REVIEW – VOICES FROM KASSERINE

Produced by International Alert Tunisia
Directed by Olfa Lamloum and Michel Tabet

A school and ernest children’s faces. They talk about their mother’s work and lack of education and what they would like to do when they grow up .… doctors, academics. They are articulate and calm. A young girl says ‘My dad went to school a bit. He can read and write. It’s my mum who didn’t go to school. Me, I want to hang in there and study as much a possible to make up for my mother’s ignorance.’ She wipes away her tears.

This is Majel Bel Abbès a border zone. On the boundary between Tunisia and Algeria. There is little development, only seasonal agriculture with fluctuating yields. So, they, the locals, turn to smuggling. Even the children. They might transport iron for six or seven euros working until 2.30 in the morning, a few hours sleep and then school.

“Kasserine is a barometer. When things go badly at Kasserine [….] they affect all Tunisia.” The movement from the impoverished rural areas to the city reveals discontent. ‘Young people expected a new vision of society, a new infrastructure.” However, ‘the rug was pulled out from under their feet even though it was them that made the revolution.’ Young and old alike talk of the difficult relationship with the authorities, how they are ‘working in a context of indifference from the state’. How ultimately they fear, perhaps a second violent social movement.

We see in this film, in microcosm the failure of the Arab Spring and the inability for society to change as quickly or as radically as hope had once desired. The State has failed. Kasserine is the only province in Tunisia without a cinema or a theatre. ‘The State needs to create a space for dialogue’. This film shows how cinema can create such a space.

Many documentaries struggle to be necessary.

Voices from Kasserine will never win an Oscar. It does not have the ‘narrative arc, the exploitation of death and celebrity of such films as the bio-documentaries about Amy Winehouse and, more recently, ‘Whitney: Can I be Me?’. Ghoulish exploitations of death. Where the pre-knowledge of death informs the entire experience of viewing. Voices from Kasserine does not exploit the dead. It does want any dying although there is the memory of death in the film. Instead the film enhances the living by showing what it takes to live. This is as far from a celebrity drama as could be.

The voices we hear in Kasserine do not attempt to reinforce myths but, to break them. What does that mean? It does not deny individual angst but it situates it in order to move beyond tragedy and failure as a documentary end in itself. It shows those who suffer not as victims but as potential agents of social change, articulate and calm in their reasoning and determined in their outlook.

There are two way to use a camera. One is to point it and take, the other is to give it and collaborate. This is not so much a question of film aesthetic but a moral choice. Power resides with those who look and capture. If power must justify itself then so must filmmaking.

To give voice is to give hope, at the very least it is a means of preventing total despair. Documentary film has always attempted to give voice, to give presence to those who have no other means to be heard. Even Flaherty despite his manipulations gave voice and presence to the unknown and marginalised.

In the clutter and never ending voices of instant communication and non-stop media how do we give voice and how do we listen? This film answers the question partly. And in the process reveals many of the contradictions at the heart of film and the heart of difference. What it shows most clearly is the self-awareness and intelligence of those who are usually only passing figures in the background of news bulletins. It shows that the exploited know they are exploited, the ruined know they are ruined. Shocking revelation is not what is required nor is cliched misery. To speak on film is cathartic

In documentary film, in everyday conversation there is often a tension when evoking or describing a different culture. This does not have to an ‘exotic’, distant culture, it does not even have to be geographically distant. It can be a distinction between classes: ’Underneath it all they are just like us’. This appeals to a comforting universalism. A tension exists between the homespun, teary eyed universalism and the idea of unfathomable difference. Our portrait of the ‘other’ too easily slips into one or the other. This is not simply an anthropological problem but a political and ethical one. The schizoid nature of these two positions haunts many a documentary film and many a thesis. Yet, from this nuance avoiding duality there emerges paradoxically and, miraculously, a sort of unity.

Most documentary film posit some form of soft humanism. A humanism sustained by the Ancients idea of the ‘golden rule’ and more recently Kant’s cosmopolitanism. This is not without its reductive dangers. Films that go beyond the depiction of strangeness and otherness, film that instead also want to carry a message, to be agents of social change, too often fall into the trap of a universalising humanism, the idea of a human ‘community’.

