The 22nd edition of the Academy Award qualifying Docaviv Film Festival is set to take place in Tel Aviv from September 3-12 after being postponed from its original date in May due to coronavirus. This year’s festival will take on a hybrid format, with both online and physical screenings - all in compliance with social distancing guidelines. Audience events will take place both indoors and outdoors throughout the city, as well as on the festival’s website, whereas industry events are planned to move entirely online.
Docaviv’s Artistic Director Karin Rywkind Segal comments: “ The decision to plan a hybrid festival was made after realizing that the safety restriction that may apply once the cinema's in Israel reopen, could limit the capacity of the large crowds that the festival usually enjoys. As a big audience festival, we want to accommodate our loyal audiences who may not be able to attend cinema screenings. Other festivals that went online and a successful curated online program we launched in May, proved that an online program is a wonderful way of reaching people that reside outside of Tel Aviv as well as audiences with disabilities that will not allow them to attend physical screenings. We cannot predict the future but we are working towards the best and safest solutions to showcase the wonderful films we have curated for this year's programme. ”
At the time of writing, no date has been announced to reopen cinemas in Israel. The decision to open them on June 14 was withdrawn on June 8 due to a new rise in COVID-19 cases in the country.
The festival will screen 120 new international and local documentaries. Sixteen films, of which 12 world and two Israeli premieres, will be part of the Israeli Competition. Some of the highlights in this competition include the world premieres of KINGS OF CAPITOL HILL by Mor Loushy (CENSORED VOICES) about Jewish lobby organizations in the United States; Yael Abecassis’ MA MÈRE RAYMONDE , about the director’s mother and singer Raymonde Abecassis; 'TIL KINGDOM COME by Maya Zinshtein (FOREVER PURE), a film that exposes the controversial fellowship between Evangelical Christians and Israel; A VALLEY'S LULLABY by Ben Shani, an artistic documentary about the painter Eli Shamir, that was transformed when Shamir was diagnosed with Parkinson’s; Yael Kipper and Ronen Zaretzky’s THE THREE YOSSI , a sociological journey back in time that begins over twenty years ago when several families were evicted from their homes and squatted in an abandoned building in Jaffa; and AND I WAS THERE by Eran Paz, who, as a young soldier, documented his unit taking over Palestinian homes. Now, 18 years later, he confronts his past and returns to where it all began. THE HUMAN FACTOR , the latest film by Dror Moreh, whose film THE GATEKEEPERS was nominated for Best Documentary Feature at the 85th Academy Awards, will celebrate its Israeli premiere in Tel Aviv. With unprecedented access to the foremost American negotiators, THE HUMAN FACTOR is the behind-the-scenes story from the last 25 years, of how the United States came within reach of pulling off the impossible –securing peace between Israel and its neighbours.
The international titles of the festival will be announced later this summer.
Awards
The winner of the Best Israeli Documentary Award will receive a total of 170,000 ILS (around 43,000 EUR / 39,000 GBP), Israel’s largest prize for documentary filmmaking: a 70,000 ILS prize, courtesy of Frank Lowy, and a 100,000 ILS grant from Docaviv, to be used for promoting the film in preparation for the Academy Awards campaign. Other awards in this competition include the Mayor’s Award for Best Debut Film, Special Jury Award, the Yossi Kaufman Best Director Award, as well as Best Editing, Cinematography, and Research awards.
Additionally, the festival introduces a new award category this year called Beyond the Screen . The nominees for this award are Israeli and international films whose subjects work to change our political, social and ecological reality. Anchored in current events, these films have the power to transcend the screen and generate real change. Two Israeli films are nominated for this award: A WASTE OF SPACE by Noam Demsky and Ido Bahat, Bahat, about children in foster care during their first year of independence; and MARRY ME HOWEVER by Mordechai Vardi, a look at the lives Orthodox-Jewish LGBTQ men and women who willingly chose to marry against their sexual orientation.
Further Israeli titles
Other Israeli films to be screened at the festival include ANOTHER DAY IN PARADISE by Tomer Halfon, LITTLE VICTORIES by Michal Warshai Arluk and MURDER AT CINEMA NORTH by Avida Livny in the festival’s Panorama strand. This year’s Depth of Field Competition, a category for films that push the boundaries of the genre, includes the world premieres of Israeli titles CODA FOR A CAPTAIN by Keren Alexander and TUNING by Ilan Yagoda. The festival’s Masters section will feature Nurith Aviv’s new film YIDDISH and Duki Dror’s documentary project LEBANON: BORDERS OF BLOOD . Competing in the International Shorts Competition is Miki Polonski’s HORST , a distant, still observation of children during recess. The festival’s Art on the Border shorts programme will feature NICO POE’SIE by Shira Farber and ARTOPIA #BELFAST by Shachaf Dekel.
About Docaviv
Docaviv is the largest film festival in the city of Tel Aviv, and the only festival in Israel dedicated exclusively to documentary films. Last year’s festival saw an all-time high with 67,000 visitors. It is among the world’s leading documentary festivals, with around 120 new local and international documentaries screened in both competitive and non-competitive sections.
In 2018, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences listed Docaviv as one of the leading festivals whose winners automatically qualify for Oscar consideration. The winners of the Israeli, International and Short competitions are eligible to compete for an Oscar in the documentary category. In 2019, ‘ADVOCATE’ by Rachel Leah Jones and Philippe Bellaiche won the Howard Gilman Award for Best Israeli Film, Oscar-nominated ‘HONEYLAND’ scooped the award for Best International Film and Martina Scarpelli took home the Best Short Award for ‘EGG’.
Docaviv will take place at the Tel Aviv Cinematheque and other locations around the city,
including Tel Aviv Port, HaPisga Garden in Jaffa, Habima Square, Teder.FM at The Romano, Bialik Square, The Steinhardt Museum of Natural History at Tel Aviv University, and Hilton Beach.