20 Documentaries you cannot miss at the 11th DMZ International Documentary Film Festival (Part 1)

By Asian Film Festival on September 5, 2019 • ( 1 Comment )

We present a list of twenty documentaries you shouldn’t miss at the 11th DMZ International Documentary Film Festival which will take place from September 20th – 27th, in Goyang & Paju, Korea.

About the festival:
Over the past decade, DMZ International Documentary Film Festival has grown into the leading documentary festival in Korea and Asia. Now it presents its vision and direction more clearly with the documentary selections and program events. In overall, the number of Korean and Asian films has significantly increased in overall. Also, the quality and number of submitted Asian documentaries introduced in Global Vision and Showcase, as well as International and Asian Competitions, have increased considerably. DMZ DOCS intends to discover and introduce talented filmmakers and Asian documentaries that are actively progressing, and serve as a bridge between the world and Asia. It will be the year to confirm the status of DMZ DOCS as a significant platform to meet Asian documentaries and build partnerships. (DMZ Web)

Selected Docs:

A is for Agustin by Grace Simbulan – Philippines | 2019 – 73 minutes
Section: International Competition

Agustin, an illiterate 41-year old man, gets fed up with being exploited by his boss, decides to leave his job, and enroll in grade 1. Over six years, Agustin is increasingly torn between his desire to learn and his duties to his family.

Trailer:

Anthropocene: The Human Epoch by Jennifer Baichwal, Edward Burtynsyk, Nicholas de Pencier – Canada | 2019 – 87 minutes
Section: Global Vision

A cinematic meditation on humanity’s massive reengineering of the planet, it is four years in the making feature documentary film from the multiple-award winning team of a trilogy – Manufactured Landscapes (2006) and Watermark (2013), and this is the third one.

Trailer:

Boy’s Room by Kim Jayang – Korea | 2019 – 75 minutes
Section: Korean Docs Showcase

A film that depicts the life of my cousin Tae-yoon. Tae-yoon, who was sent to an orphanage in his ninth year, returned home at the age of 17. At home there is a Vietnamese stepmother and a young half-brother. What does house mean to him? The film is not from the perspective of Tae-yoon or anyone in the family, but from my point of view. Why am I shooting a film about Tae-yoon?

Copper Notes of a Wish by Reza Farahmand – Iran | 2019 – 88 minutes
Section: International Competition

Jarmuk, a suburb of Damascus, once had 150,000 inhabitants. Today, after heavy fighting, the invasion of the IS and a famine, there are less than 200 residents. The boy Malook dreams of becoming a singer and planning to organize a concert with professional musicians. A spark of hope remains for the children.

Dreaming In The Red Light by Pabelle Manikan – Philippines | 2019 – 86 minutes
Section: Asian Competition

In Angeles City, everything is cheap, including the girls. The film gets inside this world through two women Amy, a former sex worker and Tisay, Amy’s daughter from a German customer, following their lives as they try to improve their conditions and how women make choices when options are few and far between.

Evaporated by Kim Sungmin – Korea | 2019 – 126 minutes
Section: Korean Competition

A girl was missing, and her father has searched for her whereabouts for 17 years. The film depicts the life of families left behind. They can’t give up nor keep searching. Their lives should go on. The film asks what is left after someone is evaporated.

Fear Not by Park Ki-yong – Korea | 2019 – 102 minutes
Section: Korean Docs Showcase

The film, following a 10-day journey of the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Paralympics, captures everyone in space equally and parallelly without focusing specific characters and events. FEAR NOT, which avoids dramatization and focuses on the reality as it is, captures a minute rift in the dichotomous framework of disability and non-disability, normal and abnormal.

Freedom Fields by Naziha Arebi – UK, Libya | 2018 – 97 minutes
Section: Global Vision

This film follows three women and their football team in post-revolution Libya, as the country descends into civil war and the utopian hopes of the Arab Spring begin to fade. With their eyes, we see the reality of a country in transition, where the personal stories of love and aspirations.

Trailer:

Hirono by Shimada Ryuichi – Japan | 2019 – 130 minutes
Section: Asian Competition

Hirono is located 20 km away from Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. Immediately after the Great East Japan Earthquake, the whole town was forced to evacuate. In 2019, 80% of the population at the time of the earthquake is back in town. This documentary is about people who struggle.

Kabul, City in the Wind by Aboozar Amini – Netherlands, Germany, Afghanistan | 2018 – 88 minutes
Section: International Competition

In Kabul, Abas drives his bus and is always looking for terrorists who target him. Teenage Afshin and his little brother, Benjamin, go with their father to put pictures of bomb victims on a memorial. When their father goes to Iran for his safety, Afshin steps into his shoes as head of the household.

Trailer: