George Gittoes’ Snow Monkey and Bill Guttentag and Michael Ware’s Only the Dead will screen at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA).
Filmed in Afghanistan in 2014 when foreign forces leave and an internal power struggle begins, Snow Monkey will screen in official competition at the festival which runs November 18-29.
Produced by Lizzette Atkins and Gittoes, the final film in his What the World Needs Now! trilogy premiered at MIFF this year and followed the lives of those living in the Yellow House at Jalalabad, a collective of artists, film makers and social revolutionaries as they again face the threat of a Taliban-ruled society. It was funded through Screen Australia's Signature Documentary program.
Only the Dead, which follows Ware, an Australian journalist for CNN and Time Magazine as he journeys through the deepest recesses of the Iraq War, will unspool in the Best of Fests section. Patrick McDonald produced with Ware. Transmission is the Australian distributor.
Co-funded by Screen Australia, the film screened at the Sydney Film Festival and at Telluride. Dogwoof, a UK-based documentary specialist, has the rights outside North America, Australia and New Zealand
IDFA competition for feature-length documentary
Bolshoi Babylon
Nick Read (Russia/England, 2015, 83 min.)
Carolina's World
Mariana Viñoles (Uruguay, 2015, 70 min.)
Clear Years
Frédéric Guillaume (Belgium, 2015, 75 min.)
Don Juan
Jerzy Sladkowski (Sweden/Finland, 2015, 92 min.)
A Family Affair
Tom Fassaert (The Netherlands, 2015, 110 min.)
Natural Disorder
Christian Sønderby Jepsen/Christian Sønderby Jepsen (Denmark, 2015, 75 min.)
Next Stop: Utopia
Apostolos Karakasis (Greece, 2015, 90 min.)
Patient
Jorge Caballero (Colombia, 2015, 70 min.)
The Road
Zanbo Zhang (China, 2015, 90 min.)
Snow Monkey
George Gittoes (Australia, 2015, 165 min.)
Sonita
Rokhsareh Ghaem Maghami (Iran/Germany/Switzerland, 2015, 90 min.)
A Strange Love Affair with Ego
Ester Gould (The Netherlands, 2015, 90 min.)
Thru You Princess
Ido Haar (Israel, 2015, 80 min.)
Thy Father's Chair
Antonio Tibaldi/Alex Lora (USA/Italy, 2015, 72 min.)
Ukrainian Sheriffs
Roman Bondarchuk (Ukraine/Latvia/Germany, 2015, 80 min.)