IDFA DocLab Competition for Digital Documentary Storytelling
Alma, a Tale of Violence Alma, une enfant de la violence Miquel Dewever-Plana, Isabelle Fougère
WORLD PREMIERE
“I was fifteen when I wanted to join a gang.” And to join the gang, Alma had to commit murder – there were no two ways about it. This is how Alma, now 26, opens her confession, seemingly unmoved by the violence of her memories. For five years, Alma was a member of the Maras, one of the most violent gangs in Guatemala. Photographer Miquel Dewever-Plana and journalist Isabelle Fougère allow Alma to tell her story on various platforms: aside from the interactive web and tablet application, they have also created a TV version, a photo exhibition and a pair of books. The interactive tablet version brings all these elements together. The user has the option to switch back and forth between two image streams, presented one above the other. The bottom screen shows Alma against a black background, telling her story – from her initiation to her violent struggle to leave the gang. The second screen, which is accompanied by an immersive sound mix, contextualizes Alma’s story (which continues in voice-over) through Dewever-Plana’s photographs and drawings by Hugues Mìcal. The app also offers four modules that provide more information on Guatemala, the Maras, the country’s violence and what could be done about it. Alma will be presented during DocLab Live: Stories of Violence and Everyday Life and as a photo exhibition at the Expanding Documentary Exhibtion. Producer Alexandre Brachet is one of the main speakers at the IDFA interactive Documentary Conference.
France, 2012 cross-platform, color / b&w
Miquel Dewever-Plana:
Director: Miquel DeweverPlana, Isabelle Fougère Photography: Miquel Dewever-Plana Editing: Lydia Decobert Sound: Grégory Le Maître Music: Grégory Corsaro Narration: Isabelle Fougère Webdesign: Sébastien Brothier Production: Alexandre Brachet for Upian Co-Production: Agence VU’ Executive Production: Margaux Missika & Gregory Trowbridge for Upian World Sales/Screening Copy: Upian Involved TV Channel: ARTE France 4 Website: www.alma.arte.tv
directing debut
directing debut
Isabelle Fougère: Pitched at the Forum 2011
Bear 71
Leanne Allison, Jeremy Mendes In Banff National Park in the Canadian Rockies, various wild animals are implanted with a GPS receiver and a chip, and from that moment they’re known as numbers: Deer 48, Fox 21, Bear 71. The park rangers know exactly where they are every moment of every day, and they film their daily comings and goings using the security cameras they set up all over the park. Web documentary Bear 71 lets us watch over their shoulders, to a disturbing effect. Director Leanne Allison’s husband, a Banff park ranger, gave her thousands of hours of grainy surveillance footage from the park, from which she and digital documentary pioneer Jeremy Mendes focus in on a threeyear-old grizzly: Bear 71. In voice-over, she explains how the animals are being pushed ever further into the mountains by advancing freeways, train tracks and tourism. The immense amounts of data and surveillance material allow the audience to follow the proceedings in the park on an interactive map. Humans rule this territory, but remotely, from behind their monitors. The site’s visitors, likewise watching a screen, are forced to share the perspective of the guard/voyeur. Slowly but surely, we become aware of a primal human urge to grab hold of new technologies to exert control and to repress. Bear 71 will be performed with live music during DocLab Live: The Best of NFB Interactive.
104
Canada, 2012 cross-platform, color / b&w
Leanne Allison:
Director: Leanne Allison, Jeremy Mendes Editing: Bill Hardman, Jennifer Moss, Hart Snider Sound: Joshua Stevenson Webdesign: Jam3Media, Aubyn Freybe-Smith Production: Loc Dao & Bonnie Thompson for National Film Board of Canada, Dana Dansereau Executive Production: David Christensen & Rob McLaughlin for National Film Board of Canada World Sales/Screening Copy: National Film Board of Canada
Jeremy Mendes:
Being Caribou (2004) Finding Farley (2009) This Land (2010) South Hill (2011)
www.jeremymendes.com Awards: Rocky Award Best Web Series Non Fiction Banff World Media Festival, Sheffield Innovation Award Sheffield DocFest, Cannes Gold Cyber Lion (Charities, Public Health & Safety, Public Awareness), a.o. Website: www.bear71.nfb.ca