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Documentaries always turn up on Chicago's roster of diverse festivals devoted to children, women, seniors, lesbians and gays, Latinos, African-Americans, Asian­ Americans and Native Americans. But films and videos belong­ing to this versatile genre have never had a festival all their own in Chicago until the Documentary Center at Columbia College started the Windy City International Documentary Festival. Billing itself as the only competitive international fest in America specializing in documentary work, this year's event drew over 120 entries from 29 countries, according to director Martha

Dear Readers: I'm thinking about Charles Foster Kane's "Declaration of Principles" when he takes over the Inquirer. "You don't wanna make any promises, Mr. Kane, you don't wanna keep," the faithful Bernstein Interjects. As the new editor of the s m magazine-barely two weeks into the job as this issue goes to press—I'm in awe of the work performed by previous editor Diana Rico and the art direction by Ruth Ann Anderson. My hat's off to them for jobs well-done. Designer Nancy Hard s and I clearly have some large footwear to fill. (I'd doff my hat to Assistant Editor Tom White and Publisher Betsy

At least two of the films screened at the recent San Francisco International Film Festival—Round Eyes In the Middle Kingdom and Personal Belongings—raised for me some significant issues about the relationship between financing a film and the resulting form, particularly in the area of personal documentary. A topic chosen by an independent filmmaker is one that not only personally interests the filmmaker but will be captivating enough to carry that interest over a number of years. While I know that a documentary's form is often a combination of fate and artistry, its form is most influenced by

In 1986, Mark Soosaar founded the International Visual Anthropology Festival (IVA) in Pärnu, an Estonian resort. Many believed this development merely a dalliance of perestroika: when interest in perestroika would wane, who would care about Pärnu? As perestroika and glasnost pass into history, the small Pärnu IVA—held at the Chaplin Art Center—celebrated its tenth anniversary, 7-14 July 1996. On a wall of the Center, three unique country handmade coverlets are displayed. One of them shows a symbolic tree of life with its roots and branches and songbirds in its crown. It's a fitting symbol for

It's an intriguing scenario: a naturalist, talented in still photography, wants to do a 35mm motion picture in the wilds of Africa, concentrating on the animals. But dis­tributors don't believe that audiences will sit still for a full-length nature film being shown in local theatres. So the naturalist rethink his approach, adopts a human story to chronicle, with animals as the characters. But still the financing road is blocked by obstacles, doubts about whether such a story could be realized. Twenty years go by, and the times change: now distributors show some interest in reaching wider, more

The IDA will bestow its 1996 Preservation and Scholarship Award to the National Film Board of Canada for its significant archival and preservation achievements over the years. The NFB will be honored at the 12th Annual IDA Awards Gala on November 1, along with the winners of the 1996 IDA Distinguished Documentary Achievement Awards, the David L. Wolper Student Documentary Achievement Award, and the Career Achievement Award winner. Established by an Act of Parliament, the NFB was founded in 1939 by pioneer documentary filmmaker John Grierson, who was its first government film commissioner

In the beginning, there was the documentary, the cinematographic evangelist. Argentinean cinema did not escape this origin. The Lumière brothers' historic and The Departure of the Lighting Factory Worker and The Arrival of the Train at the Vincennes Station have their contemporary local equivalents in The Hoisting of the Flag and The Arrival of the President of Brazil (1900), made by the photographer Eugenio Py, one of our pioneers. The cinematographic sons and daughters of the legendary Py have traveled along hazardous roads, and the majority of us have ended up imprinting our imaginations on

Dear Members, It's been a busy summer for me, the IDA, and documentarians everywhere. I just got back from the Republican National Convention in San Diego, where I began shooting Fender Philosophers, a documentary for PBS about Americans and their bumper stickers. I'm also finishing up my personal documentary, Breaking Up, which I will be taking to the Independent Feature Film Market in September. Stay tuned for a report on that market. The IDA staff and three volunteer juries have been working all summer screening documentaries from around the world submitted for the 1996 IDA Distinguished

There is a powerful scene near the end of Frederick Wiseman's new film on France's 330-year-old Comedie­ Française that the audience has been waiting for without knowing it. A scene that causes everything else in the film—before it and after it—to fall into place, and moves the audience to understanding and to tears. A prominent member of the Comedie-Française, the actress Catherine Simare, visits a home for retired artists to present an award to another actress who had also been a member of the CF many years ago. The latter is having a birthday celebration, her 100th, and is quite moved by

The 19th annual INPUT conference did not begin promisingly. You arrived at the ultraplush Continental Plaza (replete with heat-seeking air conditioning and toilets that flush themselves as soon as you stand up), in the middle of Guadalajara's sterile Expo suburb, miles from the center of town and anything Mexican. It felt like something out of Godard's Alphaville. This was too bad, because May 26-31 marked the first time that INPUT, the International Public Television Screening Conference, was held in Latin America (or anywhere outside Europe, the United States, or Canada). Fortunately, the