LADY WITH THE WHITE HAT (Dame met bet Witte Hoedje) A film by Aliona van der Horst The Netherlands Film and Television Academy 47 min. The Lady with the White Hat is a portrait of a Ukranian woman, in Odessa, whose political convictions confined her to a psychiatric ward for seven years under Brezhnev and Andropov. Physically damaged but mentally unscathed, her resolve remains intact. She is a symbol for the many victims of Soviet psychiatry for whom years of medication and psychic humiliation make re-entry to society exceedingly difficult. Psychiatrist Semyon Gluzman understands the abuse of
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The growing popularity of the personal documentary has created some unusual interest in the person(s) behind the camera. The traditional alliance of documentary with journalism meant little concern for the filmmaker's biography, values or opinions on issues. But the personal— or, self-reflexive—documentary has brought with it a kind of "auteur theory" to nonfiction film and video. Whether the imagemaker is male or female, married or single, liberal or conservative, heterosexual or homosexual—such matters gain consequence in a documentary whose approach is personal. In the consideration of
One of the missions of the Film Archive at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is to acquire, preserve and provide research access to documentary films. The Archive collects documentaries of all kinds, now having more than 2,000 titles. As documentary archivist, I am responsible for the development and care of the IDA/Academy Documentary Collection. These films come from a variety of sources. Each year since 1994, we have received copies of all the films nominated for Academy Awards, and we've acquired copies of nominees and winners in the annual IDA Distinguished Documentary
There was a time when I'd cringe at the question , "So, David, what do you do for a living?" Because once I replied "I'm a documentary filmmaker," the response would be, "That's nice, David. Now, what do you do for a living?" But, times have changed. As this century draws to a close, nonfiction film and video has reached dramatic new heights—in awareness by the general public, in interest from theatregoers and television viewers, and just plain acceptance and credibility with other media artists. I, for one, am grateful—now when respond to that hitherto anxious question, people smile, look
The Annual Meeting of the Public Broadcasting Service, held in Miami this past June, was a celebration of recent prosperity and future promise. As pointed out by Chairman of the Board Colin Campbell, PBS had gone from the near loss of federal funding in 1995 to generating millions of dollars from non-federal sources last year for additional programming. At last, PBS seems to be fulfilling its mission of "doing well while doing good." There was, however, an undercurrent of urgency. Public broadcasting is competing with the commercial networks and cable broadcasters in a race into the digital
The 16th Outfest: The Los Angeles Gay & Lesbian Film Festival celebrated its spiritely age with documentaries of all sizes, shapes and sensibilities. During a summer when the likes of Senator Trent Lott likened queerhood to kleptomania, and ex-gays and lesbians were proclaiming their miraculous convergence, Outfest '98 arrived as a much-needed antedote. All told, there were 48 short and long docs filling the screens of West Hollywood throughout the mid-summer fest, of which this writer viewed seventeen. Didn't Do It for Love, the latest from German filmmaker Monica Treut, profiles the wildly
In the past few years, reality-based programs such as Cops, Unsolved Mysteries, America's Most Wanted and others have garnered precious airtime and, in the process, contributed to a wider popularity of documentaries with general audiences. The programs are relatively inexpensive to produce and they get consistently good ratings. They look "newsy," sound and feel "so real." General audiences perhaps consider them as documentaries, part and parcel of a long tradition of truth-seeking imagemaking—but, are they? For sure, these programs contain many of the signals from the documentary approach
Each year since 1978, an international group of independent filmmakers, public television producers and commissioning editors have gathered together to exchange ideas and share work at the annual INPUT conference. Neither a festival, a television market nor a competition, INPUT convenes filmmakers and public television representatives whose common goal is to create "intelligent stories." Directors present and screen their work in a forum that encourages an honest exchange of ideas and opinions. As Enrique Nicanor, president of INPUT, stated in the 1997 call for entries, "We don't differentiate
Here we are, in the home stretch, heading for the Third International Documentary Congress in late October. If you haven't registered or made your travel plans, DO IT NOW! This is a Congress You Don't Want to Miss. The Steering and Panels committees and the IDC3 staff have worked throughout the summer preparing for what's destined to be the foremost gathering of nonfiction filmmakers, funders, programmers and historians of the century. Read on. The Congress kicks off with a pre-conference special interest program for people wanting to get started in a documentary career. For the first time