CineCola's 27th International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam Top 10

NOTE: This top 10 only includes the film that I watched and reviewed during the course of the 27th edition of the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam. Therefore, it does not include films that I did not watch, or have already watched at other festivals that I attended before. However, this list is indeed in order of preference.
 
10 - NATHAN - FREE AS A BIRD by Roel Nollet
 
Nathan - Free as a Bird is the story of a man born a woman who, after a series of failed sex change operations, decides to carry out a final wish to seek freedom through assisted suicide. A feature doc that is bound to stir up debates about the righteousness of euthanasia when employed for unbearable psychological stress, perhaps the most interesting element of the story is not provided by the documenting of Nathan's journey as his friends surround him and attempt unsuccessfully to change his mind, but the confused journey of the documentarian Roel Nollet himself, who finds himself deeply conflicted and unable to totally grasp why the subject is doing this and why he has been asked by him to film his final journey and yet, following his death, finds fimself on TV talking about it. Paradoxically, while the story itself is interesting, this film reads a lot better as a self-reflective documentary and therefore is an unusual yet interesting and unique revelation of the intimate side of the figure of the documentarian.
 
9 - IDA'S DIARY by August B. Hanssen
 
August B. Hanssen compiled his film Ida's Diary largely out of amateurish footage that the titular Ida, a young girl suffering from mental health issues, shot herself over the course of a number of years. The result is a very personal look at a troubled soul with a history of substance and alcohol abuse, tendencies to self-harm and with extreme highs and extreme lows that affect her whole existance. Ida's Diary is by no means an easy watch in any sense of the term. The rapid pacing and unsettlingly frantic editing represents the restless and merciless state of the character's condition, while the fact that the vast majority of the shots are amateurish and shaky might make some members of the audience queesy. But all this is purposely done in order to make the film very real and fully represent Ida's condition and in turn provide and indelible statement that aims to highlight issues of mental illness, which is worryingly on the rise among younger people this day an age.
 
8 - SAKEN by Sandra Madi
 
Saken is an observationalist documentary that aims to let the viewer experience, in minimal yet powerful ways, the life endured by its leading subject Ibrahim, who is a middle aged former militant, now paralysed and forced to live his life in a room of a Palestinian hosbital after a life of fighting in Lebanon. Filmmaker Sandra Madi ambitiously aims to represent his life by doing the vast majority of her filming in the restrictive setting of the room, thus rappresenting the highs and lows of such a life. The lows are represented by those moments of helplessness and depressing boredom while the highs are represented by the engaging relationship between Ibrahim and his carer, with whom a strong bond has developed out of a state of dependance. This relationship soon becomes the driving force behind the film and the conversations they share benefits from a natural and genuineness of the type of chemistry that they share.
 
7 - GOOD THINGS AWAIT by Phie Ambo
 
As far as environmental documentary go, Good Things Await is truly impressive as it seems to channel not only the beauty of nature but also the nature of the protagonist in the story it portrays. The lead subject of the documentary is an 80-year-old biodynamic farmer who practices and preaches his activities as a farmer by following a set of spiritual laws. Documentarian Phie Ambo channels his spirit and soft-spoken personality by allowing the film to have a peaceful and sometimes meditative tone, and she sometimes even slows down to depict the beauty of the settings and the beauty of nature with wonderful shots of the landscape. Despite the passion that follows this documentary, this film doesn't aim to indoctrinate the viewer, therefore making for an enjoyable experience and giving a medium to Niels which intensifies as events unravels and we realise that his likeable views are opposed and even ridiculed by richer farm owners and even by the government.

 

6 - 12TH AND DELAWARE by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady

 
In the past few years there have been a number of documentary dealing with the on-going debate on abortion, yet 12th and Delaware by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady's documentary feels quite different if not downright unique. The film follows a pregnancy care centre in Delaware run by a pro-life group set up across the street from an abortion centre. Their militant ways and passion for their mission and goal is almost too obsessive, and the film has a natural air of satire and black comedy to it that does not need to be accentuated by its filmmakers who, in fact, are rather non-judgemental in their approach to the subject. Yet, this is a close up and personal film that pricelessly reveals the tactics employed by the pro-lifers by revealing their pep talks, the roles and hierarchies within the group and a worrying mantra of the end justifies the means that excuses some truly sinister ways forgiven by their strong spiritual and religious self-endorsement.

