As elections approach in Denmark, the Copenhagen Intl. Documentary Film Festival, also known as CPH:DOX, has a role in the national debate during its 23rd edition, running March 11-22.
Katrine Kiilgaard, the festival’s managing director, says: “I do think that’s our prime aim: to be an open platform for the democratic dialogue that needs to happen. And we hope to make our mark: making people a little bit wiser before they vote two days after the festival.”
“The Sandbox”
Courtesy of Kenya-Jade Pinto
One of the festival’s declared core values is the importance of employing curiosity and challenging the status quo. Niklas Engstrøm, the festival’s artistic director, points to Kenya-Jade Pinto’s “The Sandbox” as an example of a film that does that. The film, which plays in the main competition, “is asking difficult questions about how borders are being secured using surveillance technology, and how that has the potential to spill over to being used to surveil all of us in the end.”
He adds that this topic is relevant in Denmark as immigration will be one of the key issues in the elections.
Another hot button issue in the Danish elections will be the status of Greenland, given President Donald Trump’s stated intention to annex the vast arctic island — a semi-autonomous Danish territory. Although the issue won’t play a major role in the festival, Engstrøm says, CPH:DOX will host Greenlandic filmmaker Johannes Ujo Müller’s “Our Flag,” which centers on the creation of Greenland’s flag in 1985 by local artist Thue Christiansen. Unlike other Nordic flags, it does not incorporate a Christian cross but instead draws its inspiration from the sun rising above the sea. “It says a lot about the long-standing wish of Greenlandic people to have their own nationality and their own perspective represented,” Engstrøm says.
Engstrøm underscores the importance of making the festival “a public space for dialogue.” He says: “For us, it’s super important that we stand up for every filmmaker and their right to speak and their position as artists to present documentary cinema in a way that will inspire and engage.”
However, he offers a caveat: “But we also want to curate a program that is not a safe space in the way that these films are in a sort of echo chamber. I think the most important thing for festivals today is to curate a space where we can have the very difficult conversations about things that we disagree on.”
“Palestinian Unwanted”
Courtesy of CPH:DOX
He adds that the festival “will build bridges between people of different opinions, coming from different viewpoints and perspectives.”
Another film asking tough questions, Engstrøm says, is Omar Shargawi’s “Palestinian Unwanted,” about his experiences as a Danish-Palestinian during the war in Gaza and “how he perceives the media landscape in Denmark and how the media has treated the war in Gaza,” Engstrøm says.
In particular, Shargawi criticizes the Danish media’s refusal to describe what has happened in Gaza as a genocide.
“This is not a film that tries to be objective or put in a lot of nuances. It’s an angry activist film, and it could definitely provoke some conversations,” Engstrøm says. “And then what we do is we invite the Danish media for a conversation with the filmmaker. So, the film won’t be screened in an echo chamber where the audiences are only people that already agree with Omar Shargawi, because that won’t make anyone wiser.”
“If Luck Will Come”
Courtesy of CPH:DOX
One of the festival’s other core values is diversity, in the broadest sense of the word. It is more than “what in the U.S. would be included in DEI [diversity, equity, and inclusion]. It is geographical diversity, diversity of political opinion, and perspectives on reality,” Engstrøm says. “Diversity” also applies to “the broad genre of documentary and how you can expand what it is and what it could be,” he says.
This all feeds into the curation of the program so “you have all these voices in your head, somehow, and it ends up creating a program where you feel the enormous complexity of reality is being treated in a fair way.”
He cites two films about Afghanistan to illustrate the point, “If Luck Will Come” and “Kabul Between Prayers.” The first looks at “the horrible conditions that young girls are living under after the takeover of the Taliban,” Engstrøm says, while the second follows members of the Taliban. “It is not to say that this thing is just as good as the other, it is just to say that in order to get wiser you constantly need to challenge yourself and get new perspectives,” he says.
“Kabul Between Prayers”
Courtesy of Silk Road Film Salon
The need to show different perspectives also applies to the Israel-Palestine conflict, showing both what happened to the hostages taken by Hamas, and the fate of the Palestinians in Gaza. “We, as a festival, have a huge responsibility of not narrowing reality but expanding it,” Engstrøm says.
Some festivals, such as IDFA, have excluded Israeli films that have been backed by government funding. CPH:DOX has a different position. Kiilgaard says, “It is important for us to say that the festival is built on freedom of expression, independence, impartiality, that we are this open platform that Niklas described for different voices to be presented and discussed in an open, democratic way, as a part of an open dialogue, and in that perspective, we do not really impose any political boycotts, exclude filmmakers based on nationality or anything else for that matter. And, it’s really important for us to keep this position in place to be that exact open space, and not exclude beforehand anyone who could side with one side or the other, so to speak.”
Engstrøm adds, “I think it’s important to add that it doesn’t mean that we are not horrified about what has been going on in Gaza over the last few years, and all of us in the festival have really deeply felt how terrible that war is, and the huge amount of human rights violations and atrocities that the Israeli army has been committing, but we just believe that our role in this world will be very damaged if we start pointing to different countries where the filmmakers wouldn’t be welcome.”
Variety contacted the Israeli embassy in London for a response to Engstrøm’s comments about the Israeli army, but at the time of publication no reply had been received.
Referring to the relationship with politicians, with respect to the recent situation at the Berlinale, Kiilgaard says, “There’s an arm’s length policy, which is very nicely in place, I would say. So, I don’t think we have any political pressure from any of our funders or supporters.”
Looking at the broader political climate, Engstrøm says, “We are approaching a new world order and a new reality where polarization is part of it, and where political pressure in many countries is being expanded upon. We are definitely prepared to take on these very difficult questions.”
