Does documentary filmmaking really need to be encouraged?
Our world, the real one we live in, has already been created, we don’t need to build it from scratch like the feature filmmakers do. All we have to do is pick a theme and characters from it. They already have stories ready inside them just waiting to be written down. In a documentary, the truest actors, expensive sets, perfectly fitting costumes and shot props are free. We get dialogues and situations that cannot be invented in any script. A documentary is a unique opportunity to meet great people, to enter where no one has been with a camera before. If you have a curiosity about people, sensitivity and empathy, there is a great opportunity to tell the story from your own point of view.
What excites me most about documentary is that when I press the ‘REC’ button on the camera I don’t know what’s going to happen next. But before that happens I have to give myself a chance – to find a character, a place, an issue that I want to make a film about. During the course, we will work together on making documentation for your projects, the script, choosing the location, working with the protagonist, shooting the material and editing it.
A minimum of theory and as much film practice as possible.
I invite you to join the Documentary Film Group, the world is waiting for your camera stories!
Paweł Łoziński
We invite you to register for the 18th Film Spring Open!
Our Partner is:
Pawel Lozinski – polish director, cameraman and producer of documentary films. Graduate of the Directing Department at the Film School in Lodz. He lectures in documentary film direction at the National Film School in Lodz and Gdynia Film School. Author of more than 20 award-winning documentary films at international festivals. He makes distinct and emotionally charged documentaries about people of whom he draws intimate portraits. He is also the author of photography to many of his films. His films such as Birthplace, The way it is and the latest You Have No Idea How Much I Love You are considered innovative as they venture into new thematic areas and explore uncharted spaces within the documentary film genre. In his films, he is interested in the intricacies of relationships, asks difficult questions about human existence, and, without compromising the dignity of his characters, breaks down barriers and taboos to show close-to-the-bone human issues . He pushes the boundaries of the genre by placing the camera where it is seemingly forbidden, in an often unexplored no man’s land.
His documentary debut earned him international recognition.
Birthplace (1992) about a Polish Jew Henry Grynberg looking for the murderer of his father. The film has won many prestigious awards including the Golden Gate Award at the SFIFF and the Vue sur les Docs Grand Prix in Marseille and New York Film Festival.
He worked as an assistant to Krzysztof Kieslowski on Three Colors: White. Based on the latter’s concept, he made 100 Years in The Cinema (1995) for the renowned BFI series on the centenary of cinema.
His short film Sisters (1999), a 10-minute metaphorical black comedy about the lives of two elderly ladies, received awards including the prominent Cinema du Reel Grand Prix in Paris , Visions du reel Grand Prix in Nyon and the Golden Hobby-Horse Grand Prix at the Krakow Film Festival.
The full-length The way it is about the director’s friendship with his neighbors with whom he shares the same courtyard was a breakthrough in terms of the camera’s proximity to the hero. The film received the Golden Dove at the festival in Leipzig in 1999 and the Golden Hobby-Horse and Silver Dragon at Krakow Film Festival.
He received another Golden Dove at the Festival in Leipzig for the film Between the Doors made as part of the Across the border series in 2004.
Chemo (2008), which is an intimate portrait of people struggling against cancer, was the most acclaimed Polish documentary of 2009. It received more than 15 awards including the Prix Europa for Best European Television Film in Berlin in 2009 and MDR Television Award for Best Eastern European Documentary at DOC Leipzig in 2009.
Personal and courageous film about his difficult relationship with his father, Father and Son (2013) was bestowed the St. George Award for Best Film Documentary at the 35th International Film Festival in Moscow in 2013, the Silver Horn for Best Documentary Film at the Krakow Film Festival and the main prizes in Tehran and Minsk.
Selected filmography:
2016 You Have No Idea How Much I Love You – script, direction, production
2013 Father and Son – script, direction, phototgraphy, production
2008 Chemo – script, direction, production
2004 Between the Doors – script, direction, production
1999 The way it is – script, direction, phototgraphy, production
1999 Sisters – script, direction, phototgraphy, production
1996 A 100 years in the Cinema – script, direction
1992 Birthplace – script, direction
in English 
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