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International Competition 2016
A Young Girl in Her Nineties Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Yann Coridian

Blanche is vegetating in a nursing home, a victim of Alzheimer’s disease – until the choreographer Thierry Thieû Niang wakes this sleeping beauty through dance and she falls in love … enchanting and tender.

A Young Girl in Her Nineties

Documentary Film
France
2016
85 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Marie Balducchi
Director
Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Yann Coridian
Cinematographer
Hélène Louvart, Yann Coridian
Editor
Anne Weil
Sound
François Waledisch
Like many old people in nursing homes she seems to have drawn a curtain between herself and the world. Without relatives, in the company of other Alzheimer patients, she hardly remembers her melodious name: Blanche Moreau. But then choreographer Thierry Thieû Niang arrives at the hospital. Thierry incorporates the patients’ movements, gestures and words in his dance and doubly animates them: their bodies and their souls. Among the murmurs of French chansons which, of course, talk of the adventure of love, Blanche awakes from her enchanted sleep. And more than that. “Parlez-moi d’amour” and the handsome, attentive stranger open a space for her in which she can once more get lost – or find herself – in the ecstasy of being in love. For Thierry, visibly moved by this development, the task is to create the right balance through dance.

Holding and trusting each other – that also describes the careful attitude of the director towards the dancers: a successful actress and feature film director, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, in collaboration with Yann Coridian, now delivers a sensitive debut documentary. We learn only what is revealed by the place and situation about the patients’ lives. But in any case the film makes us sense that memories are less about one’s CV than about a reservoir of emotions.

Lars Meyer



Prize of the Fédération Internationale de la Presse Cinématographique 2016

Backward Run

Animated Film
France,
Turkey
2013
4 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Les Valseurs
Director
Ayce Kartal
Animation
Ayce Kartal
Script
Ayce Kartal
In 2013, millions of people took to the streets to speak out against the Turkish government, which responded with excessive violence. Entirely drawn by hand and completed in the midst of the protests, “Backward Run” is a diary of this extraordinary struggle for justice and freedom amid the eerie silence of mainstream media.

Özge Calafato
Next Masters Competition 2016
Behind the Stone Wall Magali Roucaut

A small factory in the middle of Paris where for decades the finest cardboards were manufactured. A last look at a working world driven from our environment and a quiet, finely observed requiem.

Behind the Stone Wall

Documentary Film
France
2016
59 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Docks 66
Director
Magali Roucaut
Cinematographer
Magali Roucaut
Editor
Laureline Delom
Sound
Magali Roucaut
The machines rattle and hiss, squeak and groan. Every second robot arms dart forward and back, again and again. The people are part of the machines, pushing cardboard into steel mouths and pulling it out, in, out, to the rhythm of the machines. Punching, folding, riveting, wrapping. They stop briefly only when director Magali Roucaut asks a question, to talk about their life in the rhythm of the machines, behind the stone wall.

Over decades the inhabitants of this district in the middle of Paris, who speak from off-screen, hardly noticed the fact that a medium-sized company produced cardboard boxes here. No mass-produced goods for Scandinavian furniture stores but carefully manufactured special containers for archives and libraries. Now the small factory must go – the facade already bears a poster for the lofts that are to be built here to “upgrade” the district. Roucaut is interested in what is about to vanish here, the workers’ lives and biographies – all of them migrants, some of them second generation employees. She documents the disappearance of labour from our environment, its move to the periphery and probably soon to Asia. You only realise that some things were there when they are gone, which is what Roucaut opposes in her quiet, precisely observed requiem.

Grit Lemke


Nominated for Healthy Workplaces Film Award
International Competition Short Film 2016
Big Bunny Again? Émilie Pigeard

Grandfather shoots his five-year-old granddaughter’s favourite rabbit. A childhood trauma that can only be compensated for by a new animal: a dog with rabbit ears.

2016

Big Bunny Again?

