Fifteen exploratory, risk-taking films of the highest caliber shine in IDFA’s new Envision Competition. This is filmmaking that defies all expectations, rewriting the definition of documentary with radical artistic choices of every stripe. From the tenderest introspective journeys to the most demanding encounters with rhythm, tone, and form, the films selected for Envision plunge us into the worlds of their directors, leading us on a naked journey of discovery we won’t soon forget.
In keeping with tradition, the filmmaker and his family build a tomb for his grandparents. This carefully composed portrait of a village—with scenes of the work, personal memories, and philosophical reflections—is a mirror of existence itself.
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Bosnia-born director Tea Tupajic invites two Dutch war veterans who served during the fall of Srebrenica to spend a night in her company. She wants answers to painful questions, but also tries to discover something in the two men that can give her hope.
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The hell of ALS filmed with brutal honesty from the point of view of ALS patient Kathryn, who is completely paralyzed. The disease has destroyed everything, from Kathryn’s muscles to her marriage, but her sharp wit remains unaffected.
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Fourty years after their flight from the Khmer Rouge, filmmaker Neary Adeline Hay hopes her mother will break her silence. She follows the trail back from France, in this very personal, elegantly filmed journey through their memories.
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The late Senobia was an endearing woman who transformed her house in a Panamanian village into “The Museum of Antiquities of All Species.” Pilar Moreno and Ana Endara capture her personality and creation in a quirky, conceptual documentary.
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Amsterdam-based filmmaker Louis Hothothot was born in China, a second child in the era of the one-child policy. His birth had devastating consequences for his parents, and when he visits them he discovers other distressing events in the family as well.
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After filmmaker Nidal Al Dibs fled to Cairo from Syria, he started filming his Egyptian friends working to get a local community cinema reopened. A film about cinema as a symbol for the hopes and dreams of ordinary people in the Arab world.
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Scenes which seem very ordinary—filmmaker Oeke Hoogendijk’s elderly mother in her living room, watching television with her cat—gradually develop into the portrait of an astute woman who has to live each day with the Holocaust as her housemate.
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A moving journey through the life and mind of artist Penny Andrea, based entirely on her drawings. By studying her sketchbooks, she hopes to learn how a brain tumor shaped both her and her art.
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Diego Gutiérrez is asked to film the final phase of life of two loved ones: his mother and his best friend. On the threshold of death, events that have shaped their lives emerge.
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A fascinating archive film about the oologist Max Schönwetter, who devoted his life to the study of birds’ eggs. He collected 19,206 beautiful specimens, from birds ranging from the tiny warbler to the rhea. In the meantime, WWII was looming.
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The aftermath of the explosion that took place at the Port of Beirut in August 2020 is revealed in quiet stillness, from the destroyed buildings and the despair of local residents to the cautious first sounds of reconstruction.
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Life has been hard for South African domestic worker Mothiba Grace Bapela, and she’s lived it in service to others. In between, she pursued a career as an actor. A poignant portrait of social inequality and the oppression of women.
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A creative and futuristic visual essay in which the Argentinian director, trapped at home during lockdown, connects social issues with a personal investigation of the past and future of her generation.
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The walls in the Brazilian city of Belo Horizonte are inundated with painted pictures and words: from stunning murals to old-school graffiti, and from enigmatic cries from the heart to furious cursing.
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