During the 2nd IDFF Artdocfest/Riga the Latvian capital will be visited by Nobel Prize winner, editor of the Russian independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta Dmitry Muratov, who this year is one of the jury members of the Artdocfest festival program. As part of the documentary film symposium organized by the festival, on March 8, a conversation between philosopher Uldis Tirons and Dmitry Muratov will take place.
The Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta, headed by Dmitry Muratov, is engaged in high-level investigative journalism, including investigating human rights violations in Chechnya, the downing of Malaysian flight MH17, and the migration crisis at the EU and Belarus borders. Investigative journalism requires courage, as the topics journalists explore reflect injustice and sometimes organized crime. Unfortunately, this courage is accompanied by the threat of reprisals, and six journalists of the newspaper were killed, including Anna Politkovskaya.
In Riga, Dmitry Muratov will take part in the work of the jury of the Artdocfest/Riga, where he will also be accompanied by the Director of the Tallinn Film Festival Dark Nights Tiina Lokk and Russian writer, literary critic, radio and TV presenter Victor Erofeev. At the same time, the Baltic Focus jury will include Simone Baumann, director of the film promotion platform German Films, Peter Gottschalk, editor of the French TV channel ARTE, and director Jerzy Sladkowski.
In addition to an extensive film program, the festival also has a documentary film symposium, where filmmakers and theorists will discuss both the films included in the festival program and the latest trends and artistic solutions in documentary filmmaking. Symposium discussions will be open to the film industry and the general public. One of the events of the symposium will be a conversation between philosopher Uldis Tirons and journalist and festival jury member Dmitry Muratov. In the discussion “The Cold War: on our outskirts, in the daily lives of our neighbors”, filmmakers, politicians and public figures will discuss the tense geopolitical situation and the possible or impossible role of documentary films in it. In the talk “New Ethics and Documentary Cinema”, directors, producers and film theorists will consider the role of documentary films in a polarized society, where there is censorship and self-censorship, political correctness, the influence of political and financial instruments on the content of the film. In the discussion "Commission of the Future", young and promising directors, actors, philosophers and critics will express their predictions about the future, about how the world and cinema will develop in the next ten years and about their role in this process. More information about the symposium is available here.
From March 3 to March 8, 28 documentaries from 14 countries will be shown in Riga in two competition programs of the festival - Baltic Focus and Artdocfest, as well as in an out-of-competition program. Tickets for festival films can be purchased at the box office of the Splendid Palace cinema or on the website www.splendidpalace.lv. Screenings will be organized in the "green mode" (with document certifying the fact of vaccination or previous Covid-19 disease). The full program of the festival and more information can be found here.
The international festival Artdocfest/Riga is supported by the State Culture Capital Foundation of Latvia and many international foundations. The partners of the festival are the American TV channel Current Time TV, the German TV channel Deutsche Welle and the cinema Splendid Palace.