IDFA International Documentary Festival Amsterdam 2005
24 November, 4 December

Last week, it was announced that a number of documentaries at this year's IDFA will deal with the subject of worldwide terrorism. This year's big festival theme is the environment, however. Under the title Green Screen, IDFA is presenting seventeen recent documentaries exploring aspects of the environment. Each offers insight into the tension between man and his environment. Alongside the films, on Tuesday, 29 November, a debate will take place on this theme, organised in the grote zaal (large hall) in the Balie.
Green Screen has two main areas of focus. A number of films examine the oldest relationship between man and the soil: agriculture. Documentaries such as Our Daily Bread by Nikolaus Geyrhalter, Profils paysans: le quotidien by Raymond Depardon and Taggart Siegel's The Real Dirt on Farmer John, winner of the Sundance audience award, show how traditional agricultural techniques are increasingly making way for modern production methods - leading to the
depopulation of rural areas - while this development is being paralleled by the rise of ecological agriculture. For many farmers, agriculture offers not just an income, by above all a way of life, which is under seriously threat.
Another focal point of the programme is the relationship between multinationals and the environment. Profit-oriented companies are the biggest polluters, although many international companies are now accepting responsibility. What are the consequences for man and the environment if capitalism continues its global expansion? The role of the modern multinational is investigated in documentaries such as The Pipeline Next Door by Nino Kirtadze, The Source by Martin Marecek and Bullshit by PeA Holmquist and Suzanne Khardalian.
A unique and unconventional film in the Green Screen programme - one that transcends all issues - is the 'Science Fiction Fantasy' The Wild Blue Yonder by Werner Herzog, in which a frustrated extraterrestrial 'guide' presents his vision of the earth.

Earlier this year, three short films by Joris Ivens were rediscovered in the archive of the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision. Betonarbeid, Spoorwegbouw Zuid-Limburg and Van Jeugd, Strijd en Arbeid were made in 1930 under commission from and to mark the 10th anniversary of the Algemene Nederlandse Bouwarbeidersbond construction workers' union. These films will receive a 'second premiere' during IDFA, accompanied by live music from the group Roomtone.

IDFA opens on 24 November with Sisters in Law (England, 2005) by Kim Longinotto and Florence Ayisi. This year's Top 10 has been compiled by Dutch/Palestinian filmmaker Hany Abu-Assad. And as a taster of an extensive overview of the work of Raymond Depardon organised by the Filmmuseum Amsterdam and the Fotomuseum Rotterdam, IDFA also has a retrospective dedicated to this French filmmaker and photographer.
Under the title Docs at War, IDFA is also devoting attention this year in a special programme to documentaries from the period 1939-1946.