POV's Documentary Blog

Doc Memo: Lack of Best Picture Noms for Docs, IDA's Getting Real 2016 Recap

October 5, 2016 | POV’s daily list of essential reading for the documentary and independent filmmaking community.

Why Not a Documentary for Best Picture?
Ava DuVernay’s Selma follow- up, 13th, opened the New York Film Festival on Sept. 30 and immediately situated itself as one of the year’s best films. Why, then, is it a foregone conclusion that we won’t be talking about it in terms of best picture? No documentary has ever received a nomination for Hollywood’s top prize, despite true landmarks of the form — like Shoah and Hoop Dreams (the latter controversially snubbed in the doc category as well) — making strong cases.
Read more | Variety »

Getting Real 2016: Pat Aufderheide’s Conference Take
Getting Real 2016 was a remarkable gathering of documentary filmmakers, under the auspices of the International Documentary Association (IDA). What I heard most: Diversity will make us stronger; let’s get better business practice together; we need to build community.
Read more | Center for Media & Social Impact »

What 12 Real Female Filmmakers Wear to Set
Do women filmmakers need to wear certain clothes on set to be taken seriously? Is a female filmmaker’s wardrobe the real secret to success? When Refinery 29 recently posted a story, “How to Dress for the Job You Want” including “film director,” they inadvertently irked a number of actual female directors and producers with their career outfit suggestions.
Read more | Filmmaker Magazine »

MTV launches MTV Docs with “Prescription for Change”
MTV is officially in the documentary game. The network is launching a brand new documentary division, “MTV Docs,” which is dedicated to filmmaking that captures the artists and audiences that inspire MTV. To kick it off, the network will be premiering the film Prescription For Change: Ending America’s Opioid Crisis on Oct. 11, a one-hour documentary film tackling America’s opioid addiction epidemic.
Read more | Realscreen »

Terrence Malick’s First Documentary Tackles the History of the Universe
Over the years, I’ve used “shot as if Terrence Malick were behind the camera” as shorthand for praise for any documentary in which images of nature are filmed with lyrical, visually-stunning panache. Malick, a narrative fiction director who has made a host of gorgeous films, including Badlands, Days of Heaven and The New World, has always provided the prism through which I look at the most cinematically ambitious documentary filmmakers. And so, I could hardly contain myself when news spread that Malick was directing his first documentary, Voyage of Time.
Read more | POV’s Documentary Blog »

Submissions for the 2017 Accelerator Lab will open on October 11, 2016
Chicken & Egg Pictures will begin accepting submissions for the Accelerator Lab for first and second-time filmmakers on Monday, October 11. There is one deadline for the 2016 Open Call: Wednesday, November 9, 2016, 5:00 PM EST. The application fee is $35.
Read more | Chicken & Egg Pictures »

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