This myth of the ‘human community’ was neatly skewered by Roland Barthes in his short essay ‘The Great Family of Man’. An essay inspired by an exhibition of photographs ‘the aim of which was to show the universality of human actions in the daily life of all the countries of the world: birth, death, work, knowledge, play’. As Barthes puts it the myth functions on two levels: ‘first the difference between human morphologies is asserted, exoticism is insistently stressed, the infinite variations of the species, the diversity in skins, skulls and customs are made manifest, the image of Babel is complacently projected over that of the world. Then, from this pluralism, a type of unity is magically produced: man is born, works, laughs and dies everywhere in the same way; and if there still remains in these actions some ethnic peculiarity, at least one hints that there is underlying each one an, identical ‘nature’, that their diversity is only formal and does not belie the existence of a common mould. Of  course this means postulating a human essence’

The idea of essence removes History so that there is nothing more to be said about the situation of individual acts. Nature comes first, and we are treated as an eternal lyricism. A myth of a shared human condition devoid of specificity.  All that is being celebrated is human essence. We weep for ourselves. the ‘alibi of a ‘wisdom’ and a ‘lyricism’ [….] only make the gestures of man look eternal the better to defuse them.’

Documentary filmmaking has dove-tailed with visual anthropological concerns with the exotic, the ’other’. Concerns about the inherent ambiguity and power relations embodied in the subject/object relationship first led to a reflexive turn where the reproduction of imbalances of power, in particular colonial concerns, were exposed.

While in the past decades anthropology has shifted from its traditional naturalistic mode predicated on the rhetoric of immersive fieldwork (participant observation) to new forms of ethnographic engagement intensify the involvement of anthropologists with their ‘subjects’. A key word that has risen in the methodological shift is ‘collaboration’. Collaborative film holds dangers too

Since the 1980’s collaboration has been proposed as a way to inform ethically anthropological relations in the field. More recently, the idea of collaborative visual anthropology and collaborative documentary filmmaking have come to the fore-front. In part due to post-colonial concerns with reproducing dominant power relations but also because of the rise of new cheap technology that has made the ‘sharing’ of the research process and  filmmaking a possibility.

This has allowed filmmakers to engage not only with the political but to literally reverse the lens. ‘Subjects’ are no longer passive but are ‘para-ethnographers and filmmakers’ The technology itself is no longer foreign, the means of production are accessibly and understood by subject as well as object. In this case, the shift to regard ‘informants’, ‘witnesses’, as collaborating counterparts has come to the fore. It is no longer sufficient tor regard subjects, as characters or actors to be manipulated. The relations in the process of filmmaking has been re-articulated into a collaborative mode which continues to force filmmakers to rethink the scope of their epistemic practices and to rethink the outcomes and representational modes. As a consequence hybrid forms of documentary have arisen. The accessibility and knowledge of the function of technology have raised added complexities to the relation between filmmaker and subject. Voices from Kasserine is a film that has tried to address some of the complexities that arise from these tendencies. Tendencies that strike right to the core of what makes a documentary film and what does a documentary film make.

In its ethnographic mode collaboration seems to be praised as a a value in itself and as a productive social practice. Collaboration seems to point towards a two-way egalitarian relationship that produces at the same time egalitarian benefits, although it does not always necessarily turn out that way.

Cinema began as documentary. and reflected the colonial ideology of the day. The French documentaire was called in English a travelogue trading on the idea of the exotic a long way from the civilised shores Europe and North America. It was only with Flaherty’s ‘Moana’ (1926) that John Grierson first applied the word ‘documentary’ in speaking of the film’s ‘documentary value’

It is commonly thought that what distinguishes documentary film from other forms of cinema is its claim to be more reflective of the truth. This seems an erroneous and solipsistic discussion, even though so may documentary workshops begin with just this question.’ What is the truth of documentary film? What is more or less certain is that while there may be multiple truths in any given social situation filmmakers tend to focus on one truth. There is no such thing as un-mediated reality. It is not the truthfulness or not of documentary film that ultimately matters but its intention and effectiveness in acting upon the world, upon knowledge production.

This is not new John Grierson argued for the production of documentaries that would serve the public interest, for form with ‘sociological rather than aesthetic aims’, although he also famously defined documentary as the ‘creative treatment of actuality’. The tension implicit in these two statements remains to this day.

Documentary filmmakers have, whether knowingly or not, generally followed a method of knowledge production well know to anthropologists, namely, participant observation. A practice according to which the filmmaker has to be socially involved in the setting she/he is researching while being detached enough to establish the appropriate observational conditions. Filmmakers and anthropologists have searched for alternative forms of ethnographic engagement that explore modes of fieldwork beyond participant observation: Collaborative processes, and reflexive modes.

Experimental collaboration proposes a displacement in the fieldwork practice; it is an ethnographic mode whose epistemic practice for knowledge production is experimental (not only observational) and whose social mode of engagement is collaborative (not only participative). What does it mean for an ethnography to be experimental and collaborative? and how could collaborative experiments in the field make us think of more experimental forms of fieldwork collaboration? These questions, though anthropological in genesis, also challenge us with new questions related to our role as documentary filmmakers. Paying attention to the contemporary contours of ethnography as ‘collaboration/experiment’ might offer us the possibility of exploring new conditions for the production of anthropological and documentary knowledge.

In the past decades, anthropology has shifted from its traditional naturalistic mode with the ‘been-there-done-that’ rhetoric of immersive fieldwork to new forms of ethnographic engagement that intensify the involvement of anthropologists with their counterparts. ‘Collaboration’ has been one of the figures invoked by anthropology to describe this situation. However it is far from new: since the 1980s collaboration has been proposed as a way to inform ethically our relations in the field, or as a way to engage politically with the anthropological fieldwork. In the last years collaboration has been mobilised again but in this case in a new sense; it has been proposed as a methodological response to the ethnographies that are developed in expert contexts of knowledge production like scientific laboratories, political institutions, economic organisations or artistic and activist collectives. Holmes & Marcus (2008) have argued that in such context people have ‘para-ethnographic’ practices, very similar to those of anthropologists. As a consequence, they can no longer be treated as ‘informants’ but as collaborating counterparts. In this situation, the articulation of relations in the field in a collaborative mode forces anthropologists to reconsider the scope of their epistemic practices and to rethink the outcomes and representational modes in a gesture that ‘refunctions ethnography’ (Holmes & Marcus 2005).

Following this argument collaboration seems to be an ethnographic mode specifically apposite for social contexts oriented by the production of knowledge. But we have witnessed an intense change in the production of knowledge in the last years. Hybrid institutions have emerged as part of a process that have brought about profound shifts in the nature and distribution of expertise. The generalisation of digital technologies seems to have intensified this trend as well as added challenges to the anthropological fieldwork. People with no social science expertise are taking part in the fabric of social science research through the development of tools (visualisation of Twitter interactions, techniques for the extraction of Facebook social data…) that allow them to elaborate very sophisticated analyses of large empirical data. The same concerns inform contemporary documentary production.

This claim for a collaborative mode in documentary/ethnography is part of the emergence of collaboration as a figure praised in many social contexts. It is pointed out by governments when promoting collaborative efforts in innovation; it is mobilised in artistic contexts as a way to articulate publics and to figure the social engagement of art; it is also claimed by technology designers and developers as a key feature of digital culture. In such contexts, collaboration is praised as a value in itself and as a productive social practice. In its documentary mode collaboration seems to point to a two-way egalitarian relation that produces at the same time egalitarian benefits, although it is not always necessarily this way. Despite such a collaborative impetus in our contemporary societies we lack a precise vocabulary to refer to the particularities, nuances and differences of diverse modes of collaboration, a trend that has also affected our lack of detail in the articulation of multiple experiences of participation.

Hence, while the idea of collaborative filmmaking may seem both ethically and aesthetically to lead to a more nuanced outcome in which relations of power are laid bare and no one voice prevails, we must still suspend for a moment the assumptions we have over collaboration to ask some simple questions: What do we mean when we call a form of collaborative relation? What ethical imprint do we concede to such a practice? What are the political dimensions attributed to it? In doing so we would like to take into account the invocation of collaboration in knowledge-production contexts without forgetting its twofold character referring either to the manifold ways of ‘doing together’ (collaboration as a social form) or to the more specific ways of joint thinking and information sharing (collaboration as an epistemic mode). In this vein, maybe collaborative filmmaking might be characterised as a specific contemporary mode of inquiry on the transformations of relationally in knowledge production practices.

Collaboration is, therefore, not simply a methodological strategy but a relational and epistemic mode that filmmakers recursively unfold to pose questions that are still not able to articulate. In this vein, ‘experimentation’ becomes a figure for capturing the transformation of the form in these situations.

