DOK Leipzig will be starting the fourth season of the DOK Industry Podcast on 20 June. From now on, episodes will be released throughout the year. The six episodes of the new season will be released monthly leading up to the festival in October.

Season 4 of the DOK Industry Podcast will include a profile of the Re-Present Media initiative, which works to promote personal stories by filmmakers from groups that are underrepresented in documentary and non-fiction media. Other episodes will discuss the current working conditions of filmmakers from Hong Kong, reflect on the role of documentaries in the critical discussion of the decolonisation of museums, and explore documentary animated film.

“Our podcasts are a source of inspiration and education to envision a more diverse film industry,” explains Nadja Tennstedt, head of DOK Industry. “We believe in the power of a broad range of experiences, aesthetics, storytelling and perspectives.”

The DOK Industry podcasts are produced in collaboration with the Programmers of Colour Collective (POC2) and the creators of the “What’s Up with Docs” podcast, Toni Bell and Ranell Shubert. The conversations are curated and moderated by film industry professionals who include underrepresented perspectives in the discussion. Among this year’s curators are Lucy Mukerjee, Karen Cheung, Aisha Jamal and Maria-Christina Villaseñor from POC2, Toni Bell and XR Creator Weronika Lewandowska.

All episodes will be posted on the DOK Leipzig website as well as on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Deezer.

The podcasts have been a part of DOK Industry since 2020. Two global phenomena have had a major influence on the new format. The COVID-19 pandemic challenged DOK Leipzig to develop new means of exploring burning issues in the film industry online. At the same time, the Black Lives Matter movement brought to the fore the urgent need to discuss the level of equity and inclusivity in the documentary film industry in a more critical and transparent way.

While DOK Industry has been committed to gender parity and to supporting underrepresented voices for many years, the team recognized the need to create dedicated space in which to meaningfully address the status quo of the industry in terms of power structures and lack of representation as well as offering pathways into films, criticism and works of creators and writers from marginalized groups.

The films competing for this year's Doc Alliance Award have been announced during the Doc Day of the Marché du Film in Cannes. The 16^thDoc Alliance Award will be presented at the award ceremony of this year’s guest festival DokuFest in Prizren (4 – 12 August). Additionally, all nominated films will be screened at the festival.

The winning films will be decided by three film professionals with different experience in the industry: Anna Berthollet (CEO, Sales & Acquisitions at Lightdox), journalist and programmer Arnaud Hée (La Cinémathèque du Documentaire) and festival programmer Jonathan Ali (Third Horizon, Open City Documentary Festival, Open Doors Locarno).
 

Full list of Best Feature nominees:
 

• a-B-C-D-e-F-G-H-i-JONESTOWN, Czech Republic, director: Jan Bušta, nominated by Ji.hlava IDFF

• Christina (Kristina), Serbia, director: Nikola Spasic, nominated by FIDMarseille

• Death of a City (A Morte de uma Cidade), Portugal, director: João Rosas, nominated by Doclisboa

• Disturbed Earth, Bosnia and Herzegovina/ North Macedonia/ Spain, directors: Kumjana Novakova and Guillermo Carreras-Candi, nominated by DokuFest

• Nights Gone By (Antier noche), Switzerland/ Spain, director: Alberto Martín Menacho, nominated by Visions du Réel

• Polish Prayers, Poland/ Switzerland, director: Hanka Nobis, nominated by Millenium Docs Against Gravity

• Silent Sun of Russia (Vi er Rusland), Denmark, director: Sybilla Tuxen, nominated by CPH:DOX

• Three Women (Drei Frauen), Germany, director: Maksym Melnyk, nominated by DOK Leipzig

Full list of Best Short nominees:
 

• 07:15 – Blackbird, France, director: Judith Auffray, nominated by Ji.hlava IDFF

• Adjusting (Prilagodjeni), Serbia, director: Dejan Petrović, nominated by DokuFest

• Darkroom, Turkey, director: Asli Baykal, nominated by Visions du Réel

• May the Earth Become the Sky (Face-s-ar pământul cer), Belgium/ Hungary/ Portugal/ Romania, director: Ana Vîjdea, nominated by Doclisboa

• Nothing Runs Like a Deere, Sweden, director: Max Göran, nominated by CPH:DOX

• The cervix pass (Le passage du col), France, director: Marie Bottois, nominated by FIDMarseille

• waking up in silence, Germany/ Ukraine, directors: Mila Zhluktenko and
  Daniel Asadi Faezi, nominated by Millenium Docs Against Gravity

• Why my mum loves Russel Crowe, Netherlands, director: Emma van den Berg, nominated by DOK Leipzig
   

The Doc Alliance network of documentary film festivals supports emerging talents in European documentary film. Each of the seven festivals (CPH:DOX, Doclisboa, DOK Leipzig, FIDMarseille, Ji.hlava IDFF, Millennium Docs Against Gravity FF and Visions du Réel) as well as this year’s guest festival DokuFest have nominated one short and one feature-length documentary film from its past programme.

