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people have enough places to meet and meet easily. We know that\u2019s going to be top of the list.\u201d<\/p>\nAfter two years of taking place online, Sunny Side of the Doc, an international market for documentary and narrative experiences, is returning to La Rochelle, France, for an in-person event. The 33rd edition, which will feature the central theme of New Voices, will run from June 20 to 23. The top priority for this year\u2019s market, according to Mathieu B\u00e9jot, director of strategy and development at Sunny Side of the Doc, is to bring everyone in the industry back together again, enabling attendees to meet face-to-face and facilitating new business opportunities and creative conversations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere has been a lot done online, but at the end of the day, we all know that the kind of discussion that can be had in person is totally different,\u201d says B\u00e9jot. \u201cWe want to make sure that people have enough places to meet and meet easily. We know that\u2019s going to be top of the list.\u201d<\/p>\n
Once again, Sunny Side will host its traditional themed pitching sessions: Global Issues, Wildlife & Conservation, Science, History and Arts & Culture. Under the digital creation umbrella, there will be the Immersive Experiences session as well as the Digital Na(rra)tive Stories session, which will include \u201cbasically all nonlinear documentaries, produced for YouTube, TikTok, Snapchat, etc.,\u201d explains B\u00e9jot. \u201cAnything produced for the social networks or platforms, as long as we\u2019re not talking about the traditional linear format. We will be introducing some podcasts as well. The idea is to explore new types of storytelling in documentary.\u201d<\/p>\n
A showcase of Ukrainian projects will include titles in development, those that are looking for production, as well as those at a more advanced stage. \u201cWe\u2019re really talking about documentaries, not war footage\u2014there\u2019s a lot of coverage; we don\u2019t have much to add to that,\u201d says B\u00e9jot. \u201cBut we want to make sure that some of the Ukrainian producers and filmmakers can reach out to the international documentary community. It\u2019s about helping people find some financing for their projects, and obviously, that\u2019s something we usually do at Sunny Side.\u201d<\/p>\n
In keeping with Sunny Side\u2019s theme this year, it will have a specific New Voices pitching session. Under the umbrella of New Voices, not only are there emerging talents\u2014first- and second-time filmmakers and young and inexperienced producers\u2014but also those from underrepresented communities and countries. Amid the pandemic, which curtailed international travel, and therefore impacted and impeded production plans across borders, B\u00e9jot saw a silver lining in how it spurred on more diversity in documentary filmmaking.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne way that [documentary filmmakers] have managed to get around the pandemic is by producing with international partners, maybe just to have a local producer who can bring something to the table and make sure the documentaries could be completed,\u201d says B\u00e9jot. \u201cIt\u2019s really accelerated the movement that was kickstarted by the ideas of diversity and inclusion, to make sure that there are more local voices that are involved.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese days, when you talk to people doing wildlife, for instance, you don\u2019t send a U.K. or French crew to Africa anymore,\u201d B\u00e9jot adds. \u201cYou need to work with local partners, both behind the camera and on-screen. It\u2019s generating new, fresh looks at some of the existing stories that are already well-known. It\u2019s generating more authenticity as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
For this year\u2019s Sunny Side, there will be a delegation from South Africa, as the market has plans to expand connections throughout the African continent and around the world.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have to make sure that we have all of these new voices bring their own projects,\u201d says B\u00e9jot. \u201cThey also join the international documentary community, in order to have more inclusive projects in the genre and to help producers on either side\u2014from the global north or south, any country\u2014to set up more international co-productions.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for the sixth edition of PiXii Festival, it is continuing an evolution it began during the pandemic, placing its immersive experiences in truly immersive venues around the host city of La Rochelle. Last year, the VR experience Lady Sapiens<\/em>, which explores recent scientific discoveries about the roles and realities of women in the Homo sapiens era, was held at the city\u2019s Museum of Natural History. \u201cThat\u2019s really the idea of PiXii Festival this year, to go and meet the audience where they are, at iconic venues in La Rochelle,\u201d says B\u00e9jot, who adds that this year\u2019s three-day event will be open to both the general public and anyone with a badge from Sunny Side and PiXii Festival. \u201cWe notice that it\u2019s very much appreciated by professionals. Because instead of showing their experiences in a nondescript venue, it\u2019s much more relevant, and the feedback from the audience is much better as well.\u201d<\/p>\n B\u00e9jot also notes that this year\u2019s PiXii Festival will be more integrated with Sunny Side. The Canadian Pavilion, for example, will include both traditional linear producers of documentary and people doing immersive AR\/VR from Qu\u00e9bec under the same roof. \u201cThe idea is to mix the two of them together to build bridges between PiXii Festival and Sunny Side. At the end of the day, it\u2019s often the same producers doing both.\u201d<\/p>\n Returning to an in-person event this year after two years online, B\u00e9jot acknowledges that Sunny Side will retain some of the advantageous adaptations from the market\u2019s digital editions\u2014but that he\u2019s keen to once again deliver the benefits of an in-person event. \u201cWhat we\u2019re all looking forward to is the energy, serendipity of markets, the creative discussions, which are much more difficult to have online,\u201d says B\u00e9jot. \u201cWe hope to see that energy that we all know, that only happens at markets.\u201d<\/p>\n To cater to those who cannot attend Sunny Side in person as well as for those on-site who might not be able to attend a particular session of interest, it will have hybrid pitching and Q&A sessions. \u201cThe pitching sessions will be totally hybrid, interactive, some will be live-streamed, with the possibility of asking questions remotely,\u201d says B\u00e9jot. \u201cWe do have a kind of digital extension. What we don\u2019t have, what we don\u2019t want, is an online market. No virtual stands, no market activities. I won\u2019t say it doesn\u2019t work, but it\u2019s much more difficult, and it doesn\u2019t generate the same energy and the same return on investment.\u201d<\/p>\n The 33rd edition of Sunny Side, as it returns to form in La Rochelle, will showcase content across factual genres\u2014and often straddling genres, as B\u00e9jot notes an uptick in documentary titles that blend traditional factual categories together. There\u2019s also a proliferation of new narrative techniques, including animation and docudrama.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s the beauty of documentary; it\u2019s not as well-defined a genre as animation or drama,\u201d says B\u00e9jot, who adds that not only is there an encouraging amount of creativity in documentary filmmaking but more new voices and gender parity than ever.<\/p>\n \u201cForty percent of pitch submissions were first or second films, and there was absolute parity\u2014as many projects directed by women as by men, which was great,\u201d says B\u00e9jot. \u201cIt was great to see across all categories that we have this absolute parity between projects from female directors and male directors. That\u2019s a good sign that the industry is headed in the right direction.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" After two years of taking place online, Sunny Side of the Doc, an international market for documentary and narrative experiences, is returning to La Rochelle, France, for an in-person event that will run from June 20 to 23.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1033,"featured_media":18202,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[68,69],"tags":[1076],"class_list":["post-18201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-profiles","category-top-stories","tag-sunny-side-of-the-doc","pmpro-has-access"],"yoast_head":"\n