Animadoc
France
2016
6 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Jean-Christophe Soulageon (Les Films Sauvages)
Director
Émilie Pigeard
Music
Jean-Marc Fort, Émilie Pigeard
Editor
Émilie Pigeard, Arnaud Viémont
Animation
Émilie Pigeard
Script
Émilie Pigeard
Sound
Henri D’Armancourt, Agathe Courtin, Julien Ngo Trong, Manuel Vidal
Grandfather shoots his five-year-old granddaughter’s favourite rabbit. A childhood trauma that can only be compensated for by a new animal: a dog with rabbit ears. Ugly, everyone says – but the most brilliant companion imaginable. Until the girl grows up. In what may be the fastest coming of age story ever, Émilie Pigeard digs up a chapter of her life to take us straight into the realm of children’s fantasies with her colourful scribbled images.

Lars Meyer


Nominated for mephisto 97.6 Audience Award

Down the Deep, Dark Web

Documentary Film
France,
Israel
2016
56 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Duki Dror, Alexandre Brachet, Liat Kamay-Eshed, Margaux Missika
Director
Tzachi Schiff, Duki Dror
Music
Frank Ilfman
Cinematographer
Philippe Bellaiche, Gleb Volkov
Editor
Dror Yaakobovich
Script
Yuval Orr
Sound
Ronen Nagel
Under the surface of Google Land where life is so comfortable there is a world known as the Deep or Dark Net. A virtual data space whose content will not be found by conventional search engines and that remains closed to ordinary users – unless they install dedicated software. Governments, banks or corporations use the Deep Net, as well as all those who wish to keep their online activities hidden. In Google Land we leave traces, in the Deep Net special encryption technology allows us to remain anonymous. Duki Dror’s and Tzachi Schiff’s comprehensive film about the Internet, privacy, surveillance and the vision of a completely new economic structure opens with its worst variation: as a market platform for drugs, child pornography and arms. Is this the reason why governments are fighting the Net? On the other hand it’s the only digital space that offers protection to critical journalists, opposition members in dictatorships or whistleblowers.

The film works its detailed and knowledgeable way through the current developments of our digital world without passing judgement. What’s at stake is individual freedom. The sceptical summary: people want just enough freedom to feel good. Google Land. Who cares if we expose ourselves to constant surveillance that way?

Matthias Heeder

Glucose

Animated Film
France
2012
7 minutes
Subtitles: 
_without dialogue / subtitles

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Mihai Grecu, Thibault Gleize
Director
Mihai Grecu, Thibault Gleize
Music
Mihai Grecu, Thibault Gleize
Editor
Mihai Grecu, Thibault Gleize
Script
Mihai Grecu, Thibault Gleize
Sound
Mihai Grecu, Thibault Gleize
Mihai Grecu and Thibault Gleize take quantum theory seriously as they twist the laws of nature with a wink. On their astounding film safari they use digital animation to manipulate macro shots and toy deceptively realistically with the audience’s perception. Sweet little petits fours can be majestic volcanoes.

Ines Seifert
International Programme 2016
How’s Your Prostate? Jeanne Paturle, Cécile Rousset

The title puts it bluntly. Two young women talk about a serious subject with some humour, both perfectly balanced between wit and sensitivity, illustrated in a reduced, associative style of drawing.

How’s Your Prostate?

Animated Film
France
2015
4 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Luc Camilli
Director
Jeanne Paturle, Cécile Rousset
Music
Thomas Dappelo
Cinematographer
Jeanne Paturle, Cécile Rousset
Editor
Mélanie Braux
Animation
Jeanne Paturle, Cécile Rousset
Script
Jeanne Paturle, Cécile Rousset, Cécile Mille
Sound
Manuel Vidal
The title puts it bluntly. Two young women talk about a serious subject with some humour, both perfectly balanced between wit and sensitivity, illustrated in a reduced, associative style of drawing. A prostate operation furnishes the occasion for a surprisingly relaxed conversation between father and daughter and a cautious approach to the fundamental issue of “erectile function”. And then there are one’s own confusing erotic dreams.

André Eckardt


Nominated for mephisto 97.6 Audience Award
International Programme 2016
Lead in the Head Aurore Peuffier

A shot that hits the mark. Right into the head of the wolf that ends up as a trophy bearing a red mark on the village square. And is expected to perish there, but then leaps up unexpectedly and flees.

