This week SEARCHING FOR SUGAR MAN director Malik Bendjelloul passed away.
This week the documentary community lost the Oscar-winning filmmaker Malik Bendjelloul, who died from an apparent suicide at the age of 36. Bruce Weber of the New York Times penned an obit of Bendjelloul, while Realsceen’s Adam Benzine rounded up some tributes made to the director. Adam Schartoff released an interview conducted with Bendjelloul on his Filmwax Radio podcast. At Indiewire, Paula Bernstein also reported on Bendjelloul’s passing. Michael Dunaway remembered the director in an encomium published at Paste Magazine, and Xan Brooks did the same at The Guardian.
At Screen Daily, Colin Brown took a look at the doc lineup at this year’s Cannes International Film Festival. Daniel Walber of Nonfics.com had a great piece on the festival’s history of ignoring docs, and Basil Tsiokos provided an overview of docs screening there for his What (Not) to Doc blog.
At Nonfics.com, Christopher Campbell had a chance to interview director Joe Berlinger about his new documentary television series on Al Jazeera America, The System. At Realscreen, Kelly Anderson also spoke with Berlinger about The System, and at the International Documentary Association (IDA) website, Darianna Cardilli also profiled the series.
This week Stranger Than Fiction is hosting a screening of the film 9 MAN from director Ursula Liang about a streetball game often played in Chinatown. The film will screen on Tuesday, May 20 at 8 p.m. at the IFC Center in Manhattan, and will be followed with a Q&A with director Liang. For more information or to purchase tickets please go here.