The Documentary New Zealand Trust presents…THE DOCUMENTARY EDGE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2022 (DOC EDGE)1 June – 10 July 2022
Celebrate the power of documentary with Doc Edge’s 2022 world-class hybrid programme. The festival has just dropped its full programme of 113 feature-length and short films at https://docedge.nz/.
Doc Edge Champion Judy Bailey says: “The range and quality of films this year is extraordinary. Brave, inspiring, thought-provoking and entertaining.”
In Doc Edge’s unique Virtual Cinema, 17 feature-length films and all 39 shorts will be available to watch anytime from 1 June. Over the course of the festival, the rest of the films will be added after their in-theatre screenings in Auckland.
Audiences all over Aotearoa will be able to take part in the vibrant festival environment, with live watch parties and Q&A’s happening online. This is a rare opportunity for audiences to directly participate with the stories and their creatives dedicated to bringing the truth to you.
Tickets are now on sale for the first films in the Virtual Cinema, with all in-person screenings going on sale 9 May.
The Virtual Cinema will open on 1 June with the World Premiere of Finite: The Climate of Change, following activists who took to the trees to save a 12,000-year-old forest from the expansion of one of Europe’s biggest coal mines. To save our planet, they risked their lives.
In 2022, Doc Edge will celebrate Matariki Public Holiday at The Civic and The Capitol on 24 June with premiere of the New Zealand feature films Off the Rails, Balance of the Five Elements, Disco Bloodbath, Behind the Mask and Only I Can Hear, along with in-person Q&As and special live performances.
Doc Edge has curated a remarkable programme of 24 XR projects that take the whole experience of film viewing to a new level. These immersive experiences offer an impressive Māori and Pacific collection alongside award-winning international projects paying homage to our diverse cultures. Full programme to be announced soon.
In other news, for the first time, Doc Edge will spin its magic in Christchurch with in-person screenings at Silky Otter from 15 – 26 June, joining the previously announced Auckland and Wellington sessions.
KEY FESTIVAL DATES / VENUES:
Virtual Festival: 1 June – 10 July
Auckland Festival: 15 – 19 & 24 June at The Capitol Cinema, 15 – 26 June at Silky Otter and 22 – 26 June at The Civic
Wellington Festival: 30 June – 3 July at Embassy Theatre and 2 – 10 July at The Roxy
Christchurch Festival: 15 – 26 June at Silky Otter
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The Doc Edge Festival 2022 features a selection of Israeli and/or Jewish themed films. Here’s a run-down of them:
Dead Sea Guardians
Ido Glass, Yoav Kleinman | Israel | 2022 | 78 min | English, Arabic, Hebrew
The Dead Sea is drying up at an alarming rate as a result of conflict and climate change. Dead Sea Guardians follows the story of three men, an Israeli, a Jordanian, and a Palestinian, each from fighting borders as they join forces to heroically swim the dangerously salty sea from Jordan to Israel.
Supported by the Embassy of Israel
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/dead-sea-guardians/
I Am Not
Tomer Heymann | Israel, Guatemala | 2021 | 95 min | English, Hebrew, Spanish
Oren is a teenager who was adopted from Guatemala by an Israeli family when he was a baby.
Growing up, he battled false mental diagnoses and suffered ridicule and racist treatment. Wielding his small video camera, Oren decides to embark on a life-changing mission to the country of his birth. His quest is to find his biological family and define his identity.
Filmmaker Tomer Heymann is Doc Edge Alumni. His acclaimed film Jonathan Agassi Saved My Life screened at the festival in 2019.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/i-am-not/
Speer Goes to Hollywood
Vanessa Lapa | Israel, Austria, Germany | 2021 | 98 min | English, French, German
Albert Speer is an enigma. The highest-ranking Nazi in Nuremberg to be spared the death sentence, Speer was one of Hitler’s closest confidants and his chief architect. Speer was responsible for 12 million slave labourers. And yet, even now, he has the reputation of being the ‘good Nazi’.
The film meets Speer in 1971 when he was working on a screenplay for Paramount Pictures, based on his memoir “Inside the Third Reich”. Based on forty hours of previously unheard audio cassettes, recorded by screenwriter Andrew Birkin, it features Speer’s callous attempt to whitewash his past with a feature film.
The spellbinding story of the Nazi, Paramount Pictures and the biopic that Kubrick refused to direct.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/speer-goes-to-hollywood/
Tantura
Alon Schwarz | Israel | 2022 | 95 min | Arabic, English, Hebrew
When the State of Israel was established in 1948, war broke out and hundreds of Palestinian villages were depopulated in its aftermath. Israelis know this as the War of Independence while Palestinians call it “Al Nakba” (the Catastrophe). This is a story about one such village: Tantura.
