance,” says Driki van Zyl, General Manager: Times Media Films. “

Dis ek, Anna is being released by Times Media Films and will open at cinemas across the county on 30 October 2015.

End

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david alex wilson

Mad Moth Communications

Cell: 27 83 629 2587

e-mail: davidalex@madmoth.co.za

Triggerfish launches the Story Lab at Durban Film Mart

Media Release 

Triggerfish launches the Story Lab at Durban Film Mart

CAPE TOWN - After the international success of its first two feature films, Triggerfish Animation Studios is establishing The Triggerfish Story Lab with the support of The Department of Trade and Industry (the dti) and The Walt Disney Company.

Triggerfish will be investing up to R44m over the next three years in The Story Lab, which aims to give Africa’s most talented storytellers and filmmakers the opportunity to develop their ideas alongside Triggerfish’s international network of mentors. Selected storytellers will potentially have their concepts developed into episodic TV content or an animated feature film for the global market.

Triggerfish is conducting a continent-wide search for storytellers, which will be launched at the Durban Film Mart. These storytellers will be carefully selected, based not only on the creative and commercial merits of their concept, but also on their track record.

The entries will be evaluated by a high-profile panel of both local and international experts, including British director and co-founder of Aardman Peter Lord (Chicken Run, The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists), Hollywood writer Jonathan Roberts (The Lion King) and script consultant Karl Iglesias (Writing For Emotional Impact), and a panel of development executives from The Walt Disney Company, as well as South African storyteller Gcina Mhlope, comedian David Kau and Triggerfish’s development team of Anthony Silverston, Wayne Thornley and Raffaella Delle Donne.

Shortlisted storytellers will take part in workshops with leading Hollywood script consultant Pilar Alessandra, author of The Coffee Break Screenwriter.

The selected Story Lab participants will also receive two weeks of mentoring with key studio and television executives at Disney’s headquarters in Burbank, California.

“We are ready to bring a fresh voice to the world,” says Anthony Silverston, head of development at Triggerfish. “We believe there is extraordinary talent in Africa and the Story Lab is the perfect way to partner with them.”

“We are excited to be supporting Triggerfish on this innovative project,” says Christine Service, senior vice president and country manager of The Walt Disney Company Africa. “We believe the Story Lab provides a unique opportunity to discover this continent’s next generation of storytellers.”

“The dti is committed to developing a pool of creative talent that can produce international quality animation production scripts,” says Nelly Molokoane from the dti’s Film and TV Incentives Unit, adding that the department is honoured to support projects that will contribute to job creation.

“The Story Lab will be a great catalyst for African creativity on the global stage,” says Triggerfish CEO Stuart Forrest. “We look forward to opening up the Triggerfish production platform and our networks to the continent’s top creative talent."

The development process can take a number of years. For each phase of development, Triggerfish will provide financial support, workspace, and expert guidance by internal and international consultants and mentors, as well as a route to market through top-tier relationships with Hollywood agency William Morris Endeavor.

Animation has proven to be a successful medium for South African films to travel internationally, with Triggerfish’s films Adventures in Zambezia and Khumba being distributed in over 150 countries and dubbed into over 27 languages.

Applications are welcome from all writing and creative disciplines, not just experienced film and TV screenwriters. Applicants must be over 21 and either African citizens or permanent residents. Entries must be in English. Entries close 31 August 2015.

Full guidelines and an online application form are available at www.triggerfishstudios.com.  

Watch and embed the promo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qWjb0ksSqA.

Triggerfish will launch the Story Lab at Durban Film Mart on Sunday, 19 July 2015 from 2-3pm at Suite 5. Anthony Silverston will be in attendance and is available for interviews. 

-ENDS-

About Triggerfish Animation Studios:

Established in 1996, Triggerfish Animation Studios is a Cape Town-based film and entertainment company. The studio has produced two feature films: Adventures in Zambezia (2012), starring Jeremy Suarez, Abigail Breslin and Samuel L. Jackson, and Khumba (2013), starring Jake T. Austin, AnnaSophia Robb and Liam Neeson. The two movies are among the top five highest-grossing South African films of all time.

About The Walt Disney Company:
The Walt Disney Company, together with its subsidiaries and affiliates, is a leading diversified international entertainment and media enterprise with five business segments: media networks, parks and resorts, studio entertainment, consumer products and interactive. Disney is a Dow 30 company and had annual revenues of $48.8 billion in its fiscal year 2014.

Urucu Media launches inaugural South African edition of Cannes prestigious La Semaine de la Critique at DIFF 2015

Media Release

Urucu Media launches inaugural South African edition of Cannes prestigious La Semaine de la Critique at DIFF 2015

Urucu Media, one of South Africa’s newest feature film production houses, which recently produced the internationally acclaimed Necktie Youth, is proud to announce that they have partnered with Cannes’s La Semaine de la Critique (Critic’s Week) to host a dynamic selection of the top films emerging from this programme in recent years. 

The South African programme launches as part of the Durban International Film Festival 2015, at Cinecentre, Suncoast Casino on July 21, with the support of Institute Francaise. Five critically acclaimed films will be screened during the course of the festival with additional screenings scheduled for Johannesburg and Cape Town the following weekend.

Established in 1961, the Semaine De La Critique competition is dedicated to showcasing emerging filmmakers from around the world. Since it's inception the competition has featured the early works of numerous famous auteurs including Ken Loach, Wong Kar-Wai and Alejandro González Iñarritu.

The travelling Semaine de la Critique programme is part of a broader initiative by Urucu Media, supported by the French Institute of South Africa, to promote unique cinematic voices and innovation, while cultivating an audience for the types of films Urucu believes are worth making.

Opening the South African edition of La Semaine de la Critique is Hope, French writer-director, and documentarian, Boris Lojkine's first fiction film.

According to The Hollywood Reporter Hope is a “scrupulously well-researched” recounting of a journey of desperation taken by a Nigerian woman and a Cameroonian man across the Sahara in an attempt to reach Europe. Cine Europa Online highlighted the “incredible and moving realism that emerges reveals a director whose work should be kept an eye on.” 

Award winning director Lojkine will be in attendance at DIFF where he will present a Master Class, as part of the Talents Durban programme, on bringing reality and authenticity to fiction filmmaking.

Other films include The Kindergarten Teacher by Nadav Lapid (Israel, 2014) about a crèche teacher and aspiring poet, who discovers unusual poetic talent in her five-year old student. Informed by her own deprived past and a fear that the world will eat his sensitive soul alive, she takes it upon herself to protect the boy and the gift he carries.

Yann Gonzalez’s debut feature You And The Night by  (France, 2013) is an erotic-existential-queer comedy. Starring legendary French footballer Eric Cantona in the role of a well-hung stud/former child-poet and one of seven member of a meticulously cast orgy, it explores and intentionally confuses memory and fantasy.

From Italy and France comes Salvo the winner of last year’s La Semaine de la Critique of Cannes Film Festival directed byFabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza (2013). It tells the story of Salvo (Saleh Bakri) – a merciless body guard/hit man in Sicily’s underworld.  Meeting Rita (Sara Serraiocco), the blind sister of one of his victims – and a witness at that – changes not just Salvo’s life, but Rita’s too, and offers the pair a relief from the literal and metaphorical darkness in which they are stuck.

Writer/director Katell Quillévéré’s second feature, Suzanne  (France, 2013) follows Suzanne (Sara Forestier) during 25 years of her life. Suzanne grows up with her sister (Adèle Haenel) and widowed truck-driver father (François Damiens). When Suzanne falls pregnant while still in school, the family with its new member remains a tight unit, but when she falls in love with a gangster, the stability is threatened. 

 “My business partner, John Trengove and I are, incredibly excited about hosting the first official platform for La Semaine de la Critique in Africa and hope to cultivate strong local audience base for the wonderful films that emerge from this inspiring competition every year.” says Urucu’s Elias Ribeiro.

For more information about the La Semaine de la Critique go to www.urucumedia.com and for the Durban International Film Festival go to www.durbanfilmfest.co.za

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La Semaine de la Critique screening times:

Durban: Suncoast Casino

21st July         20:00   HOPE   - Opening Night Film - La Semaine de la Critique

22nd July        17:30   SALVO

23rd July         22:00   SUZANNE

24th July         17:30   THE KINDERGARTEN TEACHER

25th July         17:00   YOU AND THE NIGHT

Johannesburg: Rosebank Nouveau &

Cape Town: V&A Waterfront Nouveau

31st July         20:00   HOPE

1st August     17:30   SALVO
          

1st August     20:00   SUZANNE

2nd August    17:30   THE KINDERGARDEN TEACHER 

2nd August    20:00   YOU AND THE NIGHT 

Note to editors:

La Semaine de la Critique: The Films

Hope by Boris Lojkine (France, 2014, 91 min)

In his debut feature, the French helmer takes on the forever-relevant topic of migration from Africa to Europe. Léonard from Cameroon (Endurance Newton) and Hope from Nigeria (Justin Wang) form a contested partnership on their dangerous journey to Europe – a dreamland where even mosquitoes drink coca cola.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fycw0Q0ahlo

The Kindergarten Teacher by Nadav Lapid (Israel, 2014, 120 min.)

