Thessaloniki’s Industry Head on How Collaboration, Evolution Make Festival’s Agora Program Vital Stop for European Docmakers
variety.comChristopher Vourlias As the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival embarks on its second quarter-century, with its 26th edition kicking off March 7, the event’s industry arm continues to look for ways to reinvent itself. “We are educating ourselves.
We are asking the local and the regional industries and communities, ‘What do you need from us?’” says Angeliki Vergou, who heads the Agora industry program. “I believe in this open dialogue…with our colleagues about the challenges they face and we face [as we] try to figure it out together.” A perennial highlight of the industry program is the Agora’s co-production and co-financing forum, which takes place March 11 and will present 12 projects in development by documentary filmmakers from Southeastern Europe, the Middle East and the Black Sea region.
Another highlight, Agora Docs in Progress, held March 12, showcases 11 films nearing completion and ready to hit the festival circuit this year.
Recent titles to take part in the Agora pitching forum include Alisa Kovalenko’s 2023 Berlinale premiere “We Will Not Fade Away” and Tzeli Hadjidimitriou’s debut documentary feature “Lesvia” (pictured, top), which world premieres March 8 in Thessaloniki.
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