In the late 1990s, graduate student Teddy Katz conducted research into the large-scale massacre that had allegedly occurred here. His work later came under attack and his reputation was ruined, but 140 hours of audio testimonies remain.
The film examines why the Nakba is taboo in Israeli society and explores the country’s inability to come to terms with its dark past.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/tantura/
Summer Nights
Ohad Milstein | Israel | 2021 | 53 min | French, Hebrew
A window into a child’s world: his fears, his desires, his way of thinking. An exploration of the subconscious of an innocent and ingenuous child, as he falls asleep and drifts into the depths of his own mind.
Director Milstein captures his son Alva as darkness takes hold and his imagination sparks. The father and son, whispering to one another so as to not wake Alva’s sister, talk about life, death, and everything in between.
Summer Nights is ultimately a film about the bond between fathers and sons.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/summer-night/
Fiddler’s Journey on the Big Screen
Daniel Raim | United States | 2022 | 88 min | English
The fall of 2021 marked the 50th anniversary of the much beloved film Fiddler on the Roof. Now get a detailed view behind the scenes of the film Pauline Kael (The New Yorker) called “the most powerful movie musical ever made.”
Displaying a richly comprehensive examination of the passion, dedication, and love that brought this film together. Director, Daniel Raim, captures the humour and drama of Jewison’s quest to recreate the lost world of Jewish life in Tsarist Russia.
Narrated by the charming voice of Jeff Goldblum, this film shows us how one of the most revered musicals ever made made its triumphant, hazardous voyage to the big screen. Interestingly, Jewison is not of Jewish faith.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/flidders-journey-to-the-big-screen/
Nelly & Nadine
Magnus Gertten | Sweden, Belgium, Norway | 2022 | 92 min | English, French, Spanish, Swedish
Love against all odds – a remarkable story of two women falling in love in a concentration camp.
These star-crossed lovers meet on Christmas Eve, 1944 after Nelly receives a request from Nadine to sing a song from Madame Butterfly. Despite being separated in the last months of the war they reunite and spend the rest of their lives together.
Their love remained a secret for years, even from their closest family. Now Nelly’s grandchild, Sylvie, opens unseen personal archives and uncovers their incredible story about war sufferings, mysteries, well-kept secrets, and the complicated stories of concentration camp survivors. Most of all, it’s a love story for all time that will move and inspire you.
Winner of the Teddy Award at Berlinale 2022.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/nelly-and-nadine/
Viral Dreams
Sagi Bornstein, Udi Nir | Germany, Israel | 2021 | 90 min | English, French, Spanish, Malayalam
Seven young people from across the world shared their exciting plans for 2020 when “virus” started trending online. From the pandemic, through to the BLM movement and on to the US elections – VIRAL DREAMS features over a year’s worth of real-time video posts and depicts the surprising resilience of a new generation to a global change no one saw coming.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/viral-dreams/
How Saba Kept Singing
Sara Taksler | United States | 2022 | 80 min | English, Hebrew, Polish
94-year-old David “Saba” Wisnia believes he survived the horrors of Auschwitz by using his beautiful singing voice to entertain his Nazi captors. When his grandson, Avi, starts asking questions, they realise there’s more to the story. Someone may have secretly altered the course of Saba’s life.
The pair embark on an expedition that leads them into the mystery of David’s past in what is a breath-taking and moving testament to the power of music, art, and love.
Executive Produced by Hillary Rodham Clinton and Chelsea Clinton.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/how-saba-kept-singing/
Listening to Kenny G
Penny Lane | United States | 2021 | 97 min | English
Why do some people hate Kenny G’s music, and why so many more love it.
A light-hearted exploration of this conflict raises big questions about taste, genre, and marketing. Along the way we hear from music critics, record executives, radio personalities, market researchers, fans – and of course, the G man himself.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/listening-to-kenny-g/
TWO SHORT ISRAELI FILMS
Herd
Omer Daida | Israel | 2021 | 37 min | Hebrew
Itamar, Naama’s father, owns a ranch that raises cattle for slaughter. Ten-year-old Naama deals with a big philosophical question regarding life & death while working with her father. Together they attempt to bridge their worldview regarding death, while Naama develops feelings for the cattle, Itamar sees death as an inevitable part of life.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/herd/
Holy Holocaust
Noa Berman-Herzberg, Osi Wald | Israel | 2021 | 18 min | English
A dark secret from the past is suddenly exposed, creating a chasm between two close friends; Jenny the German, and Noa the Israeli. One discovers that she is the black granddaughter of a renowned Arch-Nazi and her life turns upside down. The other does everything she can to not follow suit.
https://docedge.nz/festival22/film/holy-holocaust/