Nira (Sarit Larry), a crèche teacher and aspiring poet, discovers unusual poetic talent in Yoav (Avi Shnaidman), her five-year old student. Informed by her own deprived past and a fear that the world will eat his sensitive soul alive, she takes it upon herself to protect the boy and the gift he carries.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IP3Wo1uGzTk

You And The Night by Yann Gonzalez (France, 2013, 92 min.)

Gonzalez kick-started his feature film career with an erotic-existential-queer comedy. Starring legendary French footballer Eric Cantona in the role of a well-hung stud/former child-poet and one of seven member of a meticulously cast orgy, it explores and intentionally confuses memory and fantasy.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gS2q6AYBnkQ

Salvo by Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza (Italy/France, 2013, 110 min.)

The winner of La Semaine de la Critique of Cannes Film Festival 2014 tells the story of Salvo (Saleh Bakri) – a merciless body guard/hit man in Sicily’s underworld.  Meeting Rita (Sara Serraiocco), the blind sister of one of his victims – and a witness at that – changes not just Salvo’s life, but Rita’s too, and offers the pair a relief from the literal and metaphorical darkness in which they are stuck.

Trailer:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yI5qkz91ohU

Suzanne by Katell Quillévéré (France, 2013, 94 min.)

Writer/director Quillévéré’s second feature follows Suzanne (Sara Forestier) during 25 years of her life. Suzanne grows up with her sister (Adèle Haenel) and widowed truck-driver father (François Damiens). When Suzanne falls pregnant while still in school, the family with its new member remains a tight unit, but when she falls in love with a gangster, the stability is threatened. 

Trailer:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CJyzQ3CboJ8

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Artwatch Africa at Durban International Film Festival 2015

Media Release

Artwatch Africa at Durban International Film Festival 2015

Public interest in freedom of expression has escalated dramatically since the Charlie Hebdo killings in January. An Al-Jazeera news item reported that media coverage of freedom of expression jumped from 2% in 2014 to over 23% in early 2015. Whilst freedom of expression is a right widely enshrined in the constitutions of nations across Africa, these rights are frequently not upheld. It is not just political parties or journalists that are vulnerable constituencies, but also activists from the arts and culture sectors; increasingly in some countries, artists that speak out on social and political issues are subjected to harassment, censorship or even arrest.

These and related issues are a core feature of Arterial Network’s three-fold presence at the 36th edition of the Durban International Film Festival, as part of its Artwatch Africa artist rights programme.

Aimed at artists, cultural practitioners, journalists and human rights organisations, and coordinated by Arterial Network South Africa, a closed 3-day workshop provides an opportunity to deepen understanding of human rights, cultural rights and artist rights, and will empower advocacy activities for the promotion, monitoring and defence of freedom of creative expression within local contexts. Similar Artwatch Africa workshops have taken place in Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso, Mali, DRC, Uganda, Ghana, Cameroon, Namibia, Algeria, Zambia, Gabon, Tanzania, Republic of Congo, Benin, Kenya, Rwanda, Ivory Coast and Morocco during the past year.

An open-to-all session in conjunction with DIFF’s Talents programme is the  "Behind the Veil - Arterial Network and ArtWatch Africa Exchange on Creativity and Censorship" on 21st July at 14.00 in Suite 4, Elangeni Hotel. This interactive engagement explores censorship in Africa and includes a data gathering component aimed at understanding the nature of restrictions that inhibit artistic practice in respective countries.

Finally, during the Durban International Film Festival Award Night, an Artwatch Africa Award will be presented to an African film that meaningfully engages with the issues of Freedom of Expression. The Artwatch Africa project promotes the value of creative expression for society and the role creativity plays in personal development, social cohesion or social change; it recognises the transformative power of cinema and its importance in raising awareness and conscientisation. This award celebrates activism in the arts, and honours the courage of filmmakers and their subjects. The Award is accompanied by a R15,000 cash prize.

The Artwatch Africa Jury comprises Junaid Ahmed - award winning filmmaker; Gcina Mhlophe - award winning author, poet, playwright, director, performer and storyteller; René Alicia Smith - Executive Dean (Acting): Faculty of Arts & Design at Durban University of Technology; and Peter Rorvik - Secretary-General of Arterial Network.

Artwatch Africa is supported by Swedish Foundation for Human Rights, Swedish Postcode Lottery, Swedish Institute, HIVOS, Mimeta, Goethe Institute and Doen Foundation.

With representation in more than 40 African countries Arterial Network is engaged in building sustainable networks, information dissemination, training, policy formulation,advocacy, and African-centred research, all geared towards growing and strengthening the cultural and creative sectors in Africa.

Visit  www.arterialnetwork.org or call 021-4612023 for more information.

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AfriDocs Film Week 18- 22nd July @DIFF2015

AfriDocs Film Week  18- 22nd  July

Sub-Saharan Africa Broadcast Presents:

A WEEK OF AFRICAN STORIES – ON YOUR SCREEN

Following on from the success of 2014’s AfriDocs Film Festival on Your Screen, and once again in conjunction with the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) and DStv channel ED, AfriDocs is excited to present a full week of documentary films broadcast across sub-Saharan Africa on DStv channel ED (channel 190) and GOtv (channel 65).

From the 18th – 22nd of July, AfriDocs brings some of the best of DIFF to screens across Africa with eleven films from the festival to be screened. These films include award winning documentaries - The Shore Break, by Riley Grunenwald (South Africa), The Democrats by Camilla Nielsson (Zimbabwe), Beats of the Antonov by Hajooj Kuka (Sudan) and Coming of Age by Teboho Edkins (Lesotho).

There will also be daily live broadcasts with filmmakers and industry stakeholders from DIFF at 4pm  (Central/South African time), and screenings of documentary films from 5 – 10pm with eight hours of the Best of DIFF on the weekend of the 25th and 26th of July.

With the schedule on these days repeating every six hours, you can catch the live interviews and films three more times following the first broadcast.

This feast of documentary films is not to be missed, make sure to get the full schedule and follow all the updates from AfriDocs as they broadcast live from DIFF: www.facebook.com/AfriDocs , www.afridocs.net

Saturday 18th July

AfriPedia: Kenya | Teddy Goitom, Benjamin Taft, Senay Berhe | Kenya | 2014

‘Afripedia, Kenya’ takes an intimate look at Nairobi’s urban culture scene and its leading personalities and stars.

Miners Shot Down | Rehad Desai | SA | 2013

In August 2012, mineworkers in one of South Africa’s biggest platinum mines began a wildcat strike for better wages. Six days later the police used live ammunition to brutally suppress the strike, killing 34 and injuring many more.

The Future Sound of Mzansi | Lebogang Rasethaba, Nthato Mokgata (Spoek Mathambo) | SA | 2014

Welcome to the apartheid after-party! The film explores the past, present and future of the electronic music scene and its multiple sub-genres – the mission was simple: to meet up with some of their heroes, colleagues, competitors, and co-conspirators…an ever-potent gang of electronic music pioneers sculpting The Future Sound of Mzansi.

A Mother at Fifteen  - 14 min | Malawi | 2015

The Shore Break | Ryley Grunenwald | SA | 2014

Two cousins from South Africa’s Wild Coast have opposing plans to develop their land. Nonhle wants to develop eco-tourism in order to protect her community’s homes, farms, graves and traditional lifestyle while Madiba is planning a titanium mine and national tolled highway. Meanwhile, their King and Queen, who oppose the mine and highway, are deposed by the South African Government.

Sunday 19th July

The Dream of Shahrazad | Francois Verster | Egypt, Lebabon, Turkey | 2014

The Dream of Shahrazad is a feature-length documentary film which locates political expression before, during and after the Egyptian revolution – and also within recent times in Turkey and Lebanon – within a broader historical and cultural framework: that of storytelling and music.  More particularly, it looks at the legacy of the famous collection of stories known as THE 1001 (or “ARABIAN”) NIGHTS.

Gareth’s Story  - 11 min

Beats of the Antonov | Hajooj Kuka | Sudan | 2014

Beats of the Antonov is a feature documentary about the people of the Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains in Sudan, during civil war. The film explores how music binds a community together, offering hope and a common identity for refugees engaged in a fierce battle to protect cultural traditions and heritage from those trying to obliterate them.

AfriPedia: Senegal | Teddy Goitom, Benjamin Taft, Senay Berhe | Senegal | 2014 |

Dakar has quickly become one of the most buzzing cities on the continent, infused by a new sense of creativity that cross-pollinates influences across genres and cultures

Shake the Dust | Adam Sjoberg | Global | 2014

From executive producer and rapper Nasir “Nas” Jones and journalist-turned-filmmaker Adam Sjöberg, Shake the Dust chronicles the influence of breakdancing, exploring how it strikes a resonant chord in the slums, favelas and ghettos of the world and far beyond. Showcasing some of the most jaw-dropping breakdancing moves ever committed to film, Shake the Dust is an inspiring tribute to the uplifting power of music and movement.

Monday, 20 July

Afripedia | Teddy Goitom, Benjamin Taft & Senay Berhe | Ghana|  2014

The whispers among connoisseurs talk about Accra as the next big hotspot for African cultural production, and ‘Afripedia, Ghana’ suggest they’re not wrong.

Concerning Violence| Göran Olsson | Africa | 2014

Internationally awarded documentary about the African liberation struggles of the 1960s and 1970s. It combines newly discovered archival material depicting some of the most daring moments in the confrontation with colonial powers. Narrated by Lauryn Hill, with text based on Frantz Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth.

