Jury
report: VPRO Joris Ivens Award 2000
On behalf
of the Jury of the VPRO Joris Ivens Award, it gives me great
pleasure to present the Jury Report for IDFA 2000. First of
all, we would like to thank all the filmmakers for giving us
an opportunity to see their cinematic way of reflecting the
world around us. We are grateful that the festival which is,
we believe, the most important festival for documentary films,
gave us this chance to see the present trends in documentary
filmmaking throughout the world.
We have seen 27 long films, averaging 90 minutes. We consider
it a pity that there are so many films to see and so little
time between them to reflect adequately upon them. On the other
hand, only a few of the feature length documentaries we have
seen deserve to be as long as they are. We wonder what happened
to all the good short documentaries.
Let's go to the nominations for the 2000 VPRO Joris Ivens Award.
We looked at the films in terms of their professionalism, their
original cinematic language and their ability to touch the viewer.
We found three outstanding films. In alphabetical order they
are:
DEN HØJESTE STRAF / MAXIMUM PENALTY directed by Tómas Gislason,
for its innovative use of both a traditional and a new media
approach. This very professionally made film gives well-known
historical events both a universal and a personal touch.
JENSEITS VON TIBET / OUT OF TIBET, directed by Solveig Klassen,
for its striking beauty and simplicity of style. The filmmaker
maintains a sensitive aesthetic distance in making a personal
and touching portrait.
DE ZEE DIE DENKT / THE SEA THAT THINKS, directed by Gert de
Graaff. The filmmaker has found a new means of creating interactivity
between the film and its audience as part of its narrative structure.
Although this film has been made in a fictional manner, it is
in fact a documentary about perception. One jury member however
would like to express a strong protest about the excessive addiction
to smoking of the film's protagonist, and the apparent condoning
of this deadly and socially obnoxious behaviour.
Before we announce the winner, we would like to present our
Special Jury Prize. The Special Prize of this Jury goes to a
film which portrays an extraordinary individual. The beauty
of this film, the jury finds, is in the agile and humour-filled
style with which the filmmaker deals with aspects of the protagonist's
life that some may find disturbing.
The Special Jury Prize is awarded to KEEP THE RIVER ON YOUR
RIGHT, directed by David and Laurie Gwen Shapiro.
And now it is my honour to present the 2000 VPRO Joris Ivens
Award. From all documentaries in the IDFA 2000 film competition
there is one film that stands out above the others.
The 2000 VPRO Joris Ivens Award is given to DE ZEE DIE DENKT
/ THE SEA THAT THINKS, directed by Gert de Graaff.
John Appel,
Les Blank, Zita Carvalhosa, Victor Kossakovsky, Rada Sesic
Juryreport
Filmfestival IDFA Amsterdam 2000