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As does any major competitive film festival, the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) has its own development sidebar for projects in their early stages. IDFA’s Forum on Wednesday, as the festival hits the midway point, announced winners for the section’s 2024 awards. The honors will help support these films in their journey ahead out of Europe’s premier documentary film festival — and an essential global crossroads for nonfiction films.

Ibrahim Omar’s project “Dry Sky” won the IDFA Forum Award for Best Pitch, while Lana Y. Daher’s “Do You Love Me” took home the Forum Award for Best Rough Cut, and the DocLab Forum Award went to “Amorphous” by May Abdalla.

Regarding “Do You Love Me,” produced by Lana Y. Daher, the jury — consisting of Burcu Melekoglu and Mandisa Zitha — said: “We are delighted to present the Jury Award for the most outstanding film about to be...

Ibrahim Omar’s project Dry Sky won Best Pitch at the IDFA Forum Awards presented in Amsterdam on Wednesday.

Among the other winners were Lana Y. Daher’s Do You Love Me, “an archival journey through Beirut… [that] weaves together past & present to explore Lebanon’s current status and psyche,” which earned the Forum Award for Best Rough Cut, and Amorphous, “an immersive multiplayer experience about how you feel in your skin” directed by May Abdalla winner of the DocLab Forum Award.

IDFA Forum introduced a new honor this year — the Producers Connection Award. That went to Looking for the Mermaid, directed by Yara Costa (logline: “A chanted love promise between a fisherman and a mermaid and a story of part of humanity betraying Earth.”).

Each award includes a cash prize of €1,500. Do You Love Me also will receive closed captioning and subtitles from inVision Subtitling.

Dry Sky received a 2024 IDFA Bertha Fund grant.

“Dry Sky,” produced by Ibrahim Omar, won the Forum Award for Best Pitch Wednesday at IDFA documentary festival in Amsterdam. “Do You Love Me,” produced by Lana Y. Daher, took home the Forum Award for Best Rough Cut, and “Looking for the Mermaid” by Yara Costa won the Producers Connection Award. The DocLab Forum Award went to “Amorphous” by May Abdalla.

Speaking about Forum Award for Best Pitch winner “Dry Sky”, jury members Dorota Lech and Malin Huber said: “For an articulation of a subtle cinematic language and a courageous proposal of healing. Told through a unique and critical inside perspective we look forward to a collective endeavor to imagine new futures. It takes a village.”

Logline: The film follows Ibrahim who is on his way back to his hometown. He endeavors to build what he has dreamt of all his life. However, he faces a fate intertwined with the...

Héléna Klotz’s “Spirit of Ecstasy” will open the 2024 Kashish LGBTQ+ film festival in Mumbai, while Vuk Lungulov-Klotz’s “Mutt” will close it.

“Spirit of Ecstasy,” which debuted at the 2023 Toronto International Film Festival, follows a gender-questioning stock-market trader who is determined to make it in the world of finance; not for the glory or

wealth, but because it’s leading them on the path to freedom. Lead Pomme was nominated in the most promising actress category at France’s Lumiere awards.

“Mutt” follows a trans man who goes through an emotional roller-coaster over a 24-hour period in New York City, bumping into their ex-boyfriend, sister and father for the first time after having lost touch with them since his gender transitioning. It debuted at Sundance 2023, where it won the U.S. dramatic special jury award for actor Lio Mehiel. It went on to play at Berlin, where it earned...

Celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, the IDFA Bertha Fund, which was originally created to support documentary filmmaking in developing countries, has seen a series of pivotal changes in both its budget and scope of financing in the last couple of years.

Speaking to Variety, Bertha Fund managing director and IDFA deputy director Isabel Arrate Fernandez commented on the fund’s recent changes: “One of the big changes this year is that we were able to raise the contributions and the number of projects we select in a year. We started the year with the aim to support 25 projects through the Ibf Classic and we ended up supporting 35 because we added an entire Ukrainian leg.”

Isabel Arrate Fernandez

By the Ukrainian leg, Fernandez means the IDFA Bertha Fund Classic – Ukrainian Support special call, funded by the Open Society Foundation. “It came about very quickly as a hands-on reaction to what was going on.

81 more titles have been added to the festival programme.

Bella Ciao, a documentary about the anthem that symbolized the Italian partisans’ fight against facism in the Second World War, is one of 81 new titles added to the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam (IDFA) programme.

Directed by Giulia Giapponesi, Bella Ciao will have its international premiere at IDFA, having first played at Italy’s Bari International Film Festival in March.

Scroll down for the Luminous, Frontlight feature additions

Adapted from Italian folk tune ‘Mondine’, the song ‘Bella Ciao’ has experienced a resurgence in popularity in recent weeks, partly as a show of...