The Democrats | Camilla Nielsson | Zimbawe | 2014

In politically unstable Zimbabwe, a new constitution is being put together by the ruling party of strongman Robert Mugabe and the divided opposition. Various political, local and personal interests are bogging the process down.

Coming of Age | Teboho Edkins | Lesotho | 2015

Coming of Age is a film that follows teenagers over two years as they grow up deep in the southern African mountain kingdom of Lesotho. Lefa, sees her world fall apart when her best friend Senate leaves the village, and must decide whether to stay or leave in search of a better education. Retabile takes care of the family’s livestock up in a remote cattle post, helped by his younger brother Mosaku, who watches as he goes through a rite of passage that marks his transition into manhood. The summer of youth is quickly over, doors into adulthood open and close.

The Cessation | Lotte Manicom | South Africa | 2014

Angola was subject to brutal conflicts that raged for over forty years. Thousands of refugees fled over the borders into neighbouring countries in search of a safe haven. Many came to the coastal city of Cape Town, on the western coast of South Africa. Here, in exile, the Angolan community created thriving businesses and families of their own. Now, twenty years on, this diaspora is facing a new challenge. In 2013, the South African government ended their refugee protection. This short documentary follows three members of this vibrant Angolan diaspora in Cape Town as it maps the impact of this Cessation on their lives.

Tuesday, 21 July

Afripedia | Teddy Goitom, Benjamin Taft & Senay Berhe | Angola|  2014

Welcome to Angola, home of heavy electro music known as kuduro. Follow us across the pulsating city of Luanda as we delve into the kuduro evolution and meet the people charting its course.

Under African Skies Joe Berlinger | South Africa | 2012

Paul Simon returns to South Africa to explore the journey of his Graceland album, including the political backlash he received for allegedly breaking the UN cultural boycott of South Africa designed to end the Apartheid regime.

Paths to Freedom | Richard Pakleppa | Namibia | 2015

Paths to Freedom tells of the origins of Namibian nationalism in the 1950’s and how Namibian  peasants and migrant labourers created a guerilla army to fight the illegal occupation of their country by South Africa.  Utilizing extensive archive, struggle music and eye witness accounts Paths to Freedom tells this story of David rising against Goliath against all odds.

The Man in Me – 15 min | Lesotho | 2014

Fonko: New Music from West Africa | Lamin Daniel Jadama,  Lars Lovén | 2014 |

Dakar is the unrivalled centre for the West African hip hop-scene and coupé- décalé is now a major influence all over West Africa. In Burkina Faso the name and speeches of Thomas Sankara is used by musicians to protest against injustices and corruption. In Benin, the veterans of Orchestre Polyrytmo give a historic background to the music scene of today. Narrated by Neneh Cherry.

Wednesday, 22 July

Afripedia | Teddy Goitom, Benjamin Taft & Senay Berhe |South Africa|  2014

Twenty years after liberation, ‘Afripedia, South Africa’ portrays a diverse new generation that is helping redefine the legacy of the post-apartheid Rainbow Nation.

When Voices Meet | Nancy Sutton Smith | South Africa | 2015 | 86 min

When Nelson Mandela was finally released from prison, courageous South African musicians broke through Apartheid’s barriers to form a 500-voice, multiracial children’s choir. Threatened with bombs and thwarted at every turn, they prevailed and railroaded across the country aboard The Peace Train. When Voices Meet documents the trials, tribulations and triumphs of those musician activists and young choir members. They performed together for seven years; never lost touch with one another; and then reunited 20 years later.

Cartoonists: Foot Soldiers of Democracy | Stéphanie Valloatto | France |

12 lovable lunatics, capturing the comic and tragic in all four corners of the earth: cartoonists who risk their lives to defend democracy, with a smile on their faces and a pencil as their only weapon.

Fonko: South Africa/ Nigeria | Lamin Daniel Jadama,  Lars Lovén | 2014

South Africa and Nigeria are two countries with a troubled past, that have today become the economic and cultural super powers of the continent. South Africa is the home to styles like kwaito, SA House and Shangaan electro, which is possibly the fastest club music in the world.

Nigeria is a country of extreme income gaps, deeply rooted corruption and violent religious conflicts. Here you find the most commercial music on the continent. But also fierce protest music, as artists are trying to carry on the work from the late Fela Kuti. one of the most hard-core protest singers of all times.

AfriDocs screens every THURSDAY at 8pm Central African time (GMT + 2) on DStv ED Channel 190 & GoTV across sub-Saharan Africa.

For the full programme schedule and synopses of the films, please go to www.afridocs.net or www.facebook.com/AfriDocs

You can also follow AfriDocs on twitter: @Afri_Docs

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Issued on behalf of Afridocs

Inspiring Sudanese documentary gives a human face to al-Bashir's victims - at the DIFF

Inspiring Sudanese documentary gives a human face to al-Bashir's victims - at the DIFF 

One of the most uplifting films at this year’s Durban International Film Festival is also an indictment of Sudan’s current president, Omar al-Bashir.

Beats of The Antonov, directed by Hajooj Kuka gives a human face to the victims of al-Bashir, who was allowed to leave South Africa last month, flouting a court order and international convention.

The documentary tells the story of the people of the Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains in Sudan, who fought with the South for independence but now remain trapped in a civil war in the North.

The Antonov in the title refers to the planes that drop bombs on the civilian population there. As Nuba Reports wrote in The Daily Maverick just after al-Bashir’s escape, “As South Africa dissects the implications of President Omar al-Bashir’s visit, and his illegal departure, it’s worth remembering that although the International Criminal Court wants him for crimes committed years ago, the Sudanese president is still in power – and he’s still dropping cluster bombs on civilians.”

The documentary depicts al-Bashir not just as the kind of leader who drops bombs on unarmed civilians, but also as a racist, dividing his country along racial and ethnic lines, waging war “against all the African elements in Sudan.” As CityPress wrote in their review, al-Bashir’s "quest for a purely Arab state leaves the other 156 cultural African groups unaccounted for. Bashir calls these people 'black sacks' and vows to wipe them out.” 

According to The Mail and Guardian, the ANC described the decision to aide al-Bashir’s escape as “choosing African unity over the law.” But after watching the film, you’ll be left asking whether a stand for African unity shouldn’t rather be a stand with the people of the Blue Nile and Nuba Mountains, not with those trying to Arabicize them. The documentary is not anti-Islamic; it just argues that you can be Muslim without needing to be culturally Arabic, that you can embrace being an African Muslim rather than forcing everyone to be an Arabic one. 

This may all sound like unlikely source material for the most uplifting film at the Durban International Film Festival, but Beats of the Antonov is a celebration of the human spirit and of the Sudanese people South African president Jacob Zuma failed to protect when he had the chance. These are people who laugh after surviving an air-raid, who dance all-night to stay awake while on sentry duty; this is a place where music is as integral a part of society as water, food and air, a place where there is no separation between the musicians and their audience. 

As refugee Insaf Rawad says in the film, “Culture protects us. If people don’t release their pain, they will become miserable, without these parties to lift their spirits. When people are anxious and disturbed, dancing helps them get over it.”

Similarly, ethnomusicologist Sarah Mohamed says, "Truly there is an alternative Sudan, other than the fake one presented to us in the capital Khartoum. There is a happy smiling Sudan that loves life.”

Beats of the Antonov has charmed audiences around the world, even winning The People’s Choice Documentary Award at The Toronto International Film Festival and four other international awards. Sudanese filmmaker hajooj kuka directed and shot the documentary over two years, at immense personal risk. He also produced alongside South African Steven Markovitz, as a coproduction between Sudanese production company Refugee Club and South African company Big World Cinema. South African Khalid Shamis edited the documentary with Hajooj Kuka in Cape Town. 

“I urge all South Africans to see this film,” says Steven. “This film turns the notion of Africa as a continent of victims on its head and shows the incredible resilience of Sudanese people at a time of great adversity. They deserve our support ’’

Hajooj Kuka will be attending the Durban International Film Festival, where Beats of the Antonov is in competition. The documentary premieres on Saturday, 18 July 2015 at 6pm at Suncoast. 

Watch and embed the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fi3ronTd3xg. 