The Doc Alliance Award is endowed with 5,000 EUR (Best Feature) and 3,000 EUR (Best Short) for the filmmakers to spend on their next projects. In addition, each of the festivals in the network shows at least three films from the selection at its next edition.

More information about the nominated films: Doc Alliance Award Nominations

More information about the guest festival 2023: DokuFest

DOK Leipzig is pleased to welcome three new colleagues to the festival team who will contribute varied perspectives to the festival work. Victoria Leshchenko (Coordinator Documentary Film Competitions) and Jana Kraft (Coordinator Animated Film Competitions) are joining the programme department effective immediately. At DOK Industry, Guevara Namer will oversee the DOK Co-Pro Market and the DOK Short n’ Sweet short film pitch as project coordinator.

Victoria Leshchenko is a producer of cultural events and a curator who lives in Berlin and Kyiv. In 2010, following a stint at the Molodist Kyiv International Film Festival, she became the programme coordinator at the Docudays UA International Human Rights Documentary Film Festival, which DOK Leipzig partnered with last year. Since 2019, she has served as programme director at Docudays UA, curating numerous sections of that festival. In 2022, she and Yuliia Kovalenko founded the sloïk film atelier, an independent union of Ukrainian film curators which gives space to underrepresented voices and promotes them internationally.

Jana Kraft is working towards a degree in cultural studies and aesthetic communication at the University of Hildesheim. She lives in Leipzig. As part of her studies, she has been involved in the making of various cartoon and stop-motion films. She has also worked in film coordination at the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen and the Kurzsuechtig Central German Short Film Festival.

Guevara Namer is a documentary filmmaker and visual artist based in Berlin. She started her career in Damascus in 2007. Her work deals with themes of feminism, identity and exile. Guevara Namer is a German Film Academy winner (Lola 2022 for “The Other Side of the River”), in her filmography she has held various roles in a number of collaborations with international filmmakers, including co-directing, researching, filming, and producing.

At the same time, DOK Leipzig is bidding farewell to programme coordinators Thérèse Antony (formerly Competitions) and Ulrike Schmidt (formerly DOK Co-Pro Market, DOK Short n’ Sweet), who are moving on to other endeavours. The festival team wishes them all the best.

DOK Leipzig is introducing a new award for feature-length animated films in time for the 66th edition of the festival this autumn. In doing so, festival director Christoph Terhechte is fulfilling his intention of giving greater prominence to feature-length animated films at the festival. Though announced in 2020, the introduction of a distinct competition for feature-length animated films had to be postponed repeatedly due to the pandemic.

“Every year we’ve been seeing feature-length animated films of very high artistic quality. In recent years, these animated films have been competing alongside documentaries for the Golden and Silver Doves. We now intend to change that and award a Golden Dove for a feature-length international documentary as well as a separate one for a feature-length animated film – as we’ve been doing with the short films,” explains Christoph Terhechte.

The Golden Dove for a feature-length animated film will include at least €3,000 in prize money. The exact amount this year will depend on a potential award sponsor and will be announced later on.

In adding the Golden Dove for a feature-length animated film, DOK Leipzig is also revamping the entire framework of its competitions. The six existing competitions are being consolidated into four. The number of awards, however, will remain the same.

The previous International Competitions are being split into the International Competition Documentary Film and the International Competition Animated Film.

The German Competitions will be replaced by the German Competition Documentary Film. German animated film productions will henceforth be screened in the International Competition Animated Film. The competitions for the Audience Award are being merged into the Audience Competition.

Until 2015, DOK Leipzig had had an international competition for animated films for many years. However, only short animated films ended up competing in it.

The new competition framework no longer distinguishes between short and feature-length films. With the exception of the Audience Competition, the competitions are thus open to films of any length. Separate awards will nonetheless be presented for long and short films, with the threshold at DOK Leipzig remaining at 40 minutes.

The films that earn the Golden Dove for a short animated film and both Golden Doves in the International Competition Documentary Film qualify for nomination for the annual Academy Awards, provided they meet the Academy’s requirements.

Outside of the competitions, DOK Leipzig continues to screen current documentary and animated films in its Camera Lucida and Panorama sections. These films are not in the running for the Golden and Silver Doves, but may be nominated for Partnership Awards.

This year, DOK Leipzig takes place 8 to 15 October. The call for films will open on 15 February. XR works can be submitted from 15 March.

Overview of the competitions and awards at DOK Leipzig 2023:

International Competition Documentary Film

A five-member jury presents the following awards:

• Golden Dove for a feature-length documentary film
• Golden Dove for a short documentary film
• Silver Dove for a feature-length documentary film by an up-and-coming director
• Silver Dove for a short documentary film by an up-and-coming director

International Competition Animated Film

A three-member jury presents the following awards:

• Golden Dove for a feature-length animated film
• Golden Dove for a short animated film

German Competition Documentary Film

A three-member jury presents the following awards:

• Golden Dove for a feature-length documentary film
• Golden Dove for a short documentary film

Audience Competition

A jury of five local film enthusiasts awards:

• a Golden Dove for a feature-length documentary or animated film

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