One of my favourite documentaries of the past few months must be The Defector: Escape from North Korea. And luckily, after taking on audiences worldwide, the film is now coming to the UK.

“With Kim Jong-un at the helm in North Korea, ‘Dragon’ is busy smuggling North Korean defectors across borders. His latest undercover trip with Sook-Ja and Yong-hee takes an unexpected turn when they are left stranded in China. This is only the beginning of an extraordinary 5,000 km journey. Their story reflects the reality of tens of thousands of North Koreans currently in hiding in China.”

As Emma Norton put it when she reviewed the film during IDFA last year, “Director and producer Ann Shin takes significant risks to reveal how tough it is to truly escape from one of the world’s most secretive and brutal authoritarian regimes”. No doubt this is the reason she has been invited by the government to screen the film in front of MPs on 11 June before showing it to a larger audience at Sheffield Doc/Fest where it is up for an Innovation Award.

I personally highly recommend you to see this film. Aside from the subject it has also been put together with great care and while continously ensuring none of the defectors would get into trouble over their participation in the film. If you don’t want to take my word for it, take a look at the trailer here:

In addition to the film, there is a companion interactive web doc that gives you the opportunity to experience what it is like to walk in a defector’s shoes as they attempt to make their way out of North Korea. It’s a great interactive project and no doubt will we see more and more of these kind of educational tools tied in with (especially campaigning) docs in the years to come. Please do take a look if you can.

After the succes she had with her film Brick Lane, British director Sarah Gavron has now returned to the big screen with a beautiful portrait documentary. DocGeeks asked the director about the challenges she faced when filming – literally – in a village at the end of the world.

You can not deny the beauty of the far flung corner of north west Greenland where Gavron filmed. The village, Niaqornat, is surrounded by a stunning landscape – however, it is also so small that dogs easily outnumber inhabitants.

The film, Village at the End of the World, follows four very different residents who live in the tiny community, and while we observe how the ice and the seasons dictate how they live their lives, we are also introduced to the future they face: Niaqornat’s very existence is threatened economically and ecologically. Together the villagers must find a way to safeguard their survival as a community. (Full review here)

Gavron never set out to make a full blown feature documentary about the village. It was her husband, David Katznelson, who fell in love with Greenland and convinced her to join him for a year, together with their two small children. Slowly the idea arose of making a short documentary together about the various communities in the country…

However, after multiple helicopter flights (the only means of travelling any serious distance in Greenland) they ended up in Niaqornat, fell in love with the place and their ‘adventure’ became a full-blown research trip.

“The thing that attracted us to Niaqornat is that we instantly made a connection with the people there, we made friends with the sewage collector who spoke perfect English and we realised we had the chance to paint a portrait of the community. It represents a story about how small, traditional communities all over the world are struggling to survive. We met a number of characters who told a different side of this story and it is them who make the film.”

No chance to eavesdrop

Asked if language was a problem, Gavron says that while her husband filmed and she directed, the sewage collector would often translate. “It’s not easy to find someone who can speak and interpret Greenlandic into English. There aren’t many speakers who master the language and in the UK there isn’t a single one.”

Lucky for the filmmaker, there are a few speakers in Denmark and one of them helped Gavron in the edit suite, sitting in during large chunks of the editing period.

“We’d film things while we were there and we wouldn’t know what we were shooting until we got back.

“It was funny but also challenging because it meant that you didn’t know what was going on and you couldn’t anticipate what people were about to do. Also, you couldn’t eavesdrop or pick up the general feeling of the crowd – or even chat around a subject to come up with new things like you would with other documentaries.”

Silent and far flung challenges

Another hurdle the director describes is the fact that the location they chose was so remote. Of course, this makes the feature what it is but from a filmmaker’s point of view it was very challenging. To get there would cost three days and to leave Gavron and Katznelson had to wait for a helicopter which would only fly sporadically (and not at all when the weather was bad).

“From a practical point of view, when we were editing and thought, ‘oh we really need another shot of this or that’, we couldn’t just pick up those moments as you would do with another film.

“The other thing was that it just didn’t follow the normal routine of life. They are just so sustained by nature and their lives are governed by the elements. When we interviewed Karl, the hunter, for example, he looked up at the clouds and said: ‘It is the perfect condition today for a reindeer hunt. I’ll be back in four days’. You really had to adapt to this.”

