Interview with Laura Collado, producer for Spanish outfit Trueday Films and selected for the 2019 Emerging Producers programme.

Why do you produce documentaries? Do you understand documentary film as an instrument of social and political change?
Laura Collado: Yes, I have always believed that documentaries can play an important role in challenging those pre-packaged narratives that lure us away from critical thinking. Documentary should help us question our own beliefs and perspectives and reconnect with the big picture. In this sense, and as much as social and political change can only come from individuals who are questioning the way we look at the world and are aware that our choices affect ecologies beyond our direct experience, documentaries are definitely instruments of social change.

What qualities should a documentary producer have these days?
Excellent question. I have pondered this on many occasions, particularly when facing difficulties. I think that a good documentary producer needs to be mostly perseverant and resilient, however, strategic thinking, organisation, creativity  and flexibility are also good tools to have.

What do you think is the future of distribution of documentary films?
I don’t have a clear answer to this. With the television landscape rapidly changing and broadcasters’ budgets shrinking I think that VOD will become a bigger part of the documentary distribution strategy. For me the real question is actually what is the future of the financing model of documentary films. Whilst more documentary content is being made by platforms like Netflix and Amazon, it feels that they will homogenise formats and types of stories and concentrate production in a comparatively few trusted independent producers. Will the more creative or artistic documentaries rely purely on public funding? Who will cover the part of financing and distribution that public and generalist broadcasters have traditionally invested in creative diverse documentary films?

What projects do you have under way (including in the area of fiction film and other projects)?
This is a transitional period for us, after launching and releasing Constructing Albert in 2018. At the moment we are developing a range of different projects.  We are co-producing a historical doc series called The Treasure Fleet, which is in advanced development, and a new project called, The Plan, which is in early stages of development and we want to have ready to present in the documentary markets this summer. We were working on our project Letters Through the Wall, a Palestinian-Israeli tale of friendship amongst poets on both sides of the conflict but as it often happens with political sensitive films, we have had to put this project on hold for the moment. We are also moving into fiction with a short film called El Gesto. 

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Emerging Producers is a promotional and educational project, which brings together talented European documentary film producers. The programme is organised and curated by the Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival.

Deadline for applications to the Emerging Producers 2020 edition is 15 March, 2019. Click here.