The International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) is the world's largest documentary film festival held annually since 1988 in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Anand Patwardhan is an Indian documentary filmmaker known for his socio-political, human rights-oriented films. Some of his films explore the rise of religious fundamentalism, sectarianism and casteism in India, while others investigate nuclear nationalism and unsustainable development. Notable films include Bombay: Our City (1985), In Memory of Friends (1990), In the Name of God (1992), Father, Son, and Holy War (1995), A Narmada Diary (1995), War and Peace (2002) and Jai Bhim Comrade (2011), Reason (2018), and The World is Family (2023), which have won national and international awards.
Astrid Bussink is a Dutch filmmaker. Her debut film is the documentary The Angelmakers.
Pinny Grylls is a documentary filmmaker. She co-directed Grand Theft Hamlet with Sam Crane. It's a feature documentary shot exclusively inside a video game and it won Best Documentary Jury Prize at SXSW Festival 2024.
Antoine is a 2008 Canadian documentary film directed by Laura Bari. The film features a 5-year old blind boy named Antoine Houang, living in Montreal, Quebec. It tells the real and imaginary life of Antoine, a boy detective who runs, drives, makes decisions, hosts radio shows and adores simultaneous telephone conversations. Over the course of two years, he uses a mini-boom microphone to discover and capture the sounds surrounding him. In this manner he also co-created the soundtrack of the film.
Leonard Retel Helmrich was a Dutch cinematographer and film director. Born in Tilburg, he had lived in Amsterdam since 1982. He received the highest honors for international documentaries at the Sundance Festival and was the first two-time International Documentary winner at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA). On June 5, 2018, he was awarded with the title Knight in the Order of the Netherlands Lion by the Dutch King Willem-Alexander.
Michael Obert is a German book author and journalist who has been compared with the likes of Bruce Chatwin, Jon Krakauer and Ryszard Kapuściński. His debut movie Song from the Forest was honored with the Award for Best Feature-Length Documentary at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam 2013. In 2016 Song from the Forest was considered for the 88th Academy Awards.
Keirda Bahruth is an American filmmaker based in Los Angeles, CA. She began her career working on Music Videos and Commercials before a move to New York teamed her up with legendary Saturday Night Live director James Signorelli, famous for his commercial parody sketches. As Signorelli's assistant, she began shooting behind-the-scenes footage of life at SNL for the show's 25th Anniversary Special, which gave her complete access to the inner workings of the show. After three full seasons at SNL, Bahruth returned to Los Angeles in 2001 and joined the nascent world of reality television. She has worked as a director and producer on shows for the Discovery Channel, E!, Fox, NBC/Universal, The WB and BET.
Marcel Barrena is a film director, screenwriter, producer and editor.
Petra Costa is a Brazilian filmmaker and actress. She has been a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences since 2018. Her first documentary feature, Elena (2012), won multiple awards internationally.
I'm Never Afraid! is a 2010 Dutch Super 16mm documentary film about Mack Bouwense an eight-year-old professional motorcross racer who has a mirrored heart, a condition known as dextrocardia. It is directed by award-winning Dutch filmmaker Willem Baptist and broadcast by VPRO on 20 November 2010. In German and French speaking countries the documentary was broadcast by ARTE.
Are You Listening!, is a Bangladeshi fiction-non-fiction film written-directed by Kamar Ahmad Simon and produced by Sara Afreen. The "OPENING FILM" of Open Doors Screening at LOCARNO Film Festival, 'Are You Listening!' has been invited to more than 40 International Festivals including "OFFICIAL SELECTION" of 25th IDFA, the largest documentary festival of the world and "OPENING FILM" of 55th Dok Leipzig, the oldest documentary festival. It was also exhibited on special occasions of Conference of Youth (COY) in Paris, Royal Anthropological Institute (RAI) London, Cinema Louxor in Paris, Stadkino Basel in Switzerland and many more.
Boris Gerrets (1948–2020) was a Dutch film director, film writer and editor based in Berlin, Germany. He was born into a Bulgarian-German family in Amsterdam and was raised in The Netherlands, Spain, Sierra Leone and Germany.
Gabriel Mascaro is a Brazilian visual artist and film director.
Maria Coreen T. Jimenez, better known by her screen name, Monster Jimenez, is a Philippine screenwriter, director, producer and editor best known for her work on Big Time (2005), Kano: An American and His Harem (2010), Apocalypse Child (2015), Respeto (2017), and the Sundance winner Leonor Will Never Die.
Senem Tüzen is a Turkish film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and editor. She is best known for her 2015 film Motherland. for which she earned the Best Screenplay award at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards in 2015, Warsaw International Film Festival's FIPRESCI award, and Tbilisi Film Festival's Golden Prometheus Award for Best Film. She co-directed the documentary Eat Your Catfish, which premiered at IDFA International Documentary Film Festival, Envision Competition Section, at 2021.
The Distant Barking of Dogs is a 2017 documentary film produced by Monica Hellström, and directed by Simon Lereng Wilmont. The film, set in Hnutove near Mariupol, follows the life of 10-year-old Ukrainian boy Oleg throughout a year during the War in Donbass. Through Oleg's perspective, the film examines what it means to grow up in a war zone.
Heart of Sky, Heart of Earth is a feature-length documentary film on the indigenous Maya in Mexico and Guatemala and their opposition to gold mining in their nation.
Supriyo Sen is an independent filmmaker from India. He produced and directed the film Tangra Blues (2021).
We were Rebels, is a 2014 German-South Sudanese documentary thriller film co-directed by Florian Schewe and Katharina von Schroeder and co-produced by Michael Bogar and Inka Dewitz for Perfect Shot Films.
