MOVIES
Colombia, 2011, 28 min
Ben Cheetham
27.01.2012 18:45
Walking through Bogotá it would be hard to ignore the overwhelming presence of those who call its streets home. Thousands of young people make up this sub-group of society, a legacy of decades of political instability. This film takes place in one of 26 houses set up by “the Institution for the Protection of Childhood and Adolescence“ (IDIPRON) located in the centre of Bogotá.
Saliendo Adelante explores the life of José who, now in his early 20´s, has lived on the streets since the age of 6. José is now attempting to change his life´s trajectory by talking part in a programme of social rehabilitation offered by the institution. Through the film we are also introduced to the work of Orlando, a teacher at the Institution, and his efforts to offer those like José other ways of visualizing the world around them.
I have recently graduated from a Master´s programme in visual anthropology at Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology at the University of Manchester. This film was my graduation project, which I received a distinction for. On the course I made a number of other films and photography based projects, largely informed and inspired by the principles of observational cinema.
Director and production: Ben Cheetham
Language of dialogues: Spanish
Language of subtitles: English, Czech
Česká republika, 2011, 99 min
Milan Durňak, Magdalena Koháková
28.01.2012 17:10
What should antropological films be like? How to come to terms with alternating view of the world and with stereotypes in us? In a 3-year span, this issue kept busy an execution team around Milan Durňak who went back to his home-village to capture life of Roma people together with their Ruthenian neighbours. Every stay in the Roma colony brought one episode of a film which captures everyday life, tries to describe problems which trouble them and constantly strive to jump over their own shadows. The spectator has a chance to encounter a story in a social-cummunity centre with a hard-working mayor and festivals in the village and think about the worries and merriments of one Roma colony.
Milan Durňak graduated at Charles Univerity in Prague, main field ethnology. Currently he is working at the University as a Phd student. In his studies, he mainly deals with visual anthropology and creation of antropological films.
Director: Milan Durňak
Production: Milan Durňak, Magdalena Koháková
Language of dialogues: Slovakian, Czech, Rusyn language, Gypsy language
Language of subtitles: Slovakian
The Netherlands, 2011, 29 min
Fedor Ikelaar
28.01.2012 16:15
The road, to most of us simply a path leading to a destination, but to many truck drivers the road itself is their destination, their goal and their home. To them the road is a cold-hearted mistress that dominates their lives. In this documentary three of these truck drivers are followed on that road as they passionately explain what drew them to truck driving and what is so extraordinary about their jobs. They talk openly and reflectively about the thoughts, hopes, dreams and aspirations that keep them going and help them position this demanding job into their lives. Through both humour and sorrow surprising sides and depths of these seemingly tough men with their apparent uncomplicated lives are disclosed.
At the age of 27 Fedor abandoned a successful IT career to study anthropology at the VU University in Amsterdam. Anthropology became the ideal field to explore not only his interest in culture, development and conflict, but also to combine these with his passion for filmmaking. Though his own university has no visual ethnography in its program, he spent a lot of time exploring this field on his own or with some likeminded students. With these students he also started to make short ethnographic documentaries and a full length ethnographic production titled “The Challenge.” This experience led up to “What Keeps Them Going”, his first solo production. He recently graduated and has taken on a research position at the municipality of Amsterdam, he does not intend to abandon documentary filmmaking as he intends to do projects on the side to continue developing both his skills and style.
Director and production: Fedor Ikelaar
Language of dialogues: Dutch
Language of subtitles: English
Lauching of movie:
Athens Ethnographic Film Festival