“Fipadoc, the festival of true stories. » Beyond the slogan, how better to sum up what the 4e edition of this annual gathering, shaken by the health crisis for two years, offers a rediscovered audience, too happy to return to theaters and once once more taste the pleasure of the big screen, to meet the film crews, to debate, to pose questions regarding the future of the characters, captured in the truth of their lives.
→ PORTRAIT. Anne Georget, the passion for documentaries
“The event dimension can have a starter effect to relaunch the mechanics, especially for local operators, surprised by the queues, emphasizes Anne Georget, its president. Many, public and documentary professionals, thanked us for having maintained this event, despite all the uncertainties that hovered. Foreign producers and directors had not dared to venture to Biarritz for a few days, for fear of quarantine on their return. »
In 2021, an edition without an audience
What dominates in the reactions is the need to finally see each other. The 2021 edition had been “nightmarish”, cut in two, online in January for professional meetings, with a sparse audience in mid-June. “For a young festival, insists Anne Georget, you had to hold on so as not to disappear. Refining the best possible selection to put on a shelf following months of work would be too sad. Our primary criterion is the desire to show, to share, to push the films, to discuss them. »
→ CRITICAL. “Lynx”, the sharp eye of a documentary filmmaker
Among the many initiatives, screenings, debates, carte blanche, focus, professional meetings, Fipadoc, like many festivals, organizes “pitch” sessions (rapid presentation in public of projects seeking funding in front of professional juries) , regional and international. To detect new talent and not let them escape elsewhere, the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, for example, has selected and offered its support to six young documentary filmmakers.
The need to understand reality
Fipadoc claims a mainly European programming, with 80% of films from the continent. “It has been obvious to us from the start as much as a deliberate, political choice, says Christine Camsupers, the general delegate. We are united by a common history. Our films are not like those of the rest of the world. They express a diversity of sensitivities and cultures that it is important to show. » At the end of these seven days of screenings, the winners, very international, testify to this need for openness and reciprocal knowledge.
The ceremony opened with the appearance on stage of Marie-José Tubiana, a 92-year-old ethnologist, specialist in Darfur, who helps exiles from this region to complete their political asylum applications (Marie-José will be waiting for you at 4 p.m.). It ended with flamenco dancer Paco Mora’s tribute to his mother who suffered from Alzheimer’s, in in my shoes, on the truth of the daily life of a companion.
Among the highlights of this edition, the series of testimonies on the genocide of the Uyghurs by the Chinese, a film, plus an immersive experience in the terrible re-education camps, and a shocking documentary filmed in the heart of the Hong Kong protests, violently repressed by the Beijing regime, and within this civil resistance which pays a high price.
In this confused period, so difficult to decipher, Fipadoc reveals the urgent need to find keys to interpretation in order to understand reality. Formats (series, virtual and augmented reality, short films on media like Brut or TikTok) and formal writing are diversifying to find new audiences. A figure has blown a salutary wind of optimism. Last year, on the French program acquisitions market, documentaries outstripped fiction. Sign of the times.
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The Fipadoc 2022 awards
Of the 1,500 films received by Fipadoc, 200 were presented to the public for seven days.
Thirteen prizes were awarded by various French and European juries including:
Grand Prize for International Documentary : The Balcony Movie, de Pawel Lozinski (Pologne).
Grand Prize for National Documentary : Marie-José will be waiting for you at 4 p.m., by Camille Ponsin (Belgium)
Audience award: Paris Opera, a (very) special season, by Priscilla Pizzato (France), available on www.france.tv
Grand Prize for Musical Documentary : Paradise, by Sérgio Trefaut (Portugal)
Impact Grand Prize : Revolution of Our Times, by Kiwi Chow (Hong Kong)
Young Europeans Jury Grand Prize : A Parked Life, by Peter Triest (Belgium-Netherlands)
Prix Mitrani :in my shoes, by Pedro Morato (Belgium)
