Targeting amateur to semi-pro documentary filmmakers, I find the program interesting as it aims to bring up the unseen lives of Indonesia and its residents.
Each year selected projects were chosen to be developed under guidance of professional documentary/feature filmmakers, and the projects, usually the chosen ones are up to 10 or sometimes less, will then be screened on Metro TV.
A panel of judges will choose the winner, while audiences at home can choose the winner of the most favorite film. A rule of thumb these days: you cannot make any event without our involvement with text messages.
In its early years, it was co-organized by In-Docs, a documentary film community aims to provide documentary film-making coach, documentary film public screening and distribution to film communities throughout Indonesia. It happens that In-Docs is a sister organization of my present workplace, JIFFest, which allows me gaining easy access to the outputs of what In-Docs has made in the past few years.
The year 2008 marked the last year of partnership with Metro TV. It remains to be seen how the films will turn out this year.
Even at the last year of the joined forces, I was a little disappointed with the select projects. Perhaps I was riding on a very high expectations after successive winning films for the past two years: Suster Apung (The Floating Nurse), about a nurse facing the high seas everyday on a small boat while serving her patients in remote areas of Sulawesi, and Kepala Sekolahku Pemulung (My Headmaster The Waste-Taker), a slap-on-the-face look at the failure of education system in Jakarta.
The finalists of 2008 were either walking on a safe, comfortable side, or simply digging the research materials with less efforts. The eventual winner is Prahara Tsunami Bertabur Bakau (Raising Mangroves After the Tsunami), the most compelling of the lot.
Read the full article here, while queries about watching the films can be directed to In-Docs.
The photo was taken during the public preview of the 2008 Eagle Awards finalists at Erasmus Huis, Jakarta, September 16, 2008.
