7th Perm Flahertiana - International Documentary Film Festival

The documentary film festival “Flahertiana” was founded in 1995 by a group of film makers from the Perm region in Russia. Since 2006, it takes place annually as an international event. It specializes, but not in a dogmatic sense, in films whose “main hero lives a part of his/her life on the screen, directed according to the laws of dramatic art”. The reference to Robert Flaherty and his Nanook of the North signals a deliberate alternative to the claim of authenticity as formulated by Russia’s generally accepted saint of documentary filming Aleksandr Dovzhenko.

The festival, directed by Pavel Pechenkin, offers, apart from the representative competition, a good overview over the work of regional filmmakers as well as a series of workshops. A FIPRESCI jury was present for the first time. The festival provided 3000 US$ to make the FIPRESCI prize even more attractive. Flahertiana belongs to the smaller festivals where atmosphere and friendly communication play a bigger part then stars and galas. (Thomas Rothschild)