In conclusion, by paying attention to the contemporary contours of documentary filmmaking as ‘collaboration/experiment’ might this also offer the possibility of exploring new conditions for the production of anthropological knowledge. Voices from Kasserine in its own ways attempts to address these issues, while being self-conscious enough to reject certain tropes of traditional documentary filmmaking vis-a-vis the subject. If this can lead towards an engaged filmmaking we can only applaud.

i-Docs 2018 Call for Participation

Submission deadline – October 6th 2017

Following the success of the previous i-Docs Symposia, and the continued dynamic expansion and evolution of the field, i-Docs are now seeking proposals for papers, case studies and projects to showcase at the fifth edition in 2018.

http://i-docs.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/call-for-participation.pdf

Upcoming Documentary to look out for – 40 years of Rocky: The Birth of a Classic.

Some good movies fade away, unnoticed and without causing much of a grievance to anybody. This is something that could very well have happened to the instant-classic from 1976 – “Rocky”.

Sylvester Stallone, now one of the most recognisable persons in the world and an actor beloved by many, were not always the glamorous, well respected superstar he is today. As a struggling actor and screenplay-writer, he was trying to sell the screenplay to Rocky while also trying to sell his own dog because he couldn’t afford to feed it. Stallone had only $106 to his name when he got offered a staggering $350,000 for the rights. The amazing story could have ended here, and most for most people it would, but Stallone insisted that he would be acting the part of Rocky. Completely unknown at the time, that was not an easy sell. Today, we can all be happy that Stallone is a man who like to gamble, lest we might not have his extensive and excellent work in our lives.

Fast-forward 40 years and here we are today. Rocky is considered a classic; Stallone is considered one of the most iconic personalities in Hollywood. With many sequels, some considered much worse than others, Rocky truly laid the base to something amazing. Striking the very heart of people all around the world with its first instalment, it is now time to find out more about the story behind the Cinderella-like story.

Little is known so far about this 60-minute, upcoming documentary which is currently in post-production. What we do know is that Sylvester Stallone and John G. Avildsen are going to narrate behind-the-scene footage from when the film was being made. It’s safe to speculate that this will be an emotion filled homage to the film, and most likely to the man behind it.

It is clear that Rocky is still rooted within Stallone’s heart, as, even though 40 years have passed, the latest installment was just a couple years ago, in 2015. Although not reaching the epic level of passion that was clearly visible in the first movie, Creed still sat well with the audience. With a budget of $35.0M it has managed to gross close to $110.0M. Still, it is not as impressive as the original movies budget at about $1.M, which grossed close to $120.0M, in the 1970s.

Although current information on the documentary is scarce, one thing is for certain; Rocky and Stallone will take us an emotional rollercoaster in a mix of nostalgia, amazement and hope, and we should all settle in for the ride.

In three days time the LIDF begins its association with Paris. There is some nervousness, as there always is around a new story. Some French has been practised for the opening night. Help from gentle coaching will not, alas, make it less excruciating. It has proved more challenging than anticipated to run programmes simultaneously in two cities. Happily, last weekend the LIDF found a perfect studio/workplace in Paris.

The LIDF Documentary Photography Workshops and Folio Review are organised by the London International Documentary Festival with the participation of the Twenty Twenty Agency.

There are 24 workshops places available for both days and 40 participant-observer places for the Folio Review on Sunday 5th February.

The practices of photography and film-making share a rich history. In the past decade new technologies have caused boundaries to blur and opened up possibilities for professionals and citizen journalists alike. Twenty four photographers will be given the opportunity to take part in a 2-day intensive Documentary Photography workshop lead by internationally acclaimed photographers and photo editors with a limited number of places available to observe and participate in the folio reviews.

The Workshop and Folio Review
Aimed at advanced amateurs or young professionals with a good understanding of photographic practices, the event will lead two intimate groups of 12 individuals through an intensive 2-day program of shooting, mentoring, reviews, group critiques, and, culminating in the exciting opportunity to ‘pitch’ their work for folio review to leading industry professionals. Participants will work together with their peers and a professional photographer to develop their own individual visual language, photographic identity and practical, technical and conceptual skills required to compete in the ever-changing marketplace. The classroom sessions at the beginning and end of the day will focus on the practice of editing and group critiques. Together these activities form the backbone of the learning process and are integral to the workshop experience. The workshops will be based in central London, with good transport links enabling participants to travel easily around the city. 