What people are saying: 

"I was quite wrong about where Beats of the Antonov would take me… Despite its vicious political plot, Beats of the Antonov is a story of triumph. The very thing that the dominant regime wishes to stamp out – black African identity – is what saves these people from complete desolation. By gathering to make music in local languages, and pass on these cultural practices to a new generation, they sing their identity into being: a defeat of the Bashir project.” Binwe Adebayo, CityPress

"Every now and then, it seems as if there is nothing new out there. Everything seems derivative, repetitive or just plain bland. As a filmmaker, I sometimes go through moments of extreme lack of inspiration; and even question my choice of career. And then an unexpected spark happens to light the way. Beats of the Antonov… is such a spark… Kuka paints a beautiful picture of music, war and identity in the Blue Nile and Nuba regions, and the film is unlike anything I have ever seen… Beats of the Antonov and its infectious music stayed with me for days after viewing it… With more films like this coming from African directors, we could be witnessing the start of a new canon of African film.” Dylan Valley, Africa Is A Country

‘’Beats of the Antonov is a true standout…’’ Variety

“Equal parts war-documentary and visual ethnomusicology project…  a nuanced portrayal of cultural identity, the trauma of civil war, and what it means to be Sudanese today.” OkayAfrica

"With agile camerawork that dances amongst the colourful scarves of mothers and girls, that huddles in lamp-lit tents and dives into trenches to escape a passing bomber, filmmaker and war reporter Hajooj Kuka weaves a thread where life daily teeters on a knife edge and, nonetheless, goes on.” Encounters programmer Jenna Bass

"Despite the loss and brutality that these people have faced, they remain joyful and are almost always singing. They have lost their homes, loved ones, and livelihoods and yet they remain singing and laughing because they are still alive and have survived another day.” Mia Pepler, CreativesJoint

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Durban FilmMart 2015 announces partners' awards for this year's market

Media Release

Durban FilmMart 2015 announces partners’ awards for this year’s market

The Durban FilmMart (DFM), the joint initiative of the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) and Durban Film Office (DFO) the film industry development arm of the City of Durban, which takes place from July 17 to 20, has announced partners’ awards for this year’s market, with an exciting new award being presented by the Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program.

Considered one of Africa’s most important film finance platforms and industry gatherings, the FilmMart sees about 500 film-makers from around the globe, with a significant representation from Africa, attend the festival for four days of industry development forums and networking sessions. An integral part of the DFM is the finance and co-production forum, which this year has 10 features and nine documentary films selected for intense mentoring and pitch sessions to financiers and distributors, and other industry representatives.

Over the years the DFM has developed key relationships with a myriad industry partners that have seen the value of supporting and developing African content for both continental and global markets.

This year the Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program will award a documentary film project that demonstrates potential for strong storytelling craft, artistic use of visual language, originality, feasibility, and relevance with a cash award of $7000 for further development. “In light of the tremendous talent for documentary filmmaking in Africa and the significant work of the DFM to celebrate those artists, the award is designed to contribute to and support the work of an African non-fiction filmmaker.” explains Rahdi Taylor, Film Fund Director of the Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program. “In supporting a broad spectrum of cinematic and creative non-fiction projects globally, Sundance Institute embraces contemporary storytellers as part of the collective consciousness of culture, and documentary film as a vital contributor to the language of the 21st century.”

Partners and awards this year include:

Afridocs, the broadcast stream that sees African and other international documentaries screened across 49 countries of sub-Saharan Africa on a weekly basis, will offer a €3000 grant for one outstanding documentary project.

The CineMart Award, sponsored by the co-production market of the International Film Festival Rotterdam, provides a fiction project with an opportunity to attend the Rotterdam Lab, a five-day training and networking event bringing together producers from all over the world.

The International Documentary Film Festival of Amsterdam (IDFA) awards the most promising documentary project at the DFM with an opportunity to attend the  IDFA Forum, the largest and most influential meeting place for documentary filmmakers, producers, commissioning editors, funds, private financiers and other documentary stakeholders in Europe, from November 23 to 25.

The New Cinema Network awards will give an official project an opportunity to attend the 10th edition NCN in Rome, where the producer/director will be able to present the project to film companies at an international level.

Produire au Sud of Festival des 3 Continents (Nantes), will give one fiction project an opportunity to attend its developmental workshop program, PAS, where they will be given tools, expertise, and opportunities to develop European networks.

The Restless Pitch award, is a one-year representation deal for the project by Restless Talent Management, who provide development services such as image-building and positioning, project packaging, PR, and advises its clients on film sales, distribution and promotion.

Durban’s Videovision Entertainment, will once again award the “Best South African Film Project” a prize valued at R75 000, which guarantees its release once it is completed. The prize includes marketing and distribution support from Videovision Entertainment.   

‘We are immensely grateful to all our partners for the generous opportunities they have created for the DFM selected projects,” says Toni Monty of the Durban Film Office. “For independent film-makers, this is such an ideal opportunity to take their projects to the next level through the mentorship and support provided at the Market. We are looking forward to a robust and stimulating market this year, and seeing how the projects will evolve and develop through the  DFM process.”

For more information about the DFM go to www.durbanfilmmart.com.

-ends

Wavescape Surf Film Festival

Media Release

Wavescape Surf Film Festival

To mark a decade of bringing the best surfing films to Durban, the Wavescape Surf Film Festival has announced a record lineup of 23 movies over a week at the 36th Durban International Film Festival, which takes place from July 16 to 26.

Every conceivable film technique and technology is represented in an extraordinary selection of films, according to Spike from Wavescape, co-director of the Wavescape festival. “We have some excellent documentaries, including the hair-raising story of the Signal Hill Speed Run in California that started downhill skateboard racing.”

Wavescape 2015 boasts 12 short films and 11 medium or feature length movies that reflect a unique diversity. A unique trilogy of poetic shorts form a beautiful rendition of surfing in the UK: Sea Fever - and Irish film set to a John Masefield poem and gritty black and white footage; Edges of Sanity - a uniquely powerful piece narrated by Charles Dance who plays Tywin Lannister in Game of Thrones; and Chasing Rumours - moving from the clamour of a football match at Newcastle United to the nearby Tyne River where storm waves pound grimy shores.

Included are films from the most remote wildernesses of Alaska (Arctic Swell) and the Arctic Circle (The Cradle of Storms). But from these frozen wastelands and frigid waves we sweep to the translucent tropical waters and reefs of Indonesia in the Mentawai Drone Movie, a short shot entirely by aerial drone.

“Don’t miss the languidly beautiful pace of Bella Vita that takes us to Tuscany as an Italian surfer and activist retraces his ancient roots, or the hard-hitting feminist film Flux: Redefining Women's Surfing that ask serious questions of the surf industry.”

"One of my favourite shorts is Narcose, an artistically rendered account of world apnea free diving champion Guillaume Néry's hallucinations caused by 'raptures of the deep' during one of his dives," says Spike.

There are films about skateboarding in the urban precincts of Cape Town, and keeping within themes of sustainability, two South African shorts about wooden surfboard craftsman. From the epic surfing and slo-mo definition of worldclass surfing in Attractive Distractions, we move to Always on the Road, a beautifully shot film that traces the old surf routes of Europe along the Basque countryside, as well as France and Portugal.

There are obligatory soul surfing movies (I Had Too Much To Dream Last Night, Missing, Rail to Rail and Se7en Signs) to a heady mix of high action surfing that can be found in Missing, Attractive Distractions, Strange Rumblings in Shangri La and Pipeline and Kelly Slater.

And with any selection of surf films, there is the whacky wildcard: Expencive Porno Movie (sic) spoofs the "surf porn” genre, of endless shots of waves and wave-riding, with a cheesy 1960's Austin Powers theme. The widest collection yet hails from locations such as Namibia, Cape Town, Hawaii, California, Indonesia, Portugal, Spain, Alaska, Patagonia, and Australia.

The free outdoor screening at the Bay of Plenty takes place Sunday 19 July.

Ster Kinekor Musgrave screenings are from from Monday, 20 July to Saturday, 25 July.

Films are R35 at Musgrave. 

See www.wavescapefestival.com and www.durbanfilmfest.co.za

 Tickets for Musgrave available from www.sterkinekor.com

Social Media

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#DIFF2015

-ends

36th Durban International Film Festival - Programme Announced

36th DURBAN INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 16-26 JULY 2015 - PROGRAMME ANNOUNCED

This July sees the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) return for its 36th year of cinematic celebration. From 16 to 26 July, the city will be illuminated by the wonder and diversity of global cinema, with over 200 screenings in 9 venues across the city. Alongside this selection of the best of contemporary cinema, including 74 feature films, 50 documentaries, 74 short films and 23 surf films, the festival offers an extensive workshop and seminar programme in which industry experts from around the world share their knowledge and skills.

This year's diverse line-up includes an expanded focus on African cinema with a selection of Africa’s Lost Classics and a showcase of this year’s FESPACO winners. Other focus areas include a cross-section of contemporary cinema from Brazil and an investigation into the filmmaking landscape of a changing Tunisia, as well DIFF Beat, which celebrates a number of music-based films, and Just One Earth, which presents a selection of environmentally- and sustainability themed titles. In addition to the generous selection of feature films and cutting edge documentaries, DIFF 2015 will screen 10 packages of short films and a selection of thrilling surf films in the Wavescape Surf Film Festival.

South African Focus

While DIFF is a vital showcase for the ever-expanding African film industry, South African film remains the festival’s key focus, with 14 feature and 13 documentary films and 30 short films – most of them receiving their world premieres on Durban screens.

This year’s opening night film see the African premiere of Ayanda, the second fiction feature film from South African filmmaker Sara Blecher who opened the festival in 2011 with Otelo Burning. Ayanda tells the story of single-minded 21-year-old Afro-hipster Ayanda (Fulu Mugovhani) who has a talent for taking neglected pieces of furniture and bringing them back to life. Eight years after her father’s death, his prized auto repair garage is in financial trouble and in danger of being sold, but Ayanda does everything in her power to hold onto his legacy.

Then there’s Breathe – Umphefumlo, the Isango Ensemble’s contemporary adaptation of Puccini’s La Boheme, the low-budget horror The Actor from Aiden Whytock, the politically inclined Bonnie-and-Clyde tale Impunity from Jyoti Mistry and the long awaited Necktie Youth from Sibs Shongwe-Le Mer. Other South African fiction feature films include Dis Ek, Anna, based on the famous Afrikaans novel and directed by Sara Blecher, and the dramatic thriller Lady Grey from Alain Chouquart.

