In the second half of January, two important festivals took place in the USA: the Sundance and the Slamdance. “Volte” by Monika Kotecka and Karolina Poryzała took part in the first festival, and “Icon” by Wojciech Kasperski had its American premiere at the second of the aforementioned festivals.In January, there was held the Trieste Film Festival in Italy, which featured a large representation of Polish films. Among the documentary films shown there, you could watch the films: “The Beksińskis. A Sound and Video Album” by Marcin Borchardt, “Over the limit” by Marta Prus, „The Runners” by Łukasz Borowski and “The Prince and the Dybbuk” by Piotr Rosołowski and Elwira Niewiera. In January, the film by Marcin Borchadt also had its Scandinavian premiere at the Göteborg Film Festival in Sweden. In Hungary, at the Budapest International Documentary Festival, the films “Close Ties” by Zofia Kowalewska, “Zhalanash – Empty Shore” by Marcin Sauter and “Communion” by Anna Zamecka were presented. The last two films returned from the festival with awards.
In February, “Dust” by Jakub Radej was successful: the film won the best documentary film award in the Lab competition at the festival Clermont-Ferrand. On the other hand, at the turn of February and March in Croatia, the Zagreb Dox festival took place, where five Polish documentary films were invited, and two of them, “Over the Limit” and “Call me Tony” by Klaudiusz Chrostowski, were among the award-winners of the festival.
At the turn of April and May, in the programme of the International Documentary Film Festival Hot Docs in Canada, as many as five Polish films were included: “Beksińscy. A Sound and Video Album” by Marcin Borchardt, “Leocadia’s Dream” by Krzysztof Nowicki, “Hugo” by Wojciech Klimala and Mateusz Wajda, “Over the Limit” by Marta Prus and “The Prince and the Dybbuk” by Elwira Niewiera and Piotr Rosołowski. The documentary films by Marta Prus and Elwira Niewiera and Piotr Rosołowski appeared at the festival DocAviv in Israel, and with them, “Volte” and “Call me Tony” were also presented at this festival.
In June, at the festival AFI Docs, “Over the Limit” and “One Two Zero” by Anna Pawluczuk were shown, and at the Brooklyn Film Festival – “How to Become a Pope?” by Justyna Mytnik and “Collection” by Marcin Polar.
In the second half of August, a review of Polish documentary films “Meet the Poles!” was held at the Makedox Creative Documentary Film Festival in Skopje. At this festival, the latest Polish productions were shown: “Sisters” by Michał Hytroś, “Opera about Poland” by Piotr Stasik, “How to Destroy Time Machines” by Jacek Piotr Bławut and “Festival” by Anna Gawlita and Tomasz Wolski. A week before that, the viewers in Macedonia could see the classics of the documentary film in the special programme “Masters from Krakow.”
There are a couple of months left until 2018 ends, so the list of awards and festival selections will certainly increase. Polish documentary film productions will appear at the festivals: the BFI London in Great Britain, the IDFA in the Netherlands, the DOK Leipzig in Germany and the Ji.hlava in the Czech Republic.
Such a great presence of Polish films at film festivals abroad is to large extent the effect of the activities of the Agency KFF Sales & Promotion, run by the Krakow Film Foundation, which deals with, among others, international festival distribution of Polish documentary, short and animated films. KFF Sales & Promotion operates since 2006 (previously it was called the Film Promotion Agency). Since 2016, the Agency’s additional area of operation is the sale of medium-length and feature-length documentary films. The Agency also runs the projects Polish Docs, Polish Shorts and Polish Animations, the aim of which is on the one hand, the popularisation of the Polish cinematography at the international festivals, film reviews and independent film events, and on the other hand, the promotion of Polish film industry on the international film market and the facilitation of its access to the film markets all around the world. Every year, there are about 70 new films in the database of films represented by the KFF.
The list of festival screenings, which is constantly updated, can be found here.