Cannes 2022

For his directorial debut, Ethan Coen offers up a vibrant and often exhilarating look at the turbulent life of a true rock’n’roll legend, dealing with the demons that drove Jerry Lee Lewis. To an extent this is a non-judgmental film that is as much about his determined resilience as it is the scandals that haunted his life, but it is also tight and lean, brimming with mesmerising footage and illuminating interviews.

Hot Docs award-winning producer Johannes Schubert (Austria) outlines to BDE his plans for the 2022 EFP programme and explains his fascination both for the doc form and its practitioners. "Documentary filmmakers are incredibly kind and open-minded people. They are ambassadors for a better world and are courageous. I am longing for collaboration with them, and together we always try to challenge the status quo."

Cannes Docs chief Pierre-Alexis Chevit guides Business Doc Europe through this year’s series of bespoke events, talks, debates and presentations dedicated to all things documentary. He underlines a core purpose of the event; “philosophically speaking, to advocate for documentary cinema and to work at strengthening its integration within the global film industry.”

De Humani Corporis Fabrica premiered in the 2022 edition of Directors’ Fortnight in Cannes. The film is made by Verena Paravel and Lucien Castaing-Taylor, directors of Leviathan. The producers are Norte Productions, CG Cinema, Rita Productions and the Sensory Ethnography Lab.

The morning after the world-premiere of Moonage Daydream, Brett Morgen answered questions posed by Mandy Chang (Global Head of Documentaries at Fremantle) before an audience of doc professionals. “I was definitely interested in creating a non-biographical experience,” he said. “With Bowie, it was perfectly suited for that, because David Bowie is all about projection.”

The prolific and internationally acclaimed Dutch filmmaker passed away in Amsterdam May 21 at the age of 70 after a long battle with MS and cancer.

UK doc specialist outfit Dogwoof came to Cannes ten days ago with realistic expectations of what could be achieved on the Croisette, given that the festival is primarily driven by theatrical titles. “With the theatrical figures not looking great anywhere, we knew it was going to be a very tricky market,” Ana Vicente [Dogwoof head of sales] tells Business Doc Europe.

A chilling and heart-wrenching portrait of wartime life in Ukraine, Mariupolis 2, added at the last minute to the Cannes programme as a Special Screening, is a posthumous but living monument to its director, who was killed in Ukraine by invading Russian forces.

It seems shrewdly appropriate that director Julie Bertuccelli’s documentary Jane Campion, The Cinema Woman should have its world premiere at this year’s Cannes Film Festival in the Classics section. Not only does it highlight the importance the festival has played in her illustrious career, but it also reinforces the challenges women still have in terms of making films in an industry historically dominated by men.

A delegation from Al Jazeera Documentary, comprising by Mehdi Bekkar (Senior Producer, pictured) and Jamel Dellali (Production Manager), is attending Cannes Docs both to search for projects in which to invest, as well as pitch two new works in the Spotlighted Projects section. Additionally Al Jazeera Documentary will hand out the AJD DOC Award, for which the company will board the winning project as a co-producer, with a minimum contribution of $15,000.