South African documentaries include Blood Lions, which follows a South African conservationist and an American hunter on their journey through the lion hunting industry, Coming of Age, which follows the lives of two teenagers in Lesotho, Glory Game – The Joost van der Westhuizen Story, which chronicles the famous rugby player’s battle with Motor Neuron Disease, and The Shore Break which documents the attempts by a foreign mining company to mine titanium in the Eastern Cape. 

African Focus

The rich programme of films from elsewhere on the continent includes a number of strong directorial talents. From South Africa’s Mpumelelo Mcata comes the challenging documentary-hybrid Black President. Philippe Lacôte’s Run is a left-field masterpiece from Côte d’Ivoire and Uganda delivers the goods with The Boda Boda Thieves, the latest title from vivacious creative co-operative Yes! That’s Us.

African documentaries include the powerful Beats of the Antonov which portrays the musical lives of a war-torn community in Sudan, the remarkable Sembene! which documents the life and career of African master Ousmane Sembene and Paths to Freedom, which explores the genesis of Namibia's armed struggle against South Africa.

Africa’s Lost Classics is a selection providing a rare opportunity for viewers to catch some of the most powerful and idiosyncratic works from the continent’s rich film history. The selection comprises the previously lost masterpiece Come Back, Africa, the seminal Mapantsula from Oliver Schmitz and The Blue Eyes of Yonta by pioneering Guinea-Bissau filmmaker Flora Gomes, as well as Badou Boy and Touki Bouki, both from African master Djibril Diop Mambety.

FESPACO Stallions

In a special tribute to African cinema, DIFF 2015 features six winners from the 2015 edition of the Pan-African Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou, or FESPACO. These include amongst others Fevers, which tells the story of Benjamin, who moves in with his father and grandparents in a Paris suburb in order to avoid foster-care. Sékou Traoré’s feature debut film The Eye of the Cyclone, a psychological drama about a young lawyer who has been appointed a case that no one else wants, and Rehad Desai’s Miners Shot Down which returns to DIFF after being celebrated at FESPACO this year.

WORLD CINEMA

Following its rich tradition of world cinema, DIFF 2015 presents a diverse showcase of films from around the world. 1000 Rupee Note from India tells the story of a poor old widow named Budhi who receives a gift of several 1000 Rupee notes from a politician. A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night bills itself as the first Iranian Vampire Western, while Dealer, from France, documents 24 hours in the increasingly hellish life of a small time drug dealer. Bob And The Trees tells the story of Bob, a 50-year-old logger in rural Massachusetts with a soft spot for golf and gangster rap. Jean-Jacques Annaud’s visually spectacular film Wolf Totem from France and China, Roger Allers’s animation of Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet, Gregg Araki’s dramatic thriller White Bird in a Blizzard, Kim Farrant’s uneasy drama Strangerland set in Australia, and Chinese director Zhang Yimou’s drama romance, Coming Home contribute to the richly textured programme this year.

Documentaries

This year’s festival will once more play host to a sterling selection of documentaries from around the world. The American Film (Dis)Honesty – The Truth About Lies explores the complex impact dishonesty has on our lives and our societies. Cartoonists: Foot Soldiers of Democracy, from France, tells the story of 12 cartoonists and their fight for equality, accountability and transparency. Democrats, from Denmark, tells the unique story of the political elite in Zimbabwe fighting the battle over the principles defining the country's possible future. Foodies, from Sweden, follows five of the world's most renowned foodies on their hunt for the most exclusive nourishment in the world, while Taxi, from banned Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, takes us on a vibrant and colourful journey through the streets of Tehran. This year will also screen Joshua Oppenheimer highly acclaimed follow up to his Academy Award Nominated documentary The Act of Killing, his second film The Look of Silence sees a family that survives the genocide in Indonesia confronts the men who killed one of their brothers.

Brazilian Focus

Like South Africa, Brazil is a country defined by glaring inequality and cultural polarity. It also has a rich culture of cinema and a remarkably diverse national canon. Offering a window on to this complex and diverse country, Brazilian Vision presents a wide range of films from different regions in Brazil, providing an incisive overview of its considerable cinematic output. From the north-east state of Pernambuco comes two celebrated feature films: The History of Eternity by Camilo Cavalcanti and the moving Brazilian Dream, an opera movie depicting the Brazilian economic crisis. From the capital Brasília comes White Out, Black In, which portrays a country longing for transformation, while The Ballad of Poor Jean deals with the huge social divide between rich and poor in the country.

Tunisian Focus

The explosion of free speech that followed the Tunisian revolution in January 2011 gave birth to new cinematographic voices as young filmmakers armed themselves with cameras to express their points of view on a newly emerging society. The selection which are all in Arabic with English subtitles, includes amongst others Néjib Belkadhi Bastard (Bastardo), Kaouther Ben Hania’s Challet Of Tunis (Le Challet De Tunis), Raja Amari’s Tunisian Spring (Printemps Tunisien),, Hamza Ouni’s El Gort and Mohamed Challouf’s Tahar Cheriaa Under the Shadow of the Baobab which documents the undisputed father of Pan-Africanism and founder of film Carthage Film Festival, the first film festival in Africa who deployed all his energy to create the first authentic images of post-colonial Africa enabling African cinema to contribute to the modernization of the continent.

Semaine de la Critique in South Africa

DIFF, with the support of the French Institute of South Africa and Urucu Media, presents a traveling programme of La Semaine de la Critique (Critics’ Week) of Cannes Film Festival which will launch in Durban before travelling to Cape Town and Johannesburg. Featured films include amongst others Hope, Boris Lojkine’s takes on migration from Africa to Europe, You and the Night, an erotic-existential-queer comedy from Yann Gonzalez.  As well as these screenings, La Semaine de la Critique in South Africa features a master class with visiting filmmaker Boris Lojkine in Durban and filmmaker round tables in Cape Town and Johannesburg.

DIFF BEAT

With DIFF Beat, the festival pays tribute to musical freethinkers and rule-breakers. Filmmaker Adam Sjöberg and rap superstar Nasir ‘Nas’ Jones explore breakdancing and hip-hop in unlikely places in the film Shake the Dust. Tango Negro: The African Roots of Tango intersperses dance and musical performances with interviews with tango-lovers and experts, while Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck blends Cobain’s personal archive with touching interviews with his family. Imagine Waking up Tomorrow and All Music Has Disappeared comes from cult musician/art terrorist Bill Drummond, and When Voices Meet tells the story of therapist Sharon Katz and singer/educator Nonhlanhla Wanda’s 500-voice multiracial choir.

Just One Earth

Just One Earth offers a selection of films that promote sustainable living and raise awareness about the ecological threats we are facing. All the Time in the World tells the story of Canadian filmmaker Suzanne Crocker and her family who decide to take time out from their lives and relocate to the wilds. In Energised filmmaker Hubert Canaval explores how profit-driven efforts ensure that both alternative energy solutions and the threats to our existence posed by today’s main sources of energy remain largely unknown to the public. In Just Eat It: A Food Waste Story, filmmaker Grant Baldwin and producer/writer Jen Rustemeyer explore why nearly 50% of the food produced in Canada ends up in the trash. Finally, the extraordinary Virunga tells of a group of park-rangers in the Democratic Republic of Congo who have devoted their lives to saving the gorillas in Virunga National Park.

Wavescape Surf Film Festival

The 10th Wavescape Surf Festival at DIFF celebrates a decade of films and events around ocean sustainability and beach culture. From Sunday 19 to Saturday 25 July, Wavescape will showcase the latest surf films from around the world. In keeping with tradition, the Wavescape premiere will take place under the stars at the Bay of Plenty lawns on Sunday 19 July, followed by screenings at Ster Kinekor Musgrave until 25 July.

Talents Durban

The 8th Talents Durban will bring together 40 selected filmmakers from 10 different countries in Africa, chosen from over 200 submissions, who will take part in a series of masterclasses, workshops and industry networking opportunities during the festival. Supported by the KwaZulu-Natal Film Commission, Goethe Institute SA, German Embassy in South Africa and Gauteng Film Commission, Talents Durban is presented in co-operation with Berlinale Talents. Talents Durban is a platform for African filmmakers to enhance their skills, develop collaborations and interface with the film industry in Africa and beyond.

Durban FilmMart

Now in its 6th year, the Durban FilmMart, a partnership project with the Durban Film Office and the Durban International Film Festival, is a film finance and co-production market presented in three strands – Finance Forum, Master Classes and the Africa in Focus seminars. 19 selected African projects (10 fiction features and 9 documentaries) will have an opportunity to hold one-on-one meetings with potential financiers, co-producers, and distributors in the Finance Forum. Projects will also have an opportunity to pitch to a panel of international commissioning editors and financiers in the African Pitch, a pitching forum of the DFM. See www.durbanfilmmart.com for further details.

Ticketing

DIFF 2015’s principal screening venues are Suncoast CineCentre, Ster Kinekor Musgrave, Cinema Nouveau Gateway, Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre, Ekhaya Multi-Arts Centre in KwaMashu and the Tsogo Sun Elangeni Hotel. Other venues include the Bay of Plenty Lawns, the KZNSA Gallery, the Denis Hurley Centre, Sizakala Centre in Clermont, the Durban Music School and the Luthuli Museum on the North Coast. The festival hub is once more housed at the Tsogo Sun Elangeni Hotel.