5 - THE NEWSROOM - OFF THE RECORD by Mikala Krogh

The Newsroom - Off the Record by Mikala Krogh is a close up and personal behind the scenes look at the machinations of Danish tabloid Ekstra Bladet and the challenges faced by the editorial team who struggle to fight back the decline in popularity of the printed press and their attempts at embracing new media. Krogh follows the events of the picture like a fly on the wall, glorifying the natural tension of the paper's headquarters as they almost comedically seem to be unable to stop this fall in popularity and audaciously as well as somewhat irresponsibly make decisions that harm them rather than help them. The Newsroom - Off the Record is a pricelessly insightful observation in the world of journalism, enrichened by collateral and extremely interesting observations on society and general popular taste that is relentlessly helping to shape today's world.

4 - THE QUEEN OF SILENCE by Agnieszka Zwiefka

Agnieszka Zwiefka follows the life of a ten year old deaf mute girl who lives in a childish world of her own dancing like a Bollywood princess. The real story of this girl becomes the perfect metaphor of the innocence of childhood placed under threat by the serious socio political context in which she is being brought up, unwelcome in her Roma community residing in Poland, and her sensory awakening after she receives a hearing aid dramatically co-incides with this community fighting back deportation from the country. The Queen of Silence also plays a lot with the cinematic medium, thus giving us a byway into the world of fantasy of the little girl, almost encouraging the afore mentioned influence with glorious musical numbers, and at this point it is only safe to say that the music also contributes to a wonderfully engaging viewing experience.

3 - ART AND CRAFT by Sam Cullman and Jennifer Grausman
 

In this documentary, we meet one of the greatest art forgers of all time, John Landis, a man with schizophrenia and incredible craftsmanship in reproducing the works of the great masters of the past. Part of the fun, however, lies in the actual act of donating his works, where he lets loose his multiple personalities in an act that comes close to feeling like performance art in its own right. Understanding the nature of the character, with its quirks and vulnerabilities, filmmakers Cullman and Grausman infuse the pace and mood of Art and Craft with fun and a structure that makes it come close to feeling like a work of fiction. However, they also allow for a closer and more intimate examination of Landis, in which we see a more personal side, which makes the film entertaining as well as rich of emotional and psychological depth.

2 - ESCAPING RIGA by Davis Simanis

What do filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein and the great scholar Isaiah Berlin have in common? Aside from being highly regarded figures in their respective areas of expertise and despite the two's greatly different personalities, they were both born in Riga - though both left it and both their existances evolved out of their travels. Escaping Riga by Davis Simanis is an essay documentary, objective and entertaining that makes the ambitious and rewarding choice of not using archive footage but rather film everything with re-enactments in a style resembling the cinema of the time. In this way, mood, atmosphere and the narrative arch of the film also create a pensive and reflective atmosphere that invites audience interaction - following up on the tradition of other great essay documentaries.

1 - SOMETHING BETTER TO COME by Hanna Polak

A film about people living outside of society, set in Russia and living on Europe's biggest landfill. Something Better to Come took Hanna Polak fourteen years to compile, taking her camera among the community in an unobtrusive way, setting up a strong bond and high level of trust with her subjects, and allowing them to reveal their colourful personalities as revealing their heartwarming solidarity that gets them through their nightmarish lives and living conditions. The driving force of the film, however, is the tender coming of age Yula from child to young adult. An enriching experience and a remarkable project that aims and achieve to give voice to the voiceless, this film is at once strikingly real and impressively poetic due to its genuine portrayal of the situation of extreme poverty with an underlying sentiment of optimism.