“Traditionally,” Gavron says, “the people in Niaqornat are not very expressive and open. I think this is one of the reasons they are successful as a community: they keep a lid on their emotions and keep themselves to themselves. In a way this means that their communal life works quite effectively. However, it also makes it harder to get an insight into how they feel or to what is going on. It took a while to build up our relationship with each other and understand the cultural differences – it was a real learning curve.”

Fact or fiction?

As to the question whether we will be seeing more documentaries from Gavron, she explains that though she loved making a documentary and would like to make more – she loves exploring, travelling and finding out about the secrets of the world and she now craves the linear creative filmmaking process that can only be achieved in fiction. Sadly, the world of documentary films will have to wait…

Village at the End of the World is currently in UK cinemas. More information can be found on the film’s official website.

The programme for this year’s 20th Sheffield Doc/Fest couldn’t be more exciting. Taking place 12–16 June, the festival features talks, live music, its popular pitching platform MeetMarket, and, of course, a super impressive list of screenings. Here are some of this year’s highlights…

Heather Croall then continued with the fun revealing that as it is their 20th anniversary, the festival will have not just one opening night, but three. The coolest one of those being a screening of the jaw-dropping documentary The Summit, which will be shown in a cave in the Peak District.

Croall also treated the audience to a clip of Pussy Riot – A Punk Prayer, which will get its UK premiere at the festival. The documentary, from Mike Lerner and Maxim Pozdorovkin, tells the story of the members of the feminist art collective Pussy Riot – who were arrested in Russia on charges of religious hatred.

This year also features a stellar line-up of guest speakers, featuring top names in broadcasting, including Michael Palin, Trevor McDonald, Alan Yentob, Melvyn Bragg and BBC Two controller Janice Hadlow. Host and producer of This American Life, Ira Glass, is set to make his first UK appearance at the festival to discuss his award-winning programme.

Film programmer Hussain Currimbhoy revealed some of the selected films that will be showing – he had to wade through 2,000 of them to whittle down to 77 features, 33 shorts, 10 interactive and 1 art installation. Highlights from the line-up include: Richard Pryor: Omit the Logic, Muscle Shoals, and God Loves Uganda – a hard-hitting doc about African culture and American Christian evangelists previously shown as part of Sundance London. Another returning popular name from that festival is Black Fish, nothing less than a thriller showing the deadly implications of keeping killer wales in captivity.

Commenting on this year’s festival, Croall said: “Sheffield Doc/Fest at 20 is an exciting place to be. Since I arrived seven years ago the festival has grown exponentially and we’ve done that by making sure we stay ahead of the curve. At Doc/Fest we always strive to broaden the term documentary to deliver a programme that celebrates the form across all platforms.

“This year I am particularly proud that the Interactive programme is the strongest ever, and can be seen right across the festival in speakers, sessions, docs, in The Crossover Lounge and the first ever Crossover Market. And throughout Doc/Fest we will present a live music and film events with some of the most exciting musicians around – I can’t think of a better year!”

For the full programme of films and events, head to the Sheffield Doc/Fest website by clicking here.

Aside from the great documentary screenings it hosts, London’s Frontline Club also organise workshops for filmmakers and journalists on a regular basis. Here are four events we think you’ll like.

From storytelling to social media, the new season of training events at the Frontline Club has it all.

What is your concept of success? How can you scout locations more carefully? And how do you use sound to your advantage once you’ve entered the edit suite? Check out the below courses all aimed at enhancing your skillset and you’ll find the answers to these questions.

Workshop: Documentary Storytelling

Friday 17 May 2013, 10.00 AM – 5.30 PM
This one-day workshop will address the challenge of storytelling in documentary.

Workshop: Storytelling for the Edit

Saturday 1 June 2013, 10:00 AM – 5:00 PM
This one day workshop will inspire participants to think about storytelling from an editor’s perspective.

Workshop: Digital Bootcamp Remastered

Friday 21 June, 9:30 AM – 5:00 PM
If you’re feeling overwhelmed about social media and all things digital, then Digital Bootcamp will show you how to create a manageable strategy and use available tools to get your films made and seen. You will learn how to reach and engage audiences in new and exciting ways, and how to measure the impact of your endeavours.

Two-Day Workshop: Guerrilla Filmmaking with What Took You So Long?