Tickets should be acquired through the respective venues. Prices range from R20 to R40, except at Luthuli Museum, Ekhaya, Elangeni Hotel, the Denis Hurley Centre, Sizakala Centre in Clermont, the Durban Music School and Bay of Plenty lawns, which are free of charge.

Programme booklets with the full screening schedule and synopses of all the films are available free at screening venues and other public information outlets. Full festival details can also be found on www.durbanfilmfest.co.za or by calling 031 260 2506 or 031 260 1816.

The 36th Durban International Film Festival is organised by the Centre for Creative Arts at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (a special project of the Deputy Vice Chancellor of Humanities, Cheryl Potgieter) with support from the National Film and Video Foundation, KwaZulu-Natal Department of Economic Development & Tourism, KwaZulu-Natal Film Commission, City of Durban, German Embassy, Goethe Institut, Industrial Development Corporation, KwaZulu-Natal Department of Arts and Culture and a range of other valued partners.

Durban FilmMart Success Stories 2010-2015

Media Release

Durban FilmMart Success Stories 2010-2015

Now in its sixth year, the Durban FilmMart (DFM) has become an integral part of the fast-growing South African film industry. Since its inception in 2010, DFM has helped to facilitate more than 80 African co-production projects, many of which have subsequently been produced as acclaimed films. As the African and South African industry grows, the quality and volume of submitted projects has increased every year, making DFM the leading independent film market on the continent and a major force in the facilitation of successful African films.

As a result of DFM’s success, the Durban International Film Festival now regularly includes works from DFM alumni in its programme. Major fiction projects from the last 6 years that have had their genesis at DFM and were subsequently screened at DIFF include Ayanda (DFM 2013), the opening film at this year’s festival, the acclaimed Boda Boda Thieves (DFM 2011) from Ugandan co-operative Yes! That’s Us films and Imbabazi: The Pardon (DFM 2012), a personal account of the Rwandan genocide. Non-fiction films which have been screened at DIFF and made a major splash around the world include the South African gangster documentary Devil’s Lair (DFM 2012), Unearthed (DFM 2013) which explores the dangers of fracking and The Shore Break (DFM 2012), a vitally important film that chronicles the attempt of an international mining company to mine for titanium in one of the world’s last untouched natural areas.

Fiction Film Success Stories

The Nigerian film Confusion Na Wa  was a DFM project in 2010 and went on to win best film at the 2013 African Movie Awards, as well as other awards around the world. A dark comedy about a group of strangers whose fates become intertwined over the course of 24 hours, Confusion Na Wa was produced by Tom Rowlands-Rees and directed by Kenneth Gyang.

Imbabazi: the Pardon was one of the selected project at DFM in 2011, as a result of which producer-director Joel Karekezi attended the Rotterdam Lab in 2012. A very personal story about the genocide that took place in Rwanda, the film screened at DIFF 2014 as well as other festivals around the world, from Chicago to Luxor.

A Shot at the Big Time (DFM 2012) is inspired by the true story of director Janet van Eeden's brother, Jimmy, who took his own life rather than fight in the Apartheid border war.  After receiving its world premiere at DIFF, the film was selected for the Cannes Court Metrage, the short film corner of the official Cannes Festival 2014. The film was later nominated for Best Director and Best Original Screenplay at the Independent Mzansi Short Film Festival. The feature film version of A Shot at the Big Time is currently in production.

Boda Boda Thieves began its life as a pitch at DFM 2011 and has gone on to receive international acclaim. A collaboration between South African producer James Tayler and Kenyan producer Sarah Muhoho, the project was awarded the CineMart Rotterdam Lab award at DFM and went on to win a Highlight Pitch Award at the Berlin Film Festival’s Talent Project Market.  The Boda Boda Thievestells the tale of a poverty-stricken family from Kampala, Uganda, who support themselves by driving a motorcycle taxi or ‘boda-boda’. Both producers and the film’s director Donald Mugisha are passionate about creating and developing content for African cinema, which they believe expresses a “proud identity of humanity, heritage and culture”.

Ayanda, which was selected as a project for DFM in 2013, will be opening the 36thedition of the Durban International Film Festival. Directed by Sara Blecher and produced by Terry Pheto, the film tells the story of a 21-year-old woman who fights to save her late father’s motor repair shop when it is threatened with closure.Ayanda received its world premiere at the Los Angeles Film Festival in June this year where it was awarded a special mention in the world fiction category.

Documentary Success Stories

South African director Mayenzeke Baza's short documentary film Ndiyindoda (I Am a Man) tackles male circumcision, highlighting the dilemma it poses for South Africa as the country forges a position for itself in the modern world and attempts to reconcile its strongest traditions with newly enshrined democratic rights.Produced by Andy Jones, the project won Most Promising Documentary at DFM 2011, enabling Baza and Roughton to attend the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) later that year. The film premiered at the Encounters documentary festival and went on to be nominated for two South African Film and Television Awards (SAFTA) in 2014. The film also screened on the international news channel Al Jazeera and has helped to established Baza as a significant force in the South African film industry.

Devils Lair chronicles the life of a convicted murderer and gang leader named Braam as he comes to terms with a lifetime of dubious choices. Producer Neil Brandt and director Riaan Hendricks won Most Promising Documentary Project at DFM 2012 – which came with the opportunity to participate at IDFA Summer School and to pitch at the IDFA Forum The film went on to premiere at Hot Docs and became one of the highlights of DIFF 2013. It received three nominations at the SAFTAs in 2014, going on to win Best Feature and Best Editor, as well as numerous other awards at festivals around the world.

Unearthed, directed by Jolynn Minnaar and produced by Dylan Voogt, Stacey Keppler and Saskia Schiel, explores the effects of fracking in the United States in anticipation of proposed shale gas extraction in the Karoo and elsewhere in Southern Africa. Selected as a project for DFM 2013 and winning the WorldView Development Grant, the film screened to enthusiastic audiences at DIFF in 2014 and won the Green Award at the Sheffield International Documentary Festival the same year.

The Shore Break was selected as a DFM project in 2012 and premiered at IDFA in 2014. A powerful documentary whose narrative is every bit as engaging as a fiction thriller, the film will screen at DIFF this year and has already screened at the Encounters documentary film festival. It was the only South African documentary in Competition at IDFA 2014 and the only South African feature length documentary selected for Hot Docs 2015 in Toronto. The film won Best Feature Length Documentary at the 2015 Festival International du Film d'Environnement (FIFE) in Paris and the Backsberg Audience Choice Award at Encounters South African International Documentary Festival in June this year.

The Dreams of Shahrazad (DFM 2010) directed by Francois Verster and produced by Neil Brandt, Shameela Seedat and Wael Omar, explores the relationship between art and revolution through the famous story collection The 1001 Nights. The film received development and production support from DFM as well as the Sundance Institute, the IDFA Bertha Fund, the NFVF, the Hakkaya Network, the Dutch Film Fund and Spier Films, who also act as the films sales agent. The film premiered at the prestigious Masters Section of IDFA, and has gone on to receive critical acclaim and broadcast sales worldwide.

Other major successes that have emerged from DFM include the fiction-documentary hybrid Black President (DFM 2011), produced by Anna Teeman and directed by Mpumi Mcata (and also screening at DIFF this year), as well as the remarkable I, Afrikaner (DFM 2011), produced by Lauren Groenewald and directed by Annalet Steenkamp, which won Best South African documentary at DIFF in 2014. Khalo Matabane’s Mandela: The Myth and Me was selected as a DFM project in 2012 and won Special Jury at International Documentary Film Festival in Amsterdam IDFA. Like Rehad Desai’s Miners Shot Down (DFM 2013), it has been widely recognised as one of South Africa’s most important documentary films and has gone on to have an extremely rich life at festivals around the world.

Success Stories Still in the Making

Black Sunshine tells the story of a 12-year-old albino girl named Coco and her mother Rosemary who longs to escape her frustrating African reality which is dominated by issues of skin colour. Selected for DFM 2013, the project won Arte France’s Arte International Award and received the Tribeca All Access grant. Produced by Obibini Pictures and directed by Akosua Adoma Owusu, the project was also selected for the 2012 edition of Locarno Film Festival’s Open Doors co-production market.

Solidarité , which has been renamed I am not a Witch, is a tragi-comedy about a Zambian child prodigy from first-time director Rungano Nyoni. Solidarité  was selected as project for DFM 2013 where Nyoni won the IFP Prize giving her the opportunity to present the project at IFP in New York. The same year Nyoni was also selected for the Cannes Film Festival’s Cinéfondation Résidence. The project was awarded development funding from the Hubert Bals Fund and also participated in the Locarno Open Doors co-production market, winning the Arte Prize and Vision Sud Est Prize. I am not a Witch is about to go into financing stage of pre-production.

Sea Monster from the now globally successful Triggerfish Studios tells the story of an obsessive-compulsive science geek who discovers a primordial sea monster off the coast of South Africa. Like its predecessor Khumba, which achieved sales in a large number of territories, Sea Monster is aimed at a global audience, taking on Dreamworks and Pixar at their own game. Directed by Anthony Silverston and produced by Stuart Forrest, Sea Monster is still in development.

