Being away from home allows room for perspective, and for a group of U.S.-based documentary experts who made the trip to Cannes, the glass remains half full, despite the headwinds.
The closure of Participant, Showtime Docs, CNN Films scaling back and belt-tightening across the board have led many to posit that a Golden Age of documentary films has ended. A discussion in the American Pavilion at the Cannes Film Festival begged the question: If the Golden Age is over, what comes next? For the assembled speakers, there was an acceptance of the challenges, but also a desire to take a long view and to look to the future. Related Stories News Cannes Film Festival Workers Criticize Management & French Government Over Stagnant Salary Talks And Warn Of Max Exodus From Industry Festivals 'To A Land Unknown' Review: Sympathetic Story Of Stranded Palestinian Refugees Avoids Turning Them Into Heroes - Cannes Film Festival “With the market retracting and some distribution outlets not being replaced by others, we’re forced to be creative again about how we get these films out to market, how we find audiences,” said Cinetic Media ’s Jason Ishikawa during the Deadline-hosted panel.
Imagine was in Cannes with the Ron Howard-helmed Jim Henson Idea Man , about the eponymous creator of The Muppets . Imagine Documentaries President, Sara Bernstein, agreed that the perfect storm the docs industry has weathered means there will be a rethink in terms of financing. “At Imagine we’re starti.
