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21^st THESSALONIKI DOCUMENTARY FESTIVAL [1-10/3/2019]

Docs in Progress of the Agora Doc Market

The projects of the Agora Doc Market Docs in Progress section of the 21^st Thessaloniki Documentary Festival were presented on Wednesday March 6^th at Pavlos Zannas theater. The Docs in Progress session takes place for the eighth consecutive year in the Agora Doc Market. In this year’s edition 10 projects from South-eastern Europe and the Mediterranean region participate in closed sessions exclusively for TDF’s invited industry professionals, sales agents, distributors, producers and festival programmers.

The event was opened by the head of Agora Yianna Sarri, who addressed a warm welcome to all participants.

The Two Thirty-five (2|35) Inc post-production company offers for the fifth year in a row an award in post-production services. In addition, the MuSou award for music and sound services, amounting up to 3,500 euro, will be presented for the third time and the Greek Film Centre offers an award of 3,000 euro in cash for the second time. Furthermore, through the new collaboration between TDF and the Swiss festival Visions du Réel, the winner of the Agora DiP prize will also secure accreditation and accommodation for the Festival held in Switzerland, in April.

The international Agora Docs in Progress jury consists of:

Rada Sesic, Sarajevo Film Festival, Bosnia & Herzegovina

Elisabeth Hagstedt, Histoire TV, France

Menios Karayiannis, film director, Greece

The projects that participate in the Docs in Progress section are the following:

1. Four Seasons by Katerina Patroni. Production: Eleni Chandrinou, Maria Kontogianni, Steficon, Greece
2. Libres! by Arno Bitschy. Production: Clara Vuillermoz, Les films du Balibari, Co-producer: Liisa Karpo, Marianne Makëla, Napa Films, France, Finland
3. Never Whistle Alone by Marco Ferrari. Production: Patricia Robledo, Candy Glass, Co-producer: Francesco Crespi, Basement, Italy
4. Our Choices by Salah Al Ashkar. Production: Etienne de Ricaud, Caractères Productions, Ariel Cypel, L'atelier des artistes en exil, Syria, France
5. Overtures by Louis Henderson. Production: Olivier Marboeuf, Spectre Productions, France
6. Queen of the Deuce by Valerie Kontakos. Production: Despina Pavlaki, Valerie Kontakos, Exile Films, Greece
7. A Rifle and a Bag by Cristina Hanes & Arya Rothe. Production: Isabella Rinaldi, NoCut Film Collective, Co-producer: Andra Popescu, Conset Films, India, Romania
8. School 54 (working title) by Dimitra Kouzi. Production: Dimitra Kouzi, Kouzi Productions, Greece
9. Tobias by Alexa Bakony. Production: Gábor Osváth & Ildikó Szűcs, Filmfabriq, Hungary
10. Y1 Silence of the Deep by Philippos Vardakas. Production: Stelios Efstathopoulos, Team Faos TV Productions, Co-producer: Faos TV Productions GmbH, Greece, Germany

It should be noted that the 21^st TDF Agora Doc Market is held on a daily basis until March 9th, from 10am to 8pm, at Warehouse C (Port of Thessaloniki).

Agora, an integral and valuable part of the Festival, with the support of the European program Creative Europe MEDIA, has been established as a meeting point where filmmakers from all over the world come in contact with TV broadcasters’ representatives (mainly from Europe), aiming to promote and sell their movies. The turnout is constantly on the rise, proving that Thessaloniki has consolidated its stature as a crossroad of worldwide cultural and commercial exchange.

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How much and in what ways does man differ from animals? What are the moral boundaries in experimenting with animals? How fragile is our relationship with them? How does art and philosophy converse with the animals? What does our stance towards animal kingdom reveal for our species? These are some of the questions raised in the open discussion “Why Look at Animals?” held on Tuesday 5 March at Warehouse C, as part of the 21^st Thessaloniki Documentary Festival.

An exciting and outside-the-box project was presented, for the first time, in the 21^st Thessaloniki Documentary Festival, on Tuesday, March 5th, at Warehouse C, within the framework of the Market Talks event held by the Festival’s Agora Doc Market. Greek filmmaker-scriptwriter Syllas Tzoumerkas (A Blast, The Miracle of the Sargasso Sea) and Greek actor-director Christos Passalis (Dogtooth, blitz theatre group) presented the project titled “City and the City”, commissioned by the Thessaloniki Film Festival and the Metropolitan Organization of Museums of Visual Arts of Thessaloniki (MOMus).

Austrian film director Gustav Deutsch introduced the audience to the secrets of his sui generis cinema in an open discussion which took place on Monday, March 4^th 2019 at the MOMus-Experimental Center for the Arts, as part of the 21^st Thessaloniki Documentary Festival, and in the presence of the Thessaloniki International Film Festival Artistic Director, Mr Orestis Andreadakis. This year’s TDF edition pays tribute to Gustav Deutsch’s work by screening seven of his signature films.

The 21^st Thessaloniki Documentary Festival, in an emotionally charged ambiance, honored the memory of the recently deceased Greek filmmaker Giorgos Karipidis (1946-2019) with a special screening of his rare short film The Painter Theofilos, held on Monday March 4^th, at Pavlos Zannas theater. The film had been bestowed with the first prize, as well as the critics’ award, in the 1979 Thessaloniki Film Festival. The widow of the deceased Rania Mprilaki-Karypidi also attended the event.