IDFA Competition for Short Documentary | IDFA Festival

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IDFA Competition for Short Documentary

IDFA Competition for Short Documentary

The IDFA Competition for Short Documentary showcases a mosaic of styles and themes, exploring everything a short documentary film can be. The selection presents films that use the form in imaginative and ambitious ways, by filmmakers at all stages of their careers.

A

Archipelago of Earthen Bones – To Bunya

Archipelago of Earthen Bones – To Bunya

Luminescent trees, volcanoes and desert landscapes are transformed into a dazzling palette of orange shades. This wordless film evokes the history of Australian mountain ranges, illuminated by the afterglow of a volcanic eruption.

B

Bloodline

Bloodline

Wojciech Węglarz

The arbitrariness of national borders, the effects humans have on nature, and the unseen victims: in this short film we see all this through the eyes of a lost bison. A new perspective on the cold reality of Fort Europe.

C

Cohabitants

Cohabitants

Viesturs Kairišs

Portrait of the inhabitants of Piirissaar, a tiny island in a lake in Estland, near the border with Russia. The hundred or so people who live there cherish both their Russian and Estonian traditions.

E

Echoes Within

Echoes Within

A feeling of being cut off from her roots leads Pranami Koch to the Koches, a minority community in India to which her grandmother, whom she did not know, belonged. She finds a village bursting with life and memories.

Entretierra

Entretierra

In the space that separates the victims of the Mexican drug war from the family members looking for them—the space between life and death, between dark and light—the missing can tell their story and hear their loved ones digging.

F

The Flowers Stand Silently, Witnessing

The Flowers Stand Silently, Witnessing

Theo Panagopoulos

A Scottish missionary captured the floral splendor of Palestine on 16mm film in the 1930s and 1940s. In this montage, the footage becomes a melancholic exploration of the complex relationship between the land and its inhabitants.

H

How to Suture the Soil?

How to Suture the Soil?

Wil Paucar Calle

A reconstruction by Wil Paucar Calle of his mother’s flight to the north of Ecuador 40 years ago. At the crossroads of memory, dream, self-therapy, and poetic interpretation, he seeks for a connection with his mother and the place she left behind.

I

The Iron

The Iron

The commemoration of the Second World War is used by some countries as propaganda for new conflict. In others, this is countered by defensive saber-rattling. Elsewhere, the partying just goes on.

L

Lanawaru

Lanawaru

Angello Faccini

A boy learns from his grandfather how rituals in the rainforest are important to maintain the balance between humans and nature. The scenes evoke this spiritual world in strong visual compositions.

M

Mama Micra

Mama Micra

Rebecca Blöcher

A stop-motion animation about the filmmaker’s mother, whose tremendous thirst for freedom compelled her to go into the big wide world. Freedom came at the cost of contact with her daughter, but no damage is irreparable in this affectionate film.

N

Noise: Unwanted Sound

Noise: Unwanted Sound

Hyejin Jung explores the thin dividing line between sound and noise, alternating between her own hearing loss and trade union protests in South Korea, which the authorities condemn as “illegal noise”.

O

The Other Side of the Mountain

The Other Side of the Mountain

Shirley Yumeng He

In the hilly city of Chongqing, an painter searches for the old apartment where he and his parents used to live. His daughter documents his journey from behind the camera, as they muse about history, memories, and what it means to see and make images.

P

Paci

Paci

Juliette Roudet

Choreographer and film director Juliette Roudet returns to the island Corsica after a long absence. She wants to question her estranged uncles about events in the past—but when that doesn’t work, she tries to find the truth through dance.

T

Tokkotai Paquetá

Tokkotai Paquetá

An observational documentary about the tranquil Brazilian island of Paquetá. Director Cao Guimarães finds poetry in details—often related to nature—but war is never completely out of mind.

Tough Love

Tough Love

A short experimental documentary in which filmmaker Pat Heywood explores his feelings in the wake of his grandmother’s death. What can death teach us about life?

U

Unwritten Letter

Unwritten Letter

Silvana Alarcón Sánchez

A collection of poems by the Peruvian poet Blanca Varela is the starting point for a beautiful cinematic letter about traces of absence and restrained emotions in an unfinished love story. What is transient and what is preserved?