Nicholas John Mead

During 31st January – 3rd February, the annual DOCS Barcelona festival took place in Terassa (20km outside of Barcelona) and Barcelona itself. The entire festival was absolutely fascinating from the pitching sessions to the films screened in the evenings so a big congratulations should go to the organisers.

The pitching sessions took place in Terassa and involved watching a documentary maker and producer pitch their idea to a table of around 20 producers and commissioning editors from around Europe. They each had 7 minutes in which to convince the editors that their project had what it takes. The event is fairly unique in Europe although some consider it a bit too “theatrical” to judge a good idea on. Nevertheless, it’s a very interesting way to learn what commissioners do and don’t like. There were around 20 pitches in all, usually consisting of 3 minutes of trailer and 3 minutes of pitch, and it would be impossible to go through each one but ones that caught my attention were:

- Nemesis – A Norwegian documentary by Erlend E. Mo about a TV Reporter who reported on the sentencing of a man to 19 years in Prison in the 1970′s and then devoted his life to proving his innocence as a private investigator. The eventual posthumous pardoning in the Norwegian Court was very moving and this film would probably make a pretty powerful detective/real life drama.

- Esquivar y pegar (Dodge & Hit) – A real life “Rocky” style story of a guy who spends 12 years in jail and then finds salvation in Boxing. This is interesting for Barcelona as he’s from the city and it’s likely it will appear on the local TV3 channel eventually.

- Black and White Window – A Finnish documentary pair (Jaak Kilmi and Kiur Aarma) who document the way Finnish TV invaded Estonia – much to the frustration of Soviet leaders when it was still under Soviet rule – and contributed to the “awakening” of the country to the West via American soaps such as Dallas.

- The Last Russian Revolutionaries – A very powerful story about “Another Russia” – a political party opposed to Putin following the life of Anatoly – a party leader who devotes 10 years of his life to the struggle including losing his son in prison.

These are only a small selection of the excellent films that were pitched.

In the evenings, I watched 4 documentaries on Friday and Saturday night in the Alexandria cinema all of which were absorbing and moving. The best thing is that at all the screenings I went to, the directors were there so I got the chance to ask questions during the Q&A which was always very interesting.

- El honor de las injurias – About the life of a anarchist dreaming of social revolution until the end of the Spanish Civil War in 1939.

- Kalinovsky Square – About the near fascist dictatorship which has taken over Belarus and imprisons those who protest against it

- Oltre la Paura – Very moving story of an Italian who owns an Irish bar and refuses to pay the Mafia’s protection racket in Napoli. He eventually runs as a politician on an anti-mafia agenda.

- Madres – The moving story of the Madres de Mayo – those mothers who still seek justice for the disappearance of their activist children during the 1970′s in Argentina.

- The Way of the Warrior – An amazing story about an American Michael (later Miguel) Northfuster who moves to Bolivia to become a missionary and eventually turns into a revolutionary fighting US imperialism. He’s eventually killed after kidnapping the son of Coca Cola in a police raid. This was actually one of the most moving films of the whole festival because Northfuster’s desire to change framed him as a modern day Che Guevara but his life ended very differently.

- USA vs Al-Arian – The story of a Muslim university professor, successful, rich and even pictured meeting George Bush once, who is imprisoned for sending money to Palestinian charities. He is eventually found not guilty because there is clearly no evidence but Federal Courts force him to say he is guilty in return for letting him go and deporting him from the USA forever. At the time of writing, he is still awaiting release and his family have sold everything to pay for the trial and move back to Egypt. The Norwegian director said that she had been unable to find a single major TV network willing to show this film.

Most of these films will be distributed around Europe over the next few years but if not, leave a message and I’ll try to put you in contact with the directors and producers to obtain a copy.