Lead in the Head

Animated Film
France
2016
7 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Olivier Chantriaux
Director
Aurore Peuffier
Cinematographer
Aurore Peuffier
Editor
Aurore Peuffier
Animation
Aurore Peuffier
Sound
Agathe Courtin
A shot that hits the mark. Right into the head of the wolf that ends up as a trophy bearing a red mark on the village square. And is expected to perish there, but then leaps up unexpectedly and flees. The blue hours of the night bring little redemption, but morning will bring a voice that over and beyond death will testify to the mortality of the wolf, tangibly and figuratively. Painted in expressive lines, in natural colours, blue like the hope for a new existence, and finally blazing like death.

Nadja Rademacher


Nominated for mephisto 97.6 Audience Award

Life to Come 360° – Through the Eyes of a Premature Baby

(none)
Belgium,
France,
Qatar
2016
9 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Cédric Bonin, Pascaline Geoffroy, Anton Iffland Stettner
Director
Fouzi Louahem
Cinematographer
Aïdan Obrist
Editor
Christophe Reynaud
Script
Fouzi Louahem, Claudio Capanna
Sound
Yann-Elie Gorans
Commissioning Editor
Sabine Lange (ARTE), Sophie Berque (RTBF interactive), Mohamed El Mongy (Aljazeera), Isabelle Christiaens (RTBF)
Cast
Jean-François Martin, Emilie Maréchal, Blanche Giraud-Beauregardt, Fred Cacheux, Coline Wauters
We don’t remember the first days of our life, especially the ones right after birth. Suddenly we’re in the world – the first vague memories of some day, somewhere emerge. Our long term memory only starts to develop in the second year of our life. The beginning of life remains a dim hole in our memory. With “Life to Come 360°” audiences can enter the virtual reality of a neonatal ward and experience life there from the point of view of a preemie. The docu-fiction is part of the “ARTE360” app.

Lars Rummel

My Daughter Nora

Documentary Film
Belgium,
France
2016
15 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Julie Frères
Director
Jasna Krajinovic
Cinematographer
Guillaume Vandenberghe
Editor
Marie-Hélène Mora
Sound
Quentin Jacques
It’s an achievement in itself: telling the drama of a whole generation, a family and a mother, in 15 minutes. Nora writes a letter of farewell to the world of hedonism and, like many young Muslims in Belgium, moves to Syria to join the Jihad – leaving behind desperate parents who wonder what went wrong. They have nothing left but the hope that Nora and the many others will return home safely. But not everyone is that lucky.

Matthias Heeder


Nominated for Young Eyes Film Award
Extended Reality: DOK Neuland 2016
Notes on Blindness – Into Darkness Arnaud Colinart, Amaury La Burthe, Peter Middleton, James Spinney

In his audio diary John Hull reflects on what it means to be blind, which allows us access to a world without vision on a both philosophical and poetic level.

Notes on Blindness – Into Darkness

(none)
France,
UK
2016
20 minutes

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Arnaud Colinart, David Coujard, Mike Brett, Amaury La Burthe
Director
Arnaud Colinart, Amaury La Burthe, Peter Middleton, James Spinney
Narrator
John Hull
Coding
Thomas Couchard, Florent Dumas, Robin Picou
Artistic Design
Béatrice Lartigue, Fabien Togman, Arnaud Desjardins
In his audio diary John Hull reflects on what it means to be blind, which allows us access to a world without vision on a both philosophical and poetic level. Based on audio recordings, this six-part interactive documentary examines John’s cognitive and emotional experience of blindness. Binaural sound and interactive 3D animations enable visitors to immerse themselves intimately in specific memories and places from John’s diary.

