The 7th International Documentary Film Festival will be held from May 7th to May 16

For the second straight year, HRH the Princess of Asturias will be the Patroness of Honor for the International Documentary Festival of Madrid.
In 2010, the competition will feature a new headquarters and sets up for good in Matadero Madrid.
Documenta Madrid has set a new record in the number of submissions received, 1,153 films from 92 countries, and a significant number of Spanish productions, 233 entries. 

From May 7 to 16, the 7th International Documentary Film Festival DOCUMENTA MADRID 10 will be held, organized by the Arts Department of The City of Madrid with support and backing once again from HRH the Princess of Asturias, who will, for the second consecutive year, be the Patroness of Honor for this prestigious event. This year, the competition will be changing venues and will be based for good out of Matadero Madrid, where its headquarters will be located.

In this its seventh year, the festival has received a new record number of submissions, with 1,153 films received from 92 different countries, further evidence of its increasing international growth.  Of this total, 233 films are Spanish productions, a figure that continues to go up year after year, a reflection of the good health of the genre in our country. It is also important to highlight that all the films participating in the competitive sections will be making their premiere in Spain.

In addition, three new venues have been added, along with Matadero Madrid: Casa Asia, the Sala Berlanga and the Reina Sofía National Art Museum. In addition to these, the public will be able to enjoy the festival programming in all the usual places: Cines Princesa, Cine Estudio Círculo de Bellas Artes, Filmoteca Española (the Film Arcives), Academia de Cine, Casa Árabe, the Goethe Institute, Casa Asia, the French Institute and 8 y Medio Bookshop.

This year, the competition will feature monetary prize-winnings totaling 73,000 Euros, to be distributed among 4 competitive sections: Original Documentary Competition, Documentary Competition, National Competition and Filmotech.com.

DOCUMENTA MADRID features the figure of Alanis Obomsawin

This year DOCUMENTA 10 is opting for the some of most politically-committed cinema by featuring the work of great internationally renowned filmmakers with brilliant careers, whose work has gone practically unseen in Spain.

One of the most notable figures in this year's 7th festival is the Canadian filmmaker, musician, educator and activist Alanis Obomsawin (New Hampshire, 1932), who will present a retrospective of her spirited film work. By recreating her childhood experiences on a reserve in the Abenaki nation, Obomsawin became one of her country's pioneering film directors in the 1970s, with the help of the prestigious National Film Board of Canada (NFB).

One of her most emblematic films is based on the "Oka Crisis", a conflict between the Canadian city of Oka and the Mohowk community over the building of a golf course in sacred land worshiped by the native tribe. Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance (1990), which will be screened at the festival, is mandatory viewing for university students in her country because of its clear vision of the details regarding this paradigmatic event, of the existing struggles between official policy and the survival of the native communities of Canada. Obomsawin, considered a living legend in her country, was an exceptional witness to what happened and recorded with full consent from the Mohawk community.

Her work defending the rights of natives in Canada over the course of her filmmaking career has opened up doors for indigenous communities in the most adverse of circumstances. The ins and outs of their everyday development, their curious rites and stalwart beliefs, appear throughout her work, which will be screened at DOCUMENTA MADRID 10.

http://www.documentamadrid.com/