Tutors and Reviewers

Peter Dench (www.peterdench.com)
Peter is based in London working primarily in the Ad, Editorial and Portraiture fields of Photography. A distinctive and often quirky style has guaranteed regular commissions from a range of respected international clients. In 2010 Peter was placed 2nd in Advertising at the Sony World Photography Awards.
Clients Include: TIME, New York Times Magazine, STERN, GEO, Sunday Times Magazine, NEWSWEEK, Weekend Guardian, Telegraph Magazine, GQ, Tatler, Marie Claire, CN Traveller, NEON, Liberation, Esquire, Observer Magazine, Observer Sport Monthly, Highlife, Financial Times Magazine.

Frede Spencer (Founder of the Twenty Twenty Agency)
Born in Denmark 1973, Frede Spencer studied photography in Denmark before moving to England in 1996 to do a BA in Photography at Nottingham Trent. He moved to London in 2000 and started working at Katz Pictures, before moving to Corbis in summer 2004 as an assignment photo editor/agent. Frede now runs his own photographic agency, Twenty Twenty Agency, which represents editorial and commercial photographers. He’s interested in seeing editorial, advertising and portrait images.

Nick Cunard (http://www.nickcunard.co.uk)
Nick specialises in location portraiture, human interest feature stories, successfully pitching picture led feature stories direct to national/international editorial, longer term documentary flavored projects for print, web and exhibition, stills and moving images plus words. He is owner at Nick Cunard : Stills Moving, partner at CHI-photo, and contributor at Eyevine.
Clients include: Stern Magazine, The Guardian, London Evening Standard, The Independent on Sunday, Metro International, DFID, CIMA , LDA,

Preparation for the Workshop
Photographers should include a portfolio of 5 images when booking for the workshop. Portfolios should reflect your photographic interests and style. You should be comfortable with your equipment as you will be expected to arrive at the workshop ready to photograph. Participants will be asked to arrive with at least one project idea to develop during the workshop. So that everyone can make the most of the intensive sessions, we strongly recommend that each participant conduct preliminary research before the workshop begins, and be aware that they will be responsible for their own project coordination. The preparatory research should include contact liaison, access information and, if appropriate, some preliminary shooting (still or moving image). All projects must be conducted within central London and be feasible to complete within the workshop day. Due to the fast pace of the workshop, we recommend that participants produce and edit their work digitally, using their own laptops

Tuition
£285 (including coffee and lunch)

Observer Ticket for Folio Review
£40 (including coffee and lunch)

Travel & Accommodation
Participants are expected to make their own arrangements regarding travel and accommodation. 

Dates
4th – 5th February 2017

Booking

To book for the 2 day workshop CLICK HERE

To book as a participant-observer for Sunday 5th February CLICK HERE

For queries please contact: [email protected]

For a few years the LIDF worked in Pakistan. Working with young people to make films about their reactions to violence and their hopes for their country. It was one of the most positive outcomes of the LIDF.1. Those young people developed and they have a lot to say. We have remained in touch. Next year we will go back to Pakistan for a series of screenings and debates.

Other Than Our Sea | 10 | Valentina Ferrandes | Italy

From the relics of an ancient greek colony in Southern Italy, to modern day shipwrecks in the Mediterranean Sea, a story of exploration told through fragments of classical literature, flashes of ethnographic films and manipulated excerpts of current newsreels. Referencing the recent tragic circumstances that have drowned thousands of migrants departing from Northern Africa to seek asylum in Europe, the film looks at the idea of traveling at sea in times of conflict. A journey that can be a leap into the unknown, a voyage of discovery, or forced migration, death as well as rebirth.

Downtown Village (Pequena Aldeia) | 13 | Luciana Nanci/ Priscilla Pomerantzeff | Brazil

Enrique looks at Roosevelt Square from his window. The gaze of an immigrant upon one of the most diverse and one of the only actually occupied public spots in São Paulo. Before his eyes an unusual village-like life in the heart of South America’s largest megalopolis unfolds. Enrique contemplates life away from his origins and the passing of time through his memories and the digital impressions taken amongst the urban noise.

