Open City Documentary Festival Launches its Eighth Programme Running from 4th – 9th September with Baronesa Premiering

Open City Documentary Festival is delighted to announce its eighth edition of the annual festival celebrating creative documentary and non-fiction filmmakers with a dynamic new programme for 2018. With 30 features and 48 shorts, 2 world premieres, 3 European premieres and 26 UK premieres across shorts and features from more than 30 countries, the festival will take place from the 4th - 9th September in a host of great venues across central London.

This year - through films, audio and immersive (VR/AR) projects, across screenings, special events, parties, panels, workshops and masterclasses – Open City Documentary Festival will be celebrating the art of non-fiction.

Marking the festivals’ Opening Night will be the UK Premiere of Baronesa (2017, Brazil, 71’), directed by Juliana Antunes and in partnership with MUBI. Her astonishing debut follows friends Andreia and Leid as they navigate the perilous reality of daily life in the favelas of Belo Horizonte. At first glance, their days seem calm and untroubled, but the threat of violence is never far away and Andreia dreams of moving to the safer neighbourhood of nearby Baronesa. Antunes spent five years in Belo Horizonte, working with a non-professional cast, to create a work of rare intimacy and authenticity which—despite its simple structure—emerges as a complex, multilayered and moving portrait of contemporary life in the favelas. Baronesa announces an exciting new voice in Brazilian cinema.

The Closing Night will be the UK Premiere of The Swing (2018, Lebanon, 74’) directed by Cyril Aris. An assured, emotionally rich film about the lies a family tells to keep their patriarch happy and the unattended costs of their falsehood. After sixty years of marriage, Antoine and Vivi have lost their most beloved daughter; but no one has dared to tell the bedridden nonagenarian Antoine, lest his heart crack. A simple solution, though everyone else in this densely interconnected family has then to live the same lie, giving no expression to their grief. A deeply affecting, beautifully shot cinematic novella; like all the best stories The Swing is a simple tale, but one that never short-changes its viewers.

This year the festival hosts an outstanding Jury panel for each of its competitive Awards. For the Open City Award the following documentaries have been nominated: Baronesa, dir. Juliana Antunes (Brazil); Casanova Gene, dir. Luise Donschen (Germany); Flight of a Bullet, dir. Beata Bubenec (Russia); and The Swing, dir. Cyril Aris (Lebanon). The Jury will be chaired by esteemed director Sophie Fiennes (Grace Jones: Bloodlight, Bami), and features Beatrice Gibson, Nelly Ben Hayoun, May Adadol Ingawanij and Mehelli Modi.

For the Emerging International Filmmaker Award the following documentaries have been nominated: Angkar, dir. Neary Adeline Hay (France); Those Who Come, Will Hear, dir. Simon Plouffe (Canada); Home of the Resistance, dir. Ivan Ramljak (Croatia) and The Best Thing You Can Do With Your Life, dir. Zita Erffa (Germany, Mexico). The award will be Chaired by independent Dutch documentary programme cultural advisor and filmmaker Tessa Boerman (Zwart Belicht), Luciano Barisone, Cecile Emeke, Chiara Marañón and Tadhg O’Sullivan.

The Best UK Short Award supported by the British Council has nominated The Mess, dir. Dorothy Allen-Pickard (UK); Some of These Days, dir. Vincent Förster (UK, Germany); Absent Wound, dir. Maryam Tafakory (UK, Iran); Missed Call, dir. Victoria Mapplebeck (UK); Season of Goodbyes, dir. Philippa Ndisi-Herrmann (UK, Kenya); Plastic Man, dir. Yulia Kovanova (UK); Then a Hero Comes Along, dir. Marlon Rouse Tavares (UK); Landline, dir. Matet Houghton (UK). The Award is Chaired by Stephanie Spray, non-fiction filmmaker (Manakamana) and professor of Critical Media Practices at the University of Colorado Boulder along with jurors Laure Bonville, Amar Ediriwira, Julia Nottingham and Lynn Nwokorie.