Saturday 29 & Sunday 30 June, 10:00 AM – 5:00 PM
This two-day workshop will teach you about guerrilla filmmaking as an informal and flexible method of working, which can be adapted to fit the situation, culture, country, and people you are shooting.

For more workshops, check out the Frontline Club’s website.

One of London’s lovely little film festivals, fittingly called The Smalls, is open for submissions – so get your documentaries in now people!

Filmmakers from around the world are invited to submit their short documentary films to The Smalls film festival in London.

Shortlisted films will be showcased as a part of the festival’s eight edition and take part in a great programme with screening events throughout central London.

The organisers accept short documentary films under 15 mins. The winning film of each category will be determined by a judging pannel of industry professionals and will be awarded cash prizes, and more (stay tuned for further announcements).

Last year, at their annual awards ceremony in Covent Garden, the organisers of The Smalls announced Oil & Water by Fat Rat Films as the winner of the The Smalls Film Festival documentary award 2012.

To enter your documentary film to the festival please visit The Smalls’ website.

Early Bird Submissions: 22nd April – 5th May | Fee – £10

Regular Submissions: 6th May – 16th June | Fee – £18

Late Submissions: 17th June – 8th July | Fee – £22

The Smalls Film Festival 2013 will run from Friday 30 August to Friday 6 September in central London and will host not just screenings but also industry panel sessions and master classes for creatives working in short film.

London documentary filmmakers Gemma Atkinson and Fred Grace of Fat Rat Films have recently been undertaking an interesting experiment in online film distribution with their new short animated documentary, Act of Terror.

The film tells the story of Gemma’s unpleasant encounter with police when she started filming her boyfriend being frisked by officers on the London underground back in 2009 during a routine stop and search.

Shortly after Gemma began filming the police on her camera phone, a plain-clothes officer told her that her actions were a criminal offense under the 2005 Prevention of Terrorism act, and she was threatened with arrest.

After 40 minutes of being wrestled by a number of officers, Gemma was eventually let go. Outraged by her treatment, she sought justice through the Independent Police Complaints commission and the High Court. This then began 19 months of legal wrangling to seek a clarification of the law, and to try and get an explanation as to why she had been targeted that day.

Gemma and Fred decided to transform the story into a short documentary, seeking to remind people of their rights when it comes to documenting the actions of police officers on film.  Now the documentary is complete, they want to try and share it as widely as possible.

Over the past two weeks they have been documenting their efforts to get Act of Terror noticed by the press and on social media. Last week they had some highs and lows, but things changed dramatically in their favour on Monday when the film was embedded on the front page of the Guardian website and was subsequently viewed over 250,000 times.

All this is detailed in their video blogs they’ve been posting on their Vimeo account every day. Each new entry has given a really interesting insight into just how much work it can be to distribute your film online successfully.

Gemma and Fred give some very useful tips and advice, establishing what tactics worked for them and which didn’t. Some of their most successful actions included creating an email database of press and online bloggers to contact, targeting specific communities who they thought had a strong interest in what they had to offer, identifying key ambassadors and influencers, and they establishing which online channels can provide the most engaged audience.

So if you are planning on releasing your own documentary online in the future, their video blog is well worth a watch.

To check out the first of seven episodes of their video blog, visit the Fat Rat Films Vimeo page.

Plus, make sure you also check out Act of Terror online to find out in full what happened to Gemma.

It’s May, which means a brand new programme from Dochouse in our inbox. This month the documentaries are focussing on war traumas, food insecurity and the effects of deforestation and overfishing.

First up is the documentary A Place at the Table by US filmmakers Kristi Jacobson and Lori Silverbush.

More and more children are going to school on an empty stomach, not sure when they will have their next meal. It becomes impossible to concentrate and the lack of food soon sets in motion a series of knock-on effects. The filmmakers highlight the issue and warn us the problem is getting out of control.

Though this story focuses on the US situation, Dochouse stress the film is essential viewing here in the UK where a similar situation looms, as can be seen from this story.

This documentary will be screening at the Riverside studios on Thursday 9 May at 7.30pm. More information can be found here.

The next screening on the programme is When the Boys Return which is followed by a Q&A session with Norwegian director Tone Anderson via Skype. His film will be shown at the Rich Mix cinema on Thursday 16 May at 8pm.

