04.03.2024 The Echoes of the 27th Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival begin this week in Brussels. The programme will feature the award-winning films from last year's Ji.hlava IDFF which will be screened in the European Parliament, the Prague House in Brussels, the RITCS and KASK Ghent film schools. Documentaries from the Ji.hlava’s 27th edition will also be screened in Romania, Poland, the USA and Slovakia.
"It has always been important for us to think about Ji.hlava in an international context and to interconnect films and their filmmakers across the world. Most of the challenges we face today have no borders, and so does the Ji.hlava programme, whose Echoes will be taking place in six countries this year," said Marek Hovorka, director of the Ji.hlava IDFF.
The twelfth Echoes of Ji.hlava in Belgium (5–7 March) will open tomorrow in the European Parliament with the documentary film The World According to My Dad by Marta Kovářová, which chronicles her father's fight for climate justice in the form of a live diary. The screening will be followed by a debate with the director and the protagonist. The film took home the Award of the students jury and also won the Ji.hlava Online Audience Award.
The programme will traditionally present other Ji.hlava award-winning films including Štěpán Pech's You Will Never See It All, which was awarded the Best Debut Award at the 27th Ji.hlava IDFF. The conceptualist and cartoonist Ján Mančuška died just before his 40th birthday, but during his lifetime he managed to create a remarkable work that was presented in galleries across the world – including at the Centre Pompidou in Paris and MoMA in New York.
The programme also includes Ivan Ostrochovsky's film The Goat (2015) and a masterclass by the director. Another masterclass will be led by filmmaker Lucie Rosenfeldová and the programme will also include other short films by Czech filmmakers.
Where will Ji.hlava go next?
The second half of March will be followed by the Echoes of Ji.hlava in Romania, which will present four films from the Ji.hlava programme, and the audience can also look forward to directors’ workshops at the Bucharest’s UNATC film school.
In early April, the Echoes of Ji.hlava are scheduled in Poland in Warsaw and Lodz. In the second half of April, the Echoes will move to New York, where Ji.hlava will continue its traditional cooperation with Maysles Documentary Center, Union Docs, and screenings will also take place at the Bohemian National Hall.
On May 22–29, the most important documentary festival in the region, the Beldocs IDFF, will present a cross-section of films from past editions of Ji.hlava in a special section dedicated to Czech documentary filmmakers. The programme will include, among others, the documentaries Czech Dream by Vit Klusák and Filip Remunda and The Sound in Innocent by Johana Ožvold.
This year’s extended Echoes of Ji.hlava take place in cooperation with the Czech Centres network and with the financial support of the Czech Ministry of Culture, the Czech Recovery Plan and the European Union.
The Echoes of Ji.hlava IDFF in Belgium are held under the auspices of H.E. Jakub Skalník, Ambassador of the Czech Republic in Brussels, and with the support of the Statutory City of Jihlava, the Vysočina Region and the Czech Centre Brussels.
The complete programme of the Echoes of the 27th Ji.hlava can be found here.
29.10.2023 Ji.hlava has unveiled its winning films. Photophobia by Ivan Ostrochovský and Pavol Pekarčík took home the Best Czech Documentary award, while the most prominent Opus Bonum award for best world documentary went to Elvis Lenić's Ship from Croatia. Maia Gattás Vargas, the Argentine director, was honoured an award for the original approach, and Hungarian director Béla Tarr received recognition for his contribution to world cinema. The Ji.hlava IDFF also has plans to expand the live part of the festival from six to ten days starting next year.
The twenty-seventh Ji.hlava IDFF has handed out its prizes and also announced that it will extend from the current six days to ten in the coming years. "We want to provide greater comfort for our audience. This will free up accommodation capacity, which will be available to more festival guests and visitors. The extension will also result in a greater number of screenings, allowing us to have up to four screenings of a single film,” said festival director Marek Hovorka.
Ji.hlava Online starts tomorrow. It will run until November 12th and will offer more than one hundred seventy films from this year’s live festival programme. Audiences will have the opportunity to watch not only most of the award-winning films but also the most interesting selections that Ji.hlava presented this year. All films from the programme will be available for viewing until midnight on November 12th, but only within the territory of the Czech Republic.
The winning films can be found here and in the attached press release below.
28.10.2023 Ten industry awards were presented today to the most promising projects participating in the Ji.hlava New Visions Forum 2023. In total, twenty-two projects in development, production and post-production were presented at the Forum. The winners received numerous cash and in-kind awards accorded in cooperation with the partners of Ji.hlava IDFF. See the list of all winners.
The creation of the Ji.hlava/JB Films co-production project, a joint initiative of Ji.hlava IDFF and the festival's long-term partner Jan Barta was also announced. Next year, up to EUR 110,000 will be distributed to creative documentaries from the region of Central and Eastern Europe. The films will be selected through a call for proposals to be announced in February 2024. The film projects in which Ji.hlava/JB Films will co-produce shall be announced in June 2024.
The Ji.hlava New Visions jury was composed of Gugi Gumilang (Executive Director, In-Docs & Docs by the Sea, Indonesia, Gita Saedi Kiely (Director of FilmAid, Internews’ in-house program, USA) and Nora Philippe (Head of Programme, EURODOC, France).
Ji.hlava New Visions Award 2023 for the most promising European project will receive post-production services in the value of 15,000 EUR (UPP) and 5,000 EUR (Soundsquare). The winner is:
If Pigeons Turned to Gold
Director: Pepa Lubojacki
Producers: Wanda Kaprálová, Klára Mamojková
Countries: Czech Republic, Slovakia
Jury statement: We found this film to be brave, sincere, incredibly creative, and boldly experimental. It interrogates our paths in the world, the different paths inside one family, and the ways to exist beyond the ongoing pain of addiction. With this award, we want to reinforce Pepa's commitment to share this difficult story. This film will be an alchemical process, and it will need some excellent post-production support to hone its potential and vision.
Two films received the Ji.hlava New Visions Forum Award 2023 for the most promising U.S. projects. The 7,000 USD cash award in partnership with AmDocs will be accorded to the following two projects:
Valley of the Night (5,000 USD)
Director and producer: Lynne Siefert
Country: USA
Jury statement: This is a stunning dive into a dystopian present, and we commend the filmmaker for her incredibly cinematic approach on such a relevant and pressing issue of these times. Introducing us to temporal migration with such poetic photography promises a very singular and fascinating film.
Vestibul (2,000 USD)
Director: Riley Hooper
Producers: Caitlin Mae Burke, Bryn Silverman
Country: USA
Jury statement: This is a bold and uncompromising film that will create a new conversation around the agency we have with our bodies, sex, and pleasure. We want this award to encourage this filmmaker as she begins this filmic journey that will break taboos and empower many girls, women, and all the humans that need support in building a good relationship with their bodies.
The other cash and in-kind awards were accorded in cooperation with Current Time TV, FilmAid, Docs Connect Taskovski training, Cannes Docs – Marché du Film, Documentary Association of Europe, European Film Market, EURODOC, and Meeting Point Vilnius.
Please see the list of all Ji.hlava New Visions Forum Awards 2023.
The Award for the Best Festival Posters of 2023 were accorded to Trieste Film Festival 2023 (Jury Award) and Visions du Réel 2023 (Audience Award).