the 51st International Leipzig Festival for Documentary and Animated Film came to an end on Sunday with an Audience Day when all of the prize-winning films were shown once more. Festival director Claas Danielsen is very satisfied despite lower admission figures compared to the jubilee edition in 2007:
„Both the cinemas and the digital DOK Market were very well attended. Our special programme „Afghanistan – From Inside“ was practically always sold out, there was an outstanding acceptance of the competition programmes and high praise for the film selection. I am particularly pleased about the fact that the number of the German and international professional visitors stayed stable after the big anniversary and it shows that DOK Leipzig has been firmly established as an international meeting place for the industry. Many guests praised the good atmosphere, the exciting and diverse programme, and the friendly and professional hospitality.“

27,000 people visited the 269 cinema performances and events of the accompanying programme (276 in the previous year) over the 6 days. A total of 315 animated films and documentaries from 49 countries were presented – approx. 14 days of cinema in one piece. At the anniversary edition in 2007, DOK Leipzig had posted 31,000 admissions, and there were around 24,500 spectators in 2006. Moreover, films were viewed 4,000 times in the digital DOK Market. In total, 1,400 professional visitors were accredited from around the world (1,450 in the previous year).

Claas Danielsen gave a sneak preview of the forthcoming festival at the final press conference.
He announced that the 52nd DOK Leipzig, which is to take place from 26.10 – 01.11.2009, will feature an Africa Focus, a special programme on the 20th anniversary of the peaceful revolution, and a retrospective of the work of the great documentary filmmaker Joris Ivens.


DOK Leipzig presentations

Following on straight after the festival, DOK Leipzig is presenting itself this week with a programme at the Verzió Film Festival in Budapest with such films as "Children. As Time Flies" („Kinder. Wie die Zeit vergeht“) by Thomas Heise, „Drifter“ by Sebastian Heider and „The Mother“ by Antoine Cattin and Pavel Kostomarov.

On 13 November, DOK Leipzig will be showing a selection of new Baltic documentaries as part of its partnership with the FilmFestival Cottbus.

Two days later, festival director Claas Danielsen will be in Copenhagen to present the Doc Alliance Award for the first time together with the directors of four other documentary film festivals. Within the framework of Doc Alliance, DOK Leipzig and the partner festivals CPH:DOX (Denmark), Jihlava IDFF, Planete Doc Review (Poland) and Visions du Réel (Switzerland) are promoting the feature-length, artistic author's documentary in Europe through programme exchange, promotional measures and distribution initiatives.