Flatland from producer David Horler and director Jenna Cato Bass was selected for DFM 2012 where it scooped three awards: the WorldView prize for the most promising feature project, the IFFR prize and the European Audio Visual Entrepreneurs (EAVE) prize. Set in the Karoo, Flatland is a South African feminist western which tells the tale of three women who face mental and physical hardships as they search for a fabled apartheid-era nuclear bomb. The film hassince secured production support from the World Cinema Fund and has also secured a German co-producing partner, In Good Company, under producer Roshanak Behesht Nedjad. Flatland has secured intention for world sales from The Match Factory and production will begin in Winter 2016.

The 6th Durban FilmMart takes place in Durban, at the Tsogo Sun Elangeni from17 to 20 July 2015, during the 36th edition of the Durban International Film Festival (16-26 July 2015).

For more information on the Durban FilmMart and to register as a delegate visitwww.durbanfilmmart.com

 -ends

Issued on behalf of The Durban FilmMart by:

Sharlene Versfeld

Versfeld & Associates

 031-8116528/ 083 326 3235

Sharlene@versfeld.co.za/ info@versfeld.co.za

Note to Editors:

Herewith a selection of photos - if you have any special requests please let us know.

The Durban FilmMart (DFM) is a co-production and finance market and is a joint programme of the Durban Film Office (DFO) and the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF). DFM provides filmmakers from across Africa with a valuable opportunity to pitch projects to financiers, distributors, sales agents and potential co-producers, and to participate in meetings, project presentations and a series of master classes and workshops on the latest industry trends.www.durbanfilmmart.com

The Durban Film Office (DFO) is the film industry development arm of the eThekwini Municipality, mandated to position Durban as a world-class film production destination and facilitator for the development of the local film industry. The DFO drives activity and development in the sector in order to boost tourism, job creation and the development of core skills and SMMEs in the region.www.durbanfilmoffice.com

 The Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) presents over 250 screenings from different countries and cultures with a special focus on Africa. The festival includes development programmes such as Talents Durban and a rich schedule of workshops. DIFF is a flagship project of the Centre for Creative Arts, University of KwaZulu-Natal, which facilitates creative platforms and economic opportunities for artists and related industries, intercultural exchange and network development, training, audience development and strategic Pan-African and international cooperation in the cultural sectors. www.cca.ukzn.ac.za

Videovision Entertainment Premieres Six Films at the 2015 Durban International Film Festival

Media Release

Videovision Entertainment premieres Six Films

at the 2015 Durban International Film Festival 

Videovision Entertainment announced today that it will premiere six films at the 36th Durban International Film Festival, which takes place from July 16 to 26.

The films, which will all have either South African and African premieres at the festival, are Wolf Totem, Khalil Gibran’s The Prophet, Strangerland, Mommy,  Coming Home and White Bird in a Blizzard.

“As a proudly Durban based company, we are pleased to be continuing our partnership with the DIFF by bringing these great films by some of the world’s top film-makers to the festival.” says Sanjeev Singh, director of acquisition and distribution for Videovision Entertainment. “Of particular significance for Durban, is the attendance of the award winning director Jean-Jacques Annaud at the African premiere of his visually spectacular film Wolf Totem on July 20 and the selection of the animated adaptation of Khalil Gibran’s seminal work, The Prophet directed by Roger Allers, as the closing night film of the festival.”

The much-lauded Wolf Totem by the celebrated, award-winning French director Jean-Jacques Annaud is a visually beautiful adaptation of the Chinese best-seller by Jiang Rong. The film has received critical acclaim with Variety calling the film a ‘viscerally powerful drama,’ while The Hollywood Reporter said that the film was ‘spectacularly staged…stunning’ and Screen International pronounced the film to be ‘a proud throwback in look and spirit to a kind of filmmaking we don’t see much anymore.’ The film has also achieved box office success, reaping in US$ 111 million in China and US$9 million in France.  

“We are pleased that director Annaud who has a string of blockbusters to his name such as Seven Years in Tibet, Quest for Fire, The Name of the Rose and The Bear, will be attending the festival.” says Sanjeev Singh. “This is great news for Durban, the festival and indeed the film industry as well, as his presence will stimulate the conversation around film-making in the country, on a global level. The French Institute in South Africa and ourselves look forward to hosting him in Durban and giving him a unique South African experience.”

“Jean-Jacques Annaud is one of the most internationally renowned French filmmakers and an Academy Award winner having worked with many stars like Brad Pitt, Sean Connery and Jude Law, to name a few.  The French Institute of South Africa is proud to have made it possible for him to attend the DIFF, together with UniFrance and Videovision Entertainment, as part of its efforts to strengthen the links between France and South Africa in the film industry”, says Frédéric Chambon, Film and Media Regional Attaché at the French Embassy in South Africa.

Inspired by the beloved classic Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet, the film is a richly-animated tale of an unlikely friendship between a young, mischievous girl and an imprisoned poet. Interwoven with Gibran’s lyrical and inspiring words on the true nature of love, work, freedom and marriage, the film is written and directed by Roger Allers and features the voices of Liam Neeson, Salma Hayek-Pinault, Quvenzhané Wallis, John Krasinski, Frank Langella and Alfred Molina.  The film had its World Premiere in the Official Selection of the Cannes Film Festival this year.

White Bird in a Blizzard directed by Gregg Araki (Mysterious Skin), stars Shailene Woodley, Eva Green and Angela Bassett. This dramatic thriller, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, has been described as sexy and haunting, tells the story of a young woman discovering her own sexuality when her mother mysteriously disappears. At first she is not impacted by it, but on returning home on a break from college, finds herself confronted with the truth about her mother's departure, and her own denial about the events surrounding it.

The multi award-winning, Mommy, by acclaimed director Xavier Dolan (Heartbeats, Tom at the Farm), had its World Premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.  The film is set in a fictional Canada, where a new law allows parents to abandon their troubled children to the hospital system. Diane “Die” Despres (Anne Dorval), a feisty single mother, has to pick up her teenage son Steve (Antoine-Olivier Pilon) from the institution where he lives, because he's hurt a smaller boy and so sets into motion the events of Mommy.

Strangerland directed by Kim Farrant starring Nicole Kidman, Hugo Weaving and Joseph Fiennes, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, is about a family that finds their dull life in a rural outback town rocked after their two teenage children disappear into the desert, sparking disturbing rumours of their past.

Chinese director Zhang Yimou’s drama romance, Coming Home, which was in the Cannes Film Festival’s Official Selection, is an epic story of love and loss, is pitted to become a new classic in Chinese cinema. Coming Home is described as “a deeply affectionate film with great ideological power, a milestone for Chinese cinema” by Mao Yu, Deputy Director of the China Film Bureau.

“We would like to thank Videovision Entertainment for their constant interest in, and contribution to, the festival by providing top-end films from celebrated directors.” says Pedro Pimenta, Director of DIFF. “We have a vision to provide our audiences with films that are at once accessible and aesthetically pleasing, and to ensure that some of the films screened provide stimulation for the growth of the South African film industry, and these titles certainly speak to both of these notions.”

The 36th Durban International Film Festival is organised by the Centre for Creative Arts at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (a special project of the Deputy Vice Chancellor of the College of Humanities, Cheryl Potgieter) with support from KwaZulu-Natal Department of Economic Development & Tourism, KwaZulu-Natal Film Commission, City of Durban, German Embassy, Goethe Institut, Industrial Development Corporation, KwaZulu-Natal Department of Arts and Culture and a range of other valued partners.

For more information go to www.durbanfilmfest.co.za.

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Talents Durban 2015 Participants Announced

Media Release

TALENTS DURBAN 2015 PARTICIPANTS ANNOUNCED

The 36th Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) is proud to announce the participants of the 8th edition of Talents Durban, presented in cooperation with the Berlinale Talents an initiative of the Berlin International Film Festival. Talents Durban is a five day development programme made up of workshops and seminars for African filmmakers delivered by film professionals, academics and intellectuals. The Talents, who are selected through a rigorous application process, will also have the opportunity to attend screenings and events at the Festival.

Talents Durban is one of the 6 Talents International programmes formed by Berlinale Talents in Africa and around the world including Talents Beirut in Lebanon, Talents Buenos Aires in Argentina, Talents Sarajevo in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Talents Tokyo in Japan and Talents Guadalajara in Mexico.

40 filmmakers from 10 countries across the continent including South Africa, Kenya, Ghana, Uganda, Nigeria, Tunisia, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Zambia and Cameron will be in attendance.

