"I don't believe in the objectivity of the filmmaker," Hatem Kraiche asserts as he introduces himself. "l do believe in the honesty of the filmmaker." Hatem, a one-time journalist in Spain and now a first-year student at Cuba's international film school, Escuela Internacional de Cine y Television (EICTV), is meeting—and challenging—his visiting professor, New York-based filmmaker Robert Richter. He has no inkling yet of Richter's reputation for hard-hitting, truth-telling documentaries that have earned two Academy Award nominations, national Emmy Awards and a top prize at the 1998 Havana
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Dear IDA Members: For the past eight years, Betsy Mclane served tirelessly as IDA's executive director. With Betsy's departure this past June, an era of tremendous growth, increased visibility and membership in 50 countries drew to a close. We thank Betsy for her years of dedicated service to IDA. Through her future endeavors she will undoubtedly make further contribution: to the doe documentary community. While serving with IDA, Betsy was a constant advocate for documentaries at festivals, on panels and wherever she carried the IDA banner. She enhanced and initiated programs and services that
Bud Greenspan understands the ideas of honor and glory and their manifestations on the field of sports competition. He has been called the world's foremost writer/producer/director of sports films, and the sobriquet fits. Greenspan's series of Olympic documentaries, now numbered at seven, chronicle the Los Angeles, Seoul, Barcelona and Atlanta Summer Games, and the Calgary, Lillehammer and Nagano Winter Games. Greenspan' company, Cappy Productions, has produced dozens of other sports documentaries, including The Spirit of the Olympics, which is on permanent display on 36 television screens at
The Eight Shooting Format: HDTV and Digital VideoDirected by IDA member Mark KornweibelProduced by Andrew Zinnes, Rob Turfe and Sean Coughlin From the filmmakers who brought last year's crowd-pleasing Pop & Me comes this 60-minute documentary following the US Women's rowing team as it trains for and competes in the 2000 Olympics. The struggle on the water is brutal, painful, dramatic, funny, fast-paced and inspirational. Often compared to warfare, it is as much of an emotional and spiritual struggle as it is a physical one. The women of The Eight find out what it means to be a rower, a woman
Go to any indie festival and it's not long before somebody starts talking about money. At the Visual Communications Film Fest 2000's Annual Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film and Video Festival, held May 18-25 in Los Angeles, the issue of money—in this case, corporate sponsorship of the festival—took center stage in record time. Before the screening of the opening night feature, organizers ran a "thank you" spot listing the festival's sponsors, leading off with the most generous "platinum" donors, two Asian American dot-com start-ups that had donated $15,000 to the cause. But as the listing worked
The Double Take Film Festival in Durham, North Carolina is bound to become a real filmmakers' favorite. One of the larger documentary fests in North America, Double Take has grown into an event marked by congeniality and passion. Most participants stayed for the entire event, largely because audiences and filmmakers enjoyed a long weekend of rich and intimate discussion. Fueled by copious supplies of barbeque and sweet tea, attendees took in the program, which ran on three screens at The Carolina Theatre, a handsomely restored Beaux-Arts cinema in downtown Durham, home of Duke University. The
Los Angeles audiences will get the opportunity to view the rarely seen On the Road with Duke Ellington when the IDA presents the legendary Robert Drew documentary under the stars at the John Anson Ford Amphitheatre August 6. In addition to the screening of the film in a newly restored print. courtesy of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences Academy Film Archive, the evening will also include a live performance of Ellington's music and a tribute to filmmaker Drew. On the Road with Duke Ellington first aired on NBC in 1968 as part of The Bell Telephone Hour, a venerable series devoted
Dear IDA Members: Summer is a great time to enjoy the outdoors. And what could be better than spending a warm summer evening under the stars? Watching a great documentary about a great music legend under the stars and in the company of the filmmaker! IDA has partnered with The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Academy Film Archive to present a newly restored print of an important documentary film as part of the Los Angeles County Arts Commission "Summer Nights at the Ford." The Ford, a 1,200-seat open-air amphitheatre set dramatically in Cahuenga Canyon just across ftom the Hollywood
As a documentary filmmaker and a surfer, I have always looked at sports and the pursuit of physical excellence as the perfect metaphor for freedom and human expression in nature, a theme that has consistently worked its way into almost all of my films. As a young kid growing up in Corona Del Mar, California in the late 1950s and '60s, my two biggest loves were surfing and the movies. At the time, it seemed only natural for me to pick up an 8mm camera so I could film the local action and entertain my surfing buddies. The challenge was getting the camera as close to the action as possible in
" l have learned over the course of the past 50 years that if I tell a story on film honestly and with conviction...I can move mountains." -Warren Miller There is but one icon in the world of adventure sports filmmaking. And in my attempt to shed light on the visionary that pioneered this genre of non-fiction I have realized one thing...Warren Miller Entertainment (WME) stands as the model of modern enterprise. Tucked away in the foothills of Boulder, Colorado lies a company whose humble beginnings are anything but recognizable. As you walk through its offices your mind lapses into subtle