The festival will hold selected retrospectives of two unique voices in non-fiction filmmaking: The innovative found footage documentarian Penny Lane and Japanese pioneer of ‘action documentary', Kazuo Hara. Both filmmakers will be at the festival to present their work.

The festivals’ expansive special events programme includes a focus on the short form with programmes celebrating the Ethno-Fictions of Columbian filmmaker Laura Huertas Milan and the groundbreaking hybrid experiments of Polish maverick, Bogdan Dziworksi. The festival will also host launches of new projects from Radio Atlas and NANG Magazine, and a live Audio Visual performative lecture from speculative architecture think thank Tomorrow's Thoughts Today.

For the first time the festival has invited artists to present films that have informed their own practice, with special selections from DJ and producer Nabihah Iqbal and filmmaker Marc Isaacs as well as short films chosen by a number of the filmmakers with new work at the festival, screening before their own features.

This year’s Industry Programme has more breadth of programmes and sessions than ever before covering everything from the business of documentary filmmaking, funding, marketing, distribution, production and data. Industry sessions will cover themes such as VR/AR, the challenges of biopic documentaries, the short form, ethics, memory, cinematography, sound, editing, architecture, the future of journalism and the self. The festival is honoured to welcome esteemed filmmakers to share their expert knowledge and experience, including: Tadhg O’Sullivan, Steven Eastwood, Elhum Shakerifar, Rebecca Day, Emma Davie, Edward Lawrenson, Simon Ball, Chloe White, Rose Palmer, Sierra Pettengill and David Charap.

The festival will also be hosting an Industry Bootcamp aimed at students and recent graduates. These sessions will be about preparing for the next steps in your career and getting ready to enter the industry. Each event is £5, or free with student accreditation.

Open City Documentary Festival is looking forward to hosting a number of exciting festival parties this year including the Opening and Closing Night Receptions at the Regent Street Cinema as well as the Nabihah Iqbal after-party at the ICA, where the DJ, Producer & NTS Radio presenter presents an evening of music inspired by 1972 documentary Winter Soldier, featuring protest songs and music from the anti-war movement from 1950-1975. Other various festival parties will be listed in the festival programme.

For the full programme and tickets visit the Festival website and Twitter.

About Open City Documentary Festival
Open City Documentary Festival creates an open space in London to nurture and champion the art of creative documentary and non-fiction filmmakers.

Based at UCL and working with partners across London and throughout the UK, Open City Docs delivers film screenings, training programmes and live events throughout the year to support the next generation of filmmakers.

We aim to challenge and expand the idea of documentary in all its forms. We provide a platform for emerging talent as well as established masters working within the documentary form. Although grounded in reality, the festival fosters a spirit of experimentation and often blurs the boundaries between traditional dichotomies of fact and fiction. Alongside our screening programme, we bring together non-fiction storytellers and industry experts to explore and debate the current landscape of documentary. Open City Documentary Festival is a space for conversation, appreciation and examination.

Sponsors & Cultural Partners
UCL
UCL Bartlett
UCL Joint Faculty of Arts & Humanities, Social & Historical Sciences (in type - no logo)
UCL Faculty of Engineering
British Council
Embassy of Switzerland
Canadian High Commission
Czech Centre London
Clear Cut Pictures
Five Points Brewery
Conker Spirit
Indie Bay Snacks
Pulsin
Clearspring
The Protein Ball Company
Rock Jaw Audio
Square Root London
Green Cup Coffee
Vintage Books
The Whickers

Programme Partners
Digital Catapult
Together Films
Irish Film Festival
Essay Film Festival
MUBI
In the Dark
Radio Atlas
Chinese Visual Festival
Film Africa
Birds Eye View
Virtual Umbrella
LSFF
Urban Lab
Origins Festival
Resident Advisor
Second Run
NANG
CREAM
London Migration Film Festival
Frames of Representation

Venue Partners
Regent Street Cinema
ICA
Curzon Soho
Bertha DocHouse
Picturehouses
BFI Southbank
Prince Charles Cinema
Digital Catapult