MEDIA COVERAGE

16th Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival 2012 in the Media

Aiming at the target

24. 10. 2012 / Hospodářské noviny, art.ihned.cz / Petr Fischer

The dissident theme will receive extra attention at this year’s festival. Films by North Korean directors will be screened for the first time ever. Holder of Nobel Prize for Literature Gao Xingjian will read from his books and present his own experimental film poems in Jihlava.

Another personality inconvenient to the Chinese regime will be introduced at the conclusion of the festival. The visitors will watch Ai Weiwei’s own films as well as the documentary Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, which became a hit of this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

The Jihlava festival has been far from merely screening films for quite some time now. Besides “thinking through film” framing the event, the festival will also be thinking through radio documentary and, for the first time ever, through documentary theatre. It will present the theatre reconstruction of the Mašín brothers I, Hero; the documentary collage of stories of children from children’s homes Show4Business; and the study of the invasion of television culture into the world of food Dinner Is Served!

The opening of the documentary film festival was imbued with a hunter’s atmosphere. Take a look

24. 10. 2012 / MF Dnes, iDnes.cz – Jihlava / Martin Vokáč

The opening ceremony of the 16th Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival was held on Tuesday in Jihlava’s DKO Cinema. The programme was stylized in a hunter’s spirit. Reporters of Czech Television, Aneta Snopová and Markéta Dobiášová, were awarded for their report on the purchase of Casa aircraft.

The hunter’s spirit was created by Jiří Havelka and Ondřej Cihláš of Vosto5 theatre. The “forest atmosphere” was complemented by the original festival spot with mushroom design by Petra Nesvačilová.

“Love and mushrooms have one thing in common; they will always find their ways,” such was the Vosto5 theatre members’ definition of the link between the festival of creative documentaries and mushrooms.

“I am happy that we are screening films by Chinese dissident Ai Weiwei in the times when “dalailamism” has been coined and discussed in the Czech Republic. I am happy that we can present a film about Roman Smetana, Czech protester who has been sent to prison for drawing feelers on politicians’ posters”, said festival director Marek Hovorka about the festival’s basic programming priorities.

Jihlava festival in full swing

25. 10. 2012 / Lidové noviny / Kultura

The 16th Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival, which has started on Tuesday, has announced its first winners. The Respekt Award for the best television and online report went to Aneta Snopová and Markéta Dobiášová for their investigative report Kausa Casa about the offstage purchase of CASA aircraft in the Czech Republic. The report was part of the Reporters of Czech Television programme.

The visitors of the opening ceremony further watched the premiere of The Czech Land, Your Home! by director Adolf Zika. “The film is unique for the fact that it was made by 480 Czech film amateurs who have shot their scenes during a single day on their cameras and mobile phones,” says festival director Marek Hovorka. Director Zika and editor Alois Fišárek processed the submitted material into a feature-length film mapping a single ordinary day in the Czech Republic.

Czech Television introduces projects and general directors

26. 10. 2012 / Jihlavské listy / Jiří Varhaník

The traditional partnership of Czech Television and Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival has gained another dimension. Firstly, Czech Television will introduce its concept of creative production groups and their selected documentary projects both to professional and public audiences; secondly, the festival will present the very first meeting of general directors of public service televisions of Visegrad countries. The event will take place in the Festival Centre in the Vysočina County Gallery today at 11:30.

The main themes to be discussed during the meeting of the general directors and the following panel discussion include the process of development of laws and regulations, potential co-operation between the individual public service televisions as well as long-term development plans of public service televisions and their financing.

Jihlava festival goes to the finals

27. 10. 2012 / Právo / Kateřina Farná

The lecture of Chinese writer and dramatist living in exile Gao Xingjian was one of Friday’s climaxes. On Saturday, he will present his film poems and read from his book Soul Mountain for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2000.

Members of Ukrainian feminist movement Femen have also received an invitation to Jihlava. Today afternoon, they will respond to questions related to their topless protests.

The Jihlava festival will continue until tomorrow night; the festival echoes will be held on November 1 and 8 in the DOX Centre for Contemporary Art in Prague.

Jihlava documentary “hunt” is over

28. 10. 2012 / tyden.cz / kul

The closing ceremony of the 16th Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival, too, was held in a hunter’s atmosphere. Winners of the competition for the best Czech documentary, Klára Tasovská and Lukáš Kokeš, received a thunderous applause for their film Fortress. After the ceremony, Sundance festival hit Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry was screened in Czech premiere.

The Opus Bonum award for best world documentary went to Maiko Endo’s Kuichisan. The single member of the jury, Belgian filmmaker Xavier Christiaens, awarded the portrait of Japan’s Okinawa island captured during a little boy’s walk “for its polyphony, magma and intuitive flow which, combined with incredible sensitivity, links time perception and various ways of image making (…) for the magic of this film, both vital and brave as well as effortlessly cruel.”

The five members of the jury of the Czech Joy section awarded Fortress by Klára Tasovská and Lukáš Kokeš about the totalitarian and half-legitimate Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic. Special Mention went to Two Nil by Pavel Abrhám and Tomáš Bojar as well as to Stone Games by Jan Gebert.

In Mirage, the best documentary of Central and Eastern Europe screened in the Between the Seas section, Srdjan Keča captured the contrasts of present-day Dubai. Special Mention went to The Blockade (dir. Igor Bezinović) about a strike at Zagreb University in 2009 and the following protests. The Fascinations experimental film section awarded the film underGROWTH inspired by the life style of the barred owl. The Audience Award went to New Life of Family Album (dir. Adam Ol´ha); the Lifetime Achievement Award went to Czech director Vojtěch Jasný.

Notebook

29. 10. 2012 / Mladá fronta DNES – Vysočina / Michal Kolařík

Events like Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival should be held more often in the city of Jihlava.

As if with the wave of a magic wand, Jihlava seems to have become a European city for a few days. English is heard more often than Czech and the streets are full of well-tempered people who have come to Jihlava to enjoy the film feast.

Famous people, such as legendary Czech jockey Josef Váňa and Ukrainian rebels of the Femen movement, have shown up in Jihlava. Films were screened, discussed and reflected. One could really sense Jihlava filling up with the energy of people who have come to Jihlava for a few days to be thinking through film, in accordance with the festival motto.

Filmmakers and festival visitors are also welcome by keepers of cafés, restaurants, bars and hotels. Especially hotels and boarding houses are always looking forward to the beginning of the festival to make up for the otherwise miserable year. There is no other occasion for tourists to spend more than one night in Jihlava. There is no reason for it; the zoo and the sights can all be seen during a single day. There should be more events like Jihlava IDFF.

The documentary festival was a great success

30. 10. 2012 / Jihlavské listy / Jiří Varhaník

The organizers see the past edition of the festival which has just announced its winners as a great success.

According to festival director Marek Hovorka, the 16th Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival has ranked among the best ones of the past 16 years. “It was a great success both as to the programme part, whether according to the jury or to the spectators, which makes me extremely happy, and in the sense of significant guests, the way they fit in the programme and found their audiences, said Hovorka on Sunday before the last screening of the six-day festival. The event was successful in terms of statistics, too. “Over 3 000 accredited guests and visitors have attended the festival”, said Hovorka in appreciation.

According to the festival director, the success of this edition also means a great obligation for the future: “I am happy that under the difficult circumstances of this year, despite the state holiday on Sunday and the bad weather at the end of the festival, which were factors that were against us, it all still went so smooth and well. Let us hope that we will repeat this success next year, too.”