Visual Conversations

Remarkable Images in Documentary Cinema

Mark Cousins in Visual Conversation with Albanian Cinematheque director Iris Elezi and programmer Thomas Logoreci.

We think we know the history of documentary cinema: the early landmarks, the arrival of cinéma vérité in the 1960s, the films that entered the canon. But any history is shaped by what it remembers, and what it leaves out.

With The Story of Documentary Film now complete, filmmaker and film historian Mark Cousins takes audiences on a visual journey through documentary cinema around the world, tracing its history and his own discovery of it while challenging the established canon along the way.

DokuFest will also present two chapters from the film. The 1960s chapter, Not Willing to Obey, follows documentary cinema’s shift from observation towards resistance, as portable technologies gave filmmakers new freedom to confront authority and take the camera into rapidly changing societies. The 1980s chapter looks at another transformation. Documentary became increasingly personal and self-aware, turning towards memory, identity and the many different ways truth can be approached and told.

Admission to the Conversation is free. Seating is limited and available on a first-come, first-served basis.

This Conversation is presented with support from the British Council through the Culture Connects Fund.

Screenings

The Story of Documentary Film: 1960s
9 August at 19:30 — DokuKino
13 August at 20:30 — Kino Lumi

The Story of Documentary Film: 1980s
10 August at 19:30 — DokuKino
14 August at 20:30 — Kino Lumi