26/02/2013 - Documentary Apuda by Chinese He Yuan wins this year’s edition, directed by Josetxo Cerdán in a festival, which, eight years after its debut, has become an international reference point.

The Punto di Vista documentary film festival in Pamplona (Navarra) has completed its eighth edition with an award to He Yuan for his documentary Apuda. In a bare and naturalistic way, the film shows the everyday life of a farmer who helps his father out in a remote village in northern China. The award continues the nascent tradition for recognising Chinese filmmakers, after Wang Bing won the Horizons award for Three Sisters during the last Venice Film Festival.

The jury, composed by directors Christian von Borries, Bill Brown and J.P. Sniadecki, the director of the European Cinema Festival of Seville, José Luis Cienfuegos, and the IndieLisboa festival organiser, Ana Isabel Santos Strindberg, gave the Jean Vigo award for best director to British John Smith for his short Dad Stick, an ironic exercise in style with a political undertone, based on three objects inherited from his father.

The audience’s favourite was Danish Mahdi Fleifel’s A World Not Ours, a coproduction between Britain, Denmark, and Lebanon presented in the Berlinale Panorama section. The film is an autobiographical tale of the living conditions in the Ein el-Hilweh Palestinian camp in Southern Lebanon, seen through a serene, sensible and scathing gaze.

One of the most talked about recognitions was the special mention of the Spanish documentary El modelo by Germán Scelso, a polemic and politically incorrect film on a disabled person living off charity on the streets and the rapport he establishes with director as well as spectator. Francina Verdés was awarded the 4° Proyecto X Films with La tradición. 

This year, retrospectives revolved around works by German Thomas Heise, who documented the German reunification, Spanish José María Berzonsa now based in France, and on Brazilian Eduardo Coutinho.

The Punto di Vista festival has managed in just eight editions to place itself as an international reference point for documentaries, with increasing support from the public, which crowded screenings, and a change in artistic leadership in the coming year, as Josetxo Cerdán concludes his four year mandate. 

(Translated from Spanish)