THE AFRICA SHORTS

Encounters and the Jan Vrijman Fund of IDFA are running a 4-day storytelling and production workshop in Johannesburg 15–18 July 2007.

Five filmmakers from Southern and East Africa were selected upon the basis of their proposals for a short film (of up to 10 minutes duration) on the subject of LOVE.

New love, old love, unconditional love, secret love, true love, puppy
love, forbidden love, love at first sight…

These films aim to be ready for screening at Encounters 2008 and
other festivals internationally.

The Workshop Leader is award-winning director Leonard Retel Helmrich whose film Shape of the Moon won the World Cinema Documentary Competition at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, and the prestigious Joris Ivens Award for best feature-length
documentary at the 2004 International Documentary Festival Amsterdam (IDFA).

Shape of the Moon screened at Encounters in 2005. His film Promised Paradise, winner of the Golden Dhow, 2006 Zanzibar International Film Festival, screens at Encounters this year. Retel Helmrich travels courtesy of Holland Film.