The following are the selected participants of Talents:

Oluwakemi Adesoye (Nigeria), Ssenkumba Adnan (Uganda), Lawrence Agbetsise (Ghana), Isabella Akinseye (Nigeria), Kassim Braimah (Nigeria), Bentley Brown (Tunisia), Lucky Nhlanhla Cele (South Africa), Karien Cherry (South Africa), Joanne Corrigall (South Africa), Angeline Dimingo (Zimbabwe), Daniel Ecwalu (Uganda), Daniella Esua (Nigeria), Polani Fourie (South Africa), Mehluli Hikwa (Zimbabwe), Benjamin Johnson (South Africa), Njata Joseph (Rwanda), Andrew Kaggwa (Uganda), Joel Kapungwe (Zambia) Godisamang Khunou (South Africa), Trent Kok (South Africa), Makundi Lambani (South Africa), Sheetal Megan (South Africa), Theoline Maphutha (South Africa), Francisca Meyer (South Africa), Ali Mwangola (Kenya), Samantha Nell (South Africa), Simphiwe Ngcobo (South Africa), John Nyoka (South Africa), Roselidah Obala (Kenya), Agbor Obed (Cameroon), Temotope Ogun (Nigeria), Olawale Oluwadahunsi (Nigeria), Kennedy Omoro (Kenya),Osei Owusu Banahene (Ghana), Davashni Rajoo (South Africa), Charne Simpson (South Africa), Samson Ssenkaaba (Unganda), Tendai Charles Tshuma (South Africa), Amy Van Den Houten (South Africa), Mark Wambui (Kenya).

Presented under the theme Start Motion, Talents Durban aims to boost the already rising flow of current filmmaking in Africa, and to encourage filmmakers on the continent to share their stories through their own cultured lense. Participants interact with over 600 delegates of DIFF and Durban FilmMart, the co-production and finance forum which takes place from July 17 to 20 at the festival. Selected participants get to be part of numerous project-oriented, hands on skills development programs. Practical development programmes within Talents Durban include Talent Press, Script Station and Doc Station.

Script station is a script development programme for short films which pairs four writers with script editors who assist in clarifying story and getting to an advanced draft of their script. Our participants this year are John Nyoka, Mark Wambui, Quwakemi Adesoye and Polani Fourie. The mentors for the programme are Tracey Dearham-Rainers and Karima Effendi.

Talent Press is presented in cooperation with Fipresci, an association of national organizations of professional film critics and film journalists from around the world which lobbies for the promotion and development of film culture. The programme invites four critics to cover the films and events of the Durban International Film festival for online and print publication. Talent press has four participants and they are Andrew Kaggwa, Oluwale Oluwadahunsi, Isabella Akinseye and Kennedy Omoro. They will be mentored by film writers/reviewers Sarah Dawson, Oris Aigbokhaevbolo, Debashine Thangevelo and Shaibu Hussein.

DOC station selects three documentary projects in development for coaching and mentoring towards participation in a public pitch at the DFM’s pitching forum, The African Pitch. Participants are given mentoring prior to the pitching and during preparations at the festival. Doc Station participants are Bentley Brown, Sheetal Megan and Tendayi Tshuma and the producer mentor is Odette Geldenhuys. They will receive additional mentorship from Andy Jones, Jihan El Tahri and Khalo Matabane.

Talents Durban is supported by the KwaZulu-Natal Film Commission, Goethe Institute SA, German Embassy in South Africa and Gauteng Film Commission.

The 36th Durban International Film Festival is organised by the Centre for Creative Arts at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (a special project of the Deputy Vice Chancellor of the College of Humanities, Cheryl Potgieter).

For more information about Talents Durban at the DIFF go to www.durbanfilmfest.co.za, or call Sandile Gumede on (031) 260 3586.

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SA Film Ayanda announced as DIFF's opening night film

Media Release

SA Film Ayanda announced as DIFF’s opening night film

The highly anticipated South African film Ayanda, directed by Sara Blecher and produced by Real Eyes in association with Leading Lady Productions, has been announced as the opening night film of the 36th The Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) which takes place from 16 to 26 July this year.

Set in the vibrant, Afropolitan community of Johannesburg’s Yeoville, Ayanda is a coming-of-age story of a twenty-one year old Afro-hipster, who embarks on a journey of self-discovery when she has to fight to save her late father’s legacy – a motor repair shop - when it is threatened with closure. She’s thrown into a world of greasy overalls, gender stereotypes and abandoned vintage cars once loved, now in need of a young woman’s re-inventive touch to bring them back to life again.

The film stars Fulu Mugovhani (of Scandal fame) and Nigerian actor OC Ukeje, with a star South African cast including Ntathi Moshesh, Kenneth Nkosi, Jafta Mamabola, Thomas Gumede, Sihle Xaba and veteran star of stage and screen Vanessa Cooke.

“We are pleased that this feel-good film will open this year’s festival,” says Pedro Pimenta, Director of the DIFF. “The opening film of this, the most prestigious international film event in SA, needs to reflect a clear priority established by the festival to reach and develop local audiences.”

“The recently published NFVF report on audiences in this country, is very informative and revealing in that while the industry has been successfully structured and supported from all quarters to allow a regular flow of SA content, much still needs to be done for this content to reach local audiences. By once again opening the DIFF with a strong SA film, we endorse this objective.”

This is the second opening night film at DIFF for director Sara Blecher. Her film Otelo Burning opened the 2011 edition of DIFF to critical acclaim. “We are very proud of Ayanda and are thrilled to have it selected as the opening film at this year’s festival.    The film had a very successful screening in Cannes last month and we look forward to screening it to festival-goers in Durban,” says Blecher.

“Ayanda offers an interesting and positive convergence of talents style , resources and distribution potential for the film market.” says Pimenta. “There is a real sense that reaching an audience has been the most important motivation equally shared by the filmmakers and their financiers in its creation.”

“Ayanda celebrates the diversity of our country and revels in the fact that we are a multi-cultural, colourful and exciting melting pot of Africa,” says co-producer Terry Pheto.  “With this film we have tried to capture the Afropolitan nature of our country and the energy of its people.”

“What is also particularly encouraging in terms of the South African film industry is that the film, originally titled, Andani and the Mechanic, was a project in the 2013 Durban FilmMart, the co-production and finance forum of the DIFF and the Durban Film Office.”  says Pimenta. “The film is one of five titles that have been part of the DFM process over the years that will be screened this year at DIFF.”

The festival includes more than 200 theatrical screenings and a full seminar and workshop programme, as well as the Wavescapes Film Festival, and various industry initiatives, including the 8th Talents Durban (presented in cooperation with the Berlinale Talents) and the 6th Durban FilmMart co-production market (presented in partnership with the Durban Film Office).  For more information go to www.durbanfilmfest.co.za.

The 36th Durban International Film Festival is organised by the Centre for Creative Arts at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (a special project of the Deputy Vice Chancellor of Humanities, Cheryl Potgieter) with support from the National Film and Video Foundation, KwaZulu-Natal Department of Economic Development & Tourism and Environmental Affairs, KwaZulu-Natal Film Commission, City of Durban, German Embassy, Goethe Institut, KwaZulu-Natal Department of Arts and Culture and a range of other valued partners.

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Talents Durban

TALENTS DURBAN – START MOTION

In cooperation with Berlinale Talents at the 36th Durban International Film Festival

17 – 21 July 2015

The industry development programme for young film-makers, Talents Durban, in cooperation with Berlinale Talents, will take place from 17 to 21 July as part of the 36th Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) which runs from 16 to 26 July. The DIFF reminds participants to apply for the programme before April 13, 2015.

Forty selected participants from all over Africa will be given a chance to forge relationships with their global counterparts in an intensive programme of seminars, hands-on training, workshops and industry networking activities, as well as having access to hundreds of film screenings at the festival..

“The theme of the programme this year is Start-Motion,” says Tiny Mungwe, Project Manager at the DIFF. “At the turn of the 20th century, early filmmakers used stop-motion techniques to bring a sequence of still images to life on screen, astonishing audiences with the fantastical new medium. Throughout the history of film, new technologies have continued to revolutionize the way we make and watch films.”

“The 8th edition of Talents Durban aims to identify the compelling new voices of emerging African filmmakers and invites them to re-invent the approach to making films on the continent.” explains Mungwe. “With this, the idea of Start-Motion is born. It is how we bring together the knowledge of traditional practices, combined with the latest techniques, to create momentum for emerging African filmmakers to harness and use to fuel progress in our global society. Furthermore, the approach highlights changes in the current mode of storytelling in Africa, encouraging filmmakers on the continent to share their stories through their own cultural, economic and political lenses.”

With access to screenings throughout the festival and through participating in conversations with experts from around the world, Talents Durban seeks to boost the already rising flow of current filmmaking in Africa.  The 8th Talents Durban programme will consist of master classes lead by leading experts in filmmaking, panel discussions by the key industry players, networking opportunities with fellow Talents Durban participants and over 600 delegates of the Durban International Film Festival and Durban FilmMart as well numerous project orientated skills development programmes. Combined these elements will set off a chain reaction of perpetual motion in the contemporary African film industry that will continue to expand and thrive.

Applications are now open and deadline for completed application will be 13 April 2015.

To apply online go to: http://www.berlinale-talents.de/bt/ap/select/event/50 or visitwww.durbanfilmfest.co.za

Talents Durban is presented in co-operation with Berlinale Talents and is made possible by the KZN Department of Economic Development and Tourism, the German Embassy, the KwaZulu-Natal Film Commission, the Goethe-Institut and the Gauteng Film Commission.

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For more information contact:

Centre for Creative Arts, University of KwaZulu-Natal

Tel: +27 31 260 2506/1816

Fax: +27 31 260 3074

Email: talentsdurban@gmail.com

For media enquiries please contact:

Sharlene Versfeld

Mobile: +27 (0) 83 326 3235

Tel: +27 (0) 31 811 5628

Email: sharlene@versfeld.co.za

Twitter: sharlvers

Website: www.versfeld.co.za