I Have a Weapon | 22 | Ahmad Shawar | Palestine

The story of the Palestinian village “Kafar Kaddoum”, which enages in a weekly march to demand the retrieval of land after it has been confiscated by Israeli occupation forces. The film foucuses on the popular resistance techniques that participants are adopting.

Repoman | 15 | Giacomo Gex/Bruno Gex | Spain

A day in the life of a repoman in Los Angeles, USA.

The Dream of Shahrazad | 107 | Francois Verster | South Africa

Weaving together music, politics and storytelling, the film explores recent Middle East events through the metaphor of THE 1001 NIGHTS. Drawing on Shahrazad, the storyteller princess who saves lives, a Turkish youth orchestra conductor, an Egyptian storytelling troupe, a troubled Lebanese actress and others put creativity to new political use.

A Tale of Love, Madness and Death (Un cuento de amor, locura y muerte) | 22 | Mijael Bustos Gutiérrez | Chile

The film director’s uncle is schizophrenic and his grandmother suffers from a terminal illness. The grandfather who is unable to take care of both, must decide between his wife or his son.

Dream of Sara (Sonho de Sara) | 8 | Gabriel Sanna | Brazil

A car crosses the landscape, images converge in the unknown. An experimental visual poem.

Nowhere Place | 27 | Susanne Opstal | Netherlands

Where do you find the essence of your existence? On the peaks of the highest mountains in the world? Even higher, on an uninhabited planet from which you can never escape? Or is it in the deepest sorrow, by leaving a trail of destruction that will never be forgotten. This essay documentary follows various people on their quest and inevitably leads to the question: how far do you want to go?

White Nights | 20 | Rola Shamas | Iran

Street musicians on New Year’s Eve play to make a living. They face a difficult situation but in the end the show must go on.

Dissonance (Dissonans) | 29 | Theis Mølstrøm Christensen | Denmark

Søren and Malene met and fell in love by playing and improvising music together. They had a child, but were shortly after both diagnosed with cancer. They haven’t played music together since. This film creates three rooms where the participants can play and once again find their common tune.

At 21.15 on the 6th August 1932 the first Venice Film Festival opened with a screening of Rouben Mamoulian’s ‘Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde’ and with it the era of the film festival began along with an abiding template of red carpets and glitz. The choice of film both prescient and appropriate.

All festivals, whether large or small, are Jekyll and Hyde and attempt in some way to emulate the model of indulgent exclusivity, parties, awards and screenings, while at the same time a more sober approach towards art and thought and its consequences. But, most festivals are not like Venice or Cannes or Berlin. The majority of festivals are small precarious affairs that last maybe a few days and if they are lucky more than the average festival lifespan of three years.

According to the recent study by Stephen Fellows there are roughly 3,000 recognised active film festivals, of which almost 2000 take place annually. This seems a lot and of these 3,000 only a handful will be backed by serious money or covered in any depth by print or other media. More remarkably the number of films screened at these festivals is relatively small when compared to the total number of films produced each year. The same films pass from festival to festival, programmers study other programmes.

Does all of this become stagnant? The power of a festival it has been assumed for many decades was the shine and esteem bestowed by participation and hopefully prizes at a event clearly defined by geography and duration. You had to be there. Today the situation has changed and the possibilities for distribution, for exposure of a film are no longer limited by the duration of a festival or the size of its screening rooms. Social media, Vimeo, Youtube and other platforms (new on-line platforms are being developed each day) present possibilities for ongoing exposure to vast audiences. Exposure through festivals is now dwarfed by on-line potential. This being the case what do festivals in their present form offer filmmakers?

There has been much talk recently of film festivals undergoing a crisis of identity. What in the present moment of on-line ubiquity do festivals contribute to the distribution, visibility, financing and engagement with films? What do they do for audiences, for filmmakers, for themselves? If films are made to tell a story, then what is the purpose of story-telling and how best to maximise the impact of any given tale? What can festivals offer that goes beyond the standard model?’

To return to Venice and its festival of today. Paolo Baratta, President of the Biennale di Venezia, said in a speech at this year’s Venice Film Festival: ‘We are aware of the growing competition among many festivals and of the growing competition between these festivals and other forms of promotion on the film market. We are equally aware that, as the competition grows, it becomes increasingly important for a festival to systematically pursue its own pathway in the medium-term, with its own formula and its mission clearly in mind. Steadfastly, we have kept true to the principle that a festival must provide a counterbalance to the market maelstrom with a vision that is autonomous, free of the banners at marketing’s disposal; banners which, alone, can lead to passivity and conformism.’

