Festival Data:

• Established: 1959
• Genre: Documentary (click to see)
• Attendance: 9000
• Media Attendance: 48
• Accredited Industry Attendance: 181
• Total Number of Films Submitted: 800
• Total Number of Films Screened: 74
• Total Screenings: 84
• # of Shorts Screened: 19
• # of Features Screened: 55
• Accreditations: ECFF

• Competitive

Festival Website:

Festival Description:

Festival dei Popoli – International Documentary Film Festival aims to promote and circulate creative documentaries, encourage interaction between different research experiences, and act as a meeting point for people interested in documentary film. It is organized by the Festival dei Popoli – ONLUS, the Italian Institute for Social Documentary Film, with the support of the Italian Ministry for Arts and Culture (Bureau of Cinema), the Tuscan Region, the Province of Florence, the City of Florence (Department of Culture) e with the support of the MEDIA Programme of the European Union.

Festival dei Popoli demonstrates an enthusiastic dialectical spirit, taking a fresh approach that goes beyond the International Competitions and rewards of its Main Program as it offers a week of bringing together filmmakers and producers to participate in roundtable discussions, workshops and general gatherings. The festival acts as a studio, a place in which attendees not only watch films and discuss world events, but also plan films to come. The project’s goal is to form a ’’Foundation’’ that will select high-quality creative projects to partially finance, offering residences, tutorials and meetings with producers for select filmmakers.

Festival dei Popoli embarks on a promotional campaign locally (City, Province, Region), nationally (in other cities), and internationally (by collaborating with other festivals). It works with other cities to host national documentary screenings, photography exhibits, music concerts and dining events. In exchange, Florence is often invited to other cities to screen Italian documentaries while also having the opportunity to promote the city, its culture, arts, and gastronomy.

In collaboration with other festivals, the Festival works toward creating a digital streaming source for its documentaries; a collection of DVDs is being created to be distributed via internet or through a network of special libraries.

The program for the 49th festival included:

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION:
14 features and 10-12 shorts, World Premiere films (alternatively European or Italian Premiere).

MAIN PROGRAM:
10 contemporary films, Italian Premiere, that cover the range of documentary forms, from installation work to fiction.

RETROSPECTIVE:
20 documentary films from a select country to be organized in collaboration with another festival in that country (a joint project in which the Festival dei Popoli will screen recent Italian productions in said country). A book with interviews and essays will be published in conjunction with the retrospective.

MASTER IN FOCUS:
10 films by a filmmaker of international repute. A critical study with interviews and essays will be published, and a lecture and/or a roundtable discussion will be held in conjunction with the homage.

YOUNG FILMMAKERS IN FOCUS:
3 filmmakers with five films each, with respective workshops; an essay in the festival catalogue plus an interview with each filmmaker and film sheets will be published.

THEMATIC SECTION:
5 documentary films on a single subject; comparative forms of representation; one or more guests will be present.

NANOOK’S HERITAGE: An international roundtable discussion about the status of contemporary documentaries with theorists, filmmakers, producers, and directors of international festivals.

JURIES AND PRIZES

OFFICIAL JURY PRIZE: A 5 person panel will award two prizes for Best Film for a cash prize of 10,000 Euros, and Best Director for a cash prize of 5,000 Euros.

LORENZO DE’ MEDICI/UNIVERSITA’ DI FIRENZE PRIZE: A cash prize of 2,500 Euros will be judged by a panel of 10 students coordinated by a turor.

AUDIENCE AWARD: Audiences at the Festival dei Popoli will vote on films from the International Competition and Main Programme.

Film Submissions:

• Call for Entry: http:/ / www.festivaldeipopoli.org/ en/ festival/ regolamento/ 2011