When the Boys Return brings us to join a group of teenage boys in Palestine who meet every week at their local YMCA in Hebron, the West Bank. Instead of having a laugh however, these youngsters discuss their shared traumatic experiences from which they suffer after spending time in Israeli jails.

They are just a few of the 7,500 Palestinian minors aged 12-18 who, over the past decade, have been arrested on a daily basis and placed in jails where their rights as children were completely ignored. To find out more click here.

The film is shown alongside the short My Neighbourhood by Julia Bacha and Rebekah Wingert-Jabi.

My Neighbourhood implies the neighbourhood in which Mohammed El Kurd and his family live, a neighbourhood in East Jerusalem of which they suddenly find themselves forced to leave by Israeli settlers. Mohammed, enraged by theevents, begins to protest alongside his neighbours, and is shocked when scores of Israeli supporters come forward to join their cause.

On Thursday 23 May at the Lexi Cinema, DocHouse are hosting the UK premiere of the documentary A River Changes Course by director Kalyanee Mam.

The film, winner of the World Cinema Documentary Grand Jury Prize at Sundance, takes us to Cambodi, to the area where twice per year the Tonle Sap River changes course.

This continuous change totally contradicts the way of live for nearby inhabitants who are on course to lose everything they have and seem unable to stop it. The rural farmers and fishermen struggle to overcome the crushing effects of deforestation, overfishing, and overwhelming debt and find themselves in limbo between the rural present and an ominous industrial future. To find out more click here.

Just in case you hadn’t seen it yet, the lovely people at POV have launched a new feature on their site, providing you with a topnotch overview of resources for documentary filmmakers.

The new directory of resources list the go-to places for film funding, new media and transmedia funding, public broadcasting, engagement strategists, and a comprehensive list of film festivals which feature documentaries.What more can you want?!

Check it out here on the POV website.

The call for entries for the 2013 PUMA Impact Award is now open. Over the past few years the awards have gathered success through the submission of high profile documentaries such as Budrus, Gasland and The End of the Line.

The PUMA Impact Award is an annual prize honouring the best in documentary filmmaking. The 50,000 Euro award, given to one documentary that has made the greatest social or environmental impact, acknowledges the film’s makers and also helps the continuation of the film’s campaigning work.

Anyone can put a film forward from any country and films can be put forward any time up to three years after release.

Channel4′s BRITDOC, the organisation behind the awards welcomes independent creative documentary films on any subject, from social justice issues to the environment. The submitted documentaries can be in any form, from expository to observational.

In order to be considered for the award, each filmmaking team must submit data demonstrating evidence of the film’s social impact, for example:

• How a film demonstrably changed public awareness of a given issue
• Influenced corporate policy on sustainability or workplace issues
• Impacted lawmakers & politicians triggering reviews or enquiries
• Affected consumer purchasing or voting decisions
• How the film helped build capacity or raised funds for campaign organisations and other partners

To apply visit the PUMA Impact Award website.

Submissions close on 20 May at 4pm UK time.

Robert Redford, president and founder of the Sundance film festival, this week highlighted the economic benefits of the film industry saying the industry delivers “billions to the table”.

Speaking to reporters in the UK’s capital where he attended a press conference to mark the start of the second Sundance London, Redford said: ”Someone needs to step forward and talk about the economic benefits that films bring.”

“The film industry delivers billions to the table and that should be made clear.” The actor and director drew attention to the way in which film created employment opportunities, brought in revenue and provided business for studios and cinemas.

Redford – who reached fame through films such as All the President’s Men and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid – told journalists he thought the film industry should get more credit for the contribution it makes to the wider economy.

His comments were a response to a statement made earlier that day by the UK’s Culture Secretary Maria Miller, who told arts executives they needed to focus more on the economic benefits of culture, not the artistic ones, in order to sustain their current levels of public funding.

Miller said: “When times are tough and money is tight, our focus must be on culture’s economic impact.”

A report published by the BFI last year showed that the UK film industry contributed over £4.6bn to the British economy. The film institute also calculated that the film industry in the country generates more than 115,000 employment opportunities.

The second Sundance London Film Festival runs from Thursday 25 April until Saturday 28 April. Its purpose is to bring a selection of documentaries and feature films with a US angle, previously screened at the festival in Utah, Ohio, to a European audience. Redford called this a “cultural exchange”.

For more events taking place at the festival click here.