Lars Rummel
Kids DOK 2016
November Marjolaine Perreten

It’s autumn and the animals along the river are getting ready to hibernate. A sudden flood disrupts their busy preparations …

November

Animated Film
France
2015
4 minutes
Subtitles: 
_without dialogue / subtitles

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
La Poudrière
Director
Marjolaine Perreten
Music
Serge Besset
Editor
Myriam Copier
Sound
Julien Baissat
It’s autumn and the animals along the river are getting ready to hibernate. A sudden flood disrupts their busy preparations …
International Programme 2016
Oleg’s Choice Elena Volochine, James Keogh

A young Russian at the frontline in the eastern Ukrainian Donbass region. Patriotism, heroic pathos and a battle that will change everything. A rare interior view of a war.

Oleg’s Choice

Documentary Film
France
2016
75 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Valérie Montmartin
Director
Elena Volochine, James Keogh
Cinematographer
Elena Volochine, James Keogh
Editor
Elena Volochine, Tania Goldenberg
Sound
Elena Volochine, James Keogh
He had originally planned to stay only for three days, more of a short break. But now Oleg, a Russian from West Siberia, has been here for a year and is the commander of a battalion of volunteers whom no one called, no one seems to control and who serve in no official army. They didn’t come for money but out of patriotism, for Russia, which must be defended in the Ukrainian Donbass. Journalist Elena Volochine and photo reporter James Keogh want to know why they risk their lives there, far away from home.

They are interested in what Oleg thinks, regardless of propaganda and the quick looks taken by Western media – without fraternising with him. They take down the vocabulary that feeds his self-empowerment as the saviour of the Russian cause. “Someone has to do it”, or “We just want to help” are the catchphrases, accompanied by a soundtrack of cloying patriotic pop songs that draw on the former heroic pathos of the Red Army. Even if combat operations are left out of the film, respect is due to the filmmakers for the persistence with which they stay close to Oleg to comprehend how he reflects his experience. The film revolves around an operation commanded by him which will change everything. Once you’re infected with war you don’t get rid of the virus so easily.

Cornelia Klauß
Extended Reality: DOK Neuland 2016
Phallaina Marietta Ren

It starts slowly. Fish are swimming through the air. A veil descends over our eyes before everything liquefies. And then the giant white whales … This is the story of Audrey, a girl who hallucinates whales all around her.

2016

Phallaina

(none)
France
2016
10 minutes

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Pierre Cattan, Alexandrine Stehelin
Director
Marietta Ren
Music
Côme Jalibert
Animation
Julien Baret
Script
Marietta Ren, Laurant Bramardi
Commissioning Editor
Ségolène Zaug, Voyelle Acker (France TV Nouvelles Écritures)
Coding
Christophe Da Silva
Artistic Design
Marietta Ren
It starts slowly. Fish are swimming through the air. A veil descends over our eyes before everything liquefies. And then the giant white whales … This is the story of Audrey, a girl who hallucinates whales all around her. An intimate adventure begins – that of a personal transformation. “Phallaina” is a haunting, vertically scrollable graphic novel with parallax effects. A hybrid narrative form, beautifully illustrated by Marietta Ren.

Lars Rummel

Silence

Animated Film
France
2015
4 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
La Poudrière
Director
Emma Carré
Editor
Mélanie Braux
Animation
Titouan Bordeau, Emma Carré, Anne-Louise Erambert
Sound
Loïc Burkhardt
A chance encounter in the street becomes a constant silent companion. The friendly white man who gradually and inexorably wraps Fred’s life in cotton wool keeps growing and growing. Emma Carré’s hand-drawn animation quietly turns into a distressing physical cinema experience which creates a remarkably tangible sense of the significance of hearing.

André Eckardt


Nominated for mephisto 97.6 Audience Award

The Fullness of Time (Romance)

Documentary Film
Belgium,
France
2016
14 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Nicolas Rincon Gille
Director
Manon Coubia
Cinematographer
Nicolas Rincon Gille
Editor
Manon Coubia
Sound
Aline Huber
One September morning in 1957 a mountaineer sets out with a friend to climb Mont Blanc and dies in the eternal ice. His young wife sleepily stays behind among the folds of her duvet. All her life she’ll wait for the glacier to give him up again. Manon Coubia portrays this almost classical love tragedy in which time stops, at least for the lost body, in a clear and symbolic visual language as a film triptych somewhere between stagnation and movement.

Lars Meyer