OPEN MASTERCLASS PROGRAM CIRCLE Women Doc Accelerator 2021 / Module 1

The CIRCLE Masterclass program and exclusive talks with CIRCLE experts are realized in collaboration with CED Media Offices from Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia and Montenegro.

The program is open to all film professionals and general audience upon inscription and is held in English. Email for reservations: info@doccircle.me

CIRCLE Women Doc Accelerator 2021 is supported by RE-ACT, Film Centre of Montenegro, HAVC Croatian Audiovisual Centre, Ministry of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia, City of Novi Sad, WEMW Co-Pro Forum, Marche du Film – Cannes Docs, Documentary Association of Europe (DAE)Foundation, EWA Network, Syndicado, Cineuropa, Sekvenca production and Cut Up production.

TOUCHING THE HEARTS OF YOUR AUDIENCE

8 June 2021, 5:30 PM (CET)
TOUCHING THE HEARTS OF YOUR AUDIENCE
How to communicate your project and yourself
Joanna Solecka – publicity and film marketing strategist (Alphapanda)

Film marketing, social media & audience design strategist with extensive experience of working for film producers and cultural institutions. Lecturer, mentor and speaker at the international training workshops for fiction and documentary filmmakers such as CIRCLE Women Doc Accelerator, Impakt, Torino Film Lab, Moving Docs, DOC.Incubator. Member of the Advisory Board of DAE – Documentary Association of Europe. Between 2004 – 2015 Joanna worked as Head of PR, Festivals and Sales at Wajda Studio & School, Warsaw, Poland. Since 2015 Joanna has joined Alphapanda, a European film marketing agency based in Berlin, Geneva and Warsaw, founded in 2011. Alphapanda specializes in the development of marketing strategies and the implementation of social media campaigns for the film industry. Alphapanda’s clients list includes the European Film Awards, Warner Bros, Under the Milky Way as well as many European sales agents, distributors, VOD platforms and production companies. As a mother of three daughters, Joanna especially enjoys working on young audiences and women empowering stories. Among recent titles, Joanna handled campaigns for films like: THE SCARS OF ALI BOULALA (Tribeca ’21), STOP-ZEMLIA (Berlinale ’21), NINJABABY (Berlinale & SXSW ’21), THE WALL OF SHADOWS (Hot Docs ’20), BEWARE OF CHILDREN (Venice ’19), ANOTHER DAY OF LIFE (Cannes ’18).

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TAMING THE GARDEN – JOURNEY OF A SUCCESSFUL DOCUMENTARY
9 June 2021, 2:30 PM (CET)
From conception to distribution
Salomé Jashi, director (Georgia)
Aleksandar Govedarica, distributor (Syndicado FS, Canada)

Projection of the award-winning film Taming the Garden by Salomé Jashi, followed by a conversation with the film director and its distributor.

Can you plan the success of your film from the very beginning? How to be both an active filmmaker and a single mother at the same time? How to overcome challenges of working in a male-oriented context as a female artist?

Synopsis:

A powerful and anonymous man has developed an unusual hobby. He buys century-old trees, some as tall as 15-story buildings, from communities along the Georgian coast and has them excavated to collect them for his private garden. In order to transplant trees of such dimensions, the landscape surrounding them is ripped apart and the people living around them are forced to adapt to the disruption. As the film follows this process, it portrays the needs and values of today’s Georgian society and reflects on the theme of forced migration, where “uprooting” is more than a metaphor.

https://tamingthegarden-film.com/en/

Salomé Jashi was born in Tbilisi, Georgia in 1981. She first studied journalism and worked as a reporter for several years. In 2005 she was awarded a British Council scholarship to study documentary filmmaking at Royal Holloway, University of London.

Salomé’s Taming the Garden [2021] premiered at Sundance and Berlinale Forum. Her The Dazzling Light of Sunset [2016] has been awarded the Main Prize at Visions du Réel’s Regard Neuf Competition as well as at ZagrebDox, Jihlava IDFF, FIC Valdivia and several other festivals. Her earlier work Bakhmaro [2011], made in co-production with ma.ja.de. filmproduktion and MDR/Arte, received an Honorary Mention for a Young Documentary Talent at DOK Leipzig, was awarded as the Best Central and Eastern European Documentary at Jihlava IDFF, and was nominated for the Asia Pacific Screen Awards and Silver Eye Awards. She was a fellow of Nipkow Scholarship in 2017 and DAAD Artists-in-Berlin Program in 2020.

15 June 2021, 2:30 PM (CET)
FINDING YOUR “FILMMAKER SELF”
A subjective, singular, and specific expedition
Diana El Jeiroudi, filmmaker and screenwriter (Syria/Germany)

Diana El Jeiroudi is a Syrian producer, director and screenwriter. Her films encapsulate sociopolitical tensions and contradictions and extend well over time. She is best known for her Dolls – A Woman from Damascus (2007) and Morning Fears, Night Chants (2012). As producer, her filmography includes the award-winning Silvered Water – Syria Autoportrait by O. Mohamad & W. S. Bedirxan (Cannes 2014), and The Mulberry House by Oscar-nominated Sara Ishaq (IDFA 2013). Her efforts in supporting and advancing the documentary community and culture, notably through establishing DOX BOX as Syria’s first documentary film festival, and then as the Berlin-based documentary film support organization, has earned her various awards, including the EDN Award, The Katrin Cartlidge Award, and The Heart of Sarajevo. She is a member of the American Academy of Motion Pictures, the Deutsche Filmakademie, and the Asia-Pasific Screen Academy. She served on several committees and juries, most notably Cannes Film Festival Golden Eye Documentary Award, Sundance Documentary Program, IDFA, AFAC, and APSA Awards. Diana supported many careers and tutored talents through the professional training initiatives and workshops of DOX BOX, EuroDoc, Ex-oriente, IDFA, and Story Doc.

22 June 2021, 2:30 PM (CET)
DECONSTRUCTING THE EDITORIAL PROCESS
Yael Bitton, editor (Switzerland/France)

Yael Bitton has been making films for over 20 years, as an editor, director, tutor and script supervisor. She currently works as an editing tutor at DokIncubator, and tutors students at the HEAD / Cinéma du Réel in Geneva. She is a consulting editor for the Rough Cut Service, hosted by Ikka Vehkalahti. Some of her recent credits as an editor include: Advocate by Philippe Bellaiche & Rachel Leah Jones; Los Fantasmas des Caribe by Felipe Monroy; Machines by Rahul Jain; The Wonderful Kingdom of Papa Alaev by Noam Pinchas and Tal Barda; Muchachas by Juliana Fanjul; as a editing or script consultant: The Edge of Democracy by Petra Costa; Thy Father’s Chair by Antonio Tibaldi and Alex Lora; as a script supervisor: Lisbon Story by Wim Wenders. CIRCLE Women Doc Accelerator 2021 is supported by RE-ACT, Film Centre of Montenegro, HAVC Croatian Audiovisual Centre, Ministry of Culture and Information of the Republic of Serbia, City of Novi Sad, When East Meets West, Marche du Film – Cannes Docs, Documentary Association of Europe (DAE)Foundation, EWA Network, Cineuropa, Sekvenca production and Cut Up production.