As Forum, the industry program of documentary festival IDFA, launches today, Adriek van Nieuwenhuijzen, the festival’s head of industry, and its artistic director Isabel Arrate Fernandez, talk about the shifts in the business landscape, and how the festival is responding to those changes with modifications to its industry program.
Reflecting on the challenges that face documentary filmmakers in the market, Van Nieuwenhuijzen observes that there is a disconnect between what broadcasters and streamers consider to be documentaries worthwhile investing in and IDFA’s view.
“Often their definition of what a documentary is is not the same as what we consider as an interesting, important creative work,” Van Nieuwenhuijzen says. “So, it’s a matter of definition. At IDFA, we stand for artistic, bold filmmaking, and that is not always what is, let’s say, celebrated at some television stations or streamers. The filmmakers aiming to make these kind of films often face difficulties in finding their finance, and these opportunities can often be found when they co-produce with local, often European producers, also some transnational funds. But it is not a very positive outlook if you look at financing opportunities in total.”
Van Nieuwenhuijzen adds that there are “different realities” for filmmakers. “We still get films with a budget close to a million euros, whereas others are making a feature film for 300,000 euros,” she says. “They all exist next to each other, and both types of projects are programmed next to each other at Forum.”
Fernandez adds that IDFA has often, in previous editions, looked at how tough it is for filmmakers to survive financially, especially as the market seems to be in a continuous cycle of change. “The steps that we have taken now with these changes [to Forum] are related to that, in the sense of trying to keep adapting the model of the market so that it suits the reality of the people that are making the films,” she says, “or, at the very least, we have tried to create more opportunities and a space where different ways of making the films, different ways of collaborating can exist.”
Van Nieuwenhuijzen underscores the festival’s desire to “elevate” artistic documentaries, and for those the priority was to find co-producers rather than chase commissions from broadcasters and streamers, she explains.
This led to the formation four years ago of Producers Connection Presentations, which aimed to connect the producers of artistic documentaries with co-producing partners. Meanwhile, those projects that did want to target broadcaster and streamer buyers were focused on the Forum Pitch sessions.
This year, in a further move to boost the prospects of artistic docs, Producers Connection Presentations and the Forum Pitches will run alongside each other at ITA on Monday and Tuesday mornings, allowing Forum guests to attend both, and Van Nieuwenhuijzen says the integration will ensure the artistic projects “get far more visibility.”
Fernandez adds that the aim of the changes is to burst the different bubbles that professionals exist in and “create crossover so that people are triggered by something that is happening in a sphere where they normally would not work in, or films they normally would not see.”
Another change is that the Forum will introduce thematic panels to replace the post-pitch feedback from buyers. The thematic panels will be “curated around specific financing models, aiming to provide filmmakers with practical insights on navigating the current documentary financing landscape,” IDFA says.
One-on-one meetings with potential buyers and co-producers will remain a core element of Forum, IDFA adds, “allowing for in-depth conversations around artistic intent, financing plans, and potential collaborations.”
The thematic panels will be “quite small scale and informal presentations” by industry representatives “laying out their formats, their strands and their strategies,” Van Nieuwenhuijzen says. Among examples of questions that could be posed, she says, are: How do I find a broadcaster or funding in France? How do the transnational funds work? What are the opportunities with Eurimages? Or, what are the co-production opportunities with the Nordic countries?
Fernandez comments that the festival and Forum work together to create a “meeting place” for filmmakers, producers and buyers, and host a broad spectrum of documentaries. All parts of IDFA, including the Bertha Fund, are “interconnected, but at the same time also operate separately,” and while the Forum is aimed at professionals who differ in their interests to the public attendees of the festival, there are “overlapping circles.”
It should be noted that IDFA’s reputation for inclusivity was challenged last month, when several media outlets, including Variety, claimed that IDFA was not selecting films from Israel or allowing Israeli filmmakers to apply for accreditation.
The festival rejected the assertion but admitted that films and filmmakers that had received funding from the Israeli government had not been accepted and conceded that it had signed up to a cultural boycott of Israel (see here), in line with its existing guidelines.
IDFA said in a statement, “If filmmakers and films have demonstrable ties to governments that contribute to serious human rights violations, these films are generally not selected.”
Israeli film professionals see the matter differently, as you can read in Variety’s report on the issue, here.