A festival should be a fertile ground for encounter and exchange. However, that ground changes over the years. The Venice Film Festival itself has since its inception in 1932 evolved and changed direction often under the weight of historical events. It has been competitive and non-competitive, there were three non-consecutive years during the 1970s when it did not even take place.

Just as, according to the sociologist Zygmunt Bauman, society is being transformed by the passage from the “solid” to the “liquid” phases of modernity, where the ‘solid’ structures of modernity are no longer adequate and instead ‘liquid modernity’ captures succinctly the changing nature of knowledge in our society, so a festival, which is a form of knowledge provider must evolve into a form that coincide with changes of knowledge acquisition and production within the wider society, taking account of new technologies and lived experience and the possibilities of a global interaction no longer tied to a specific place or a time.

The festival form that sufficed for so long now seems inadequate for the challenge of not only reflecting the work but actively increasing dialogue and exchange. The ‘static’ form of a festival, a few days in which a few people gather in a single place, does not reflect the fluidity of liquid modernity.

So, what sort of form can the LIDF take? A form that would create a festival more relevant and efficacious, more engaging and dialogic, more in tune with its original aims as opposed to being dominated by the demands of the peripheral? How can it editorialise content better, contribute new distribution models, prolong engagement with content and filmmakers, stimulate in-depth dialogue, educational possibilities and social activism? And finally, how can it replace a hierarchical model of ownership and participation with a cooperative one in which the festival does not merely try and represent many voices but is constituted by many voices?

The festival came about because a small group of people decided that a pocket was a pocket of resistance.

NEXT: Festival Futures

This week saw the release of ‘Ronaldo’ – a new film based on the life of Real Madrid’s prolific front-man. The Portuguese had a camera crew following him around over a year, and when one thinks about the level of invasion that scenario would be bound to cause, the first thought most people have is: “why?”

It’s no secret that Cristiano Ronaldo doesn’t need the money – he is after all earning a reported £300,000 a week at the Bernabeu (and that figure doesn’t take into account his personal sponsorship or modelling contracts) – so what could have possibly motivated him to allow even the slightest possibility of disrupting what seems to be the perfect life?

However, when one considers that the man behind this movie is none other than James Gay-Rees (the creative mind behind the much-lauded and critically-acclaimed biopic, ‘Senna’ as well as a major contributor to ‘Amy’ – a documentary based on the British soul artist), it all starts to become clear: this is about leaving a legacy that stretches beyond mere numbers on a bank account or statistics in the record books. This is his chance to show the public what makes him so special.

Ultimately what comes across over the course of an hour and forty-two minutes is a man’s determination to be the absolute best in his field, regardless of the sacrifices this achievement may require. He is ultimately a deeply private character, who surrounds himself with only his family and a few close friends – and his commitment to training borders on the obsessive. Those free-kicks don’t just happen: he works and he works and he works.

Perhaps one of the biggest misconceptions about the former Manchester United and Sporting Lisbon winger is that he is arrogant – a point emphasised by his recent claim that he believes himself to be a better player than his long-standing rival, Barcelona’s Lionel Messi.

The pair next come head-to-head when the two players’ respective teams meet on November 21st at the Bernabeu, and given both players’ almost freakish scoring record over the course of their careers, rather than asking if either player will hit the back of the net, many will be placing money on who’ll score first. As always, Betway will be offering up-to-the-minute odds on both the result and first goal scorer – just don’t expect to be in the minority if you bet on Ronaldo after he scored in both league fixtures last season.

Between he and Messi, the pair have won the last seven Ballon d’Or awards – given to the player voted as the world’s number one by a panel of respected journalists – and as such there can be little doubt that one of them is truly the best. But regardless of results, ‘Ronaldo’ has given the Real Madrid man a platform to showcase his personality like Messi never has – and that is how great players become sporting legends.

The LIDF has been chosen as a qualifying film festival by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Recipients of the festival’s prize in the Documentary Short Subject category will now qualify for consideration at the Annual Academy Awards® (OSCAR®) without the standard theatrical run, provided the film otherwise complies with the Academy rules.