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DocPoint Comes to an End

Published on February 3, 2012

The following is a guest post by Anya Kandel, filmmaker of the MTM9 film Why Do White People Have Black Spots?

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I left the DocPoint refreshed and inspired. I left with a resolution to collect more stories from my grandma and with a promise to notice the remarkable in the every day. Here is why…

How Are You Doing, Rudolf Ming by Latvian filmmaker Roberts Rubins, offers a journey into the creative mind of a young boy. Rudolf, obsessive, eccentric, aloof and (perhaps) brilliant, makes his own movies with strips of paper and a slide projector. Drawing pictures in miniature, this 13-year-old boy plays all the voices and makes all the sounds. “There is this creative spark that drives some people. It consumes them,” Roberts tells me, “This fascinates me.” Roberts next project continues his interest in the creative geniuses of the world. He is currently searching for them. If you know someone, he might be interested to hear.

Lebanese-born Mahmoud Kaabour has a knack for finding both heart and adventure in the simplicity of everyday life. His recent film, Grandma, A Thousand Times has been tremendously successful. Many of you in New York might have caught it at IFC a few months ago. Mahmoud offers an unaffected and intimate portrait of his quick-witted, wry and lovely 83-year-old grandma in Beruit. After the film, the grandmother of Mahmoud’s sole Finnish friend in the UAE raised her hand. She had traveled from the countryside to send with Mahmoud a hug to her granddaughter. “Grandma’s are the same all over the world,” she said. “Our job is to love.” Few left without tears in their eyes. Stay tuned for Mahmoud’s next project, The Champ of the Camp, about a national singing competition that takes place in the UAE labor camps. To learn more, read this interview.

You may have caught wind of the film Kumaré, directed by and starring Vikram Gandhi. It has received accolades throughout its global festival run, including the documentary feature audience award at the 2011 SXSW Film Festival. Vikram, in his quest to discover why gurus are so popular, becomes one. Donning his grandmother’s accent, he grows out his hair and beard and becomes central in his own social experiment. With trident and picnic basket in hand, he leaves New York to visit yoga studios in Arizona. He teaches “fake” yoga moves and preaches the notion of “illusion.” Brilliantly maneuvered, he speaks the truth, fools everyone and finds himself along the way. From what I could tell, many left the theater wishing they had their own Kumaré, illusion or not. This is only the beginning. I am sure we will be seeing much more of Vikram’s work in the coming years.

And some other films that got buzz at the festival:

Finsurf gracefully chronicles the bold surfers who brave the ice cold waves in Finland.

Italy, Love It Or Leave It follows a couple who, fed up with the social and political issues in Italy, travel their country finding a reason not to emigrate. Poignant and playful. And yes, Gustav Hofer and Luca Ragazzi are as delightful in real life as they are in the film.

Foreign, a film by Miriam Fassbender, follows a man’s tremulous journey from Mali to Spain, giving a “face to migration.”

Water Babies, by Dutch filmmaker Aliona van der Horst boldly looks at pregnancy, menstruation, and the “possibility to give life” in a way that one viewer said “helped me realize a taboo that I didn’t even know I subscribed too,” then “swept me away with her story.”

I actually lied. This isn’t my last post. Once we finish putting together the footage from the secondary students I worked with, I will pass their film along. They have important things to say.

Thanks for listening.

Anya

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