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The documentary and IDA are on an important threshold. The docu­mentary form is in the forefront of more minds, on more television sets, in more theatres, and more powerful than at any previous time. As a result, we have before us great opportunity at IDA. As the organization that is most closely identified with this genre, we are at the center of the profusion of non-fiction work. And it is incumbent on IDA that we use our voice to further support, promote and preserve the documentary. Of course, it's unrealistic to assume that IDA can or should do all the work necessary in this field alone

There's a new festival in town! It all started in November 1995 when Lyall Bush, with the support of the Washington Commission for the Humanities, decided to take on the monumental task of creating the first film festival in the Northwest dedicated solely to the genre of documentary film. In a city where there are film festivals for al most every ethnic group and style of filmmaking, the concern was: would a new festival be just another face in the crowd? January 1996 found Lyall and a small group of volunteers with a budget that would make any producer cringe. They began the task of looking

The worldwide proliferation of new documentaries has meant that festival programmers today have increased riches to draw upon, in their bid for relevance and audiences. Some recently established festivals specialize or emphasize a narrow spectrum from the annual avalanche of new documentaries, e.g., the Human Rights Watch International Film Festival in New York, which in June concluded its seventh annual event. But "narrow" need not mean cramped or confined: indeed, the selection of human rights films is broad (41 titles from 15 nations). Human rights films seem to increase each year: only

EDITOR'S NOTE: Alan Rosenthal received the 1990 IDA Preservation and Scholarship Award, in recognition of landmark achievements in authoring and editing numerous books on the documentary; his most recent volume is Writing Docudrama (1994). A director/producer/writer of documentaries, based in Israel, his Out of the Ashes (1983) received Peabody and Christopher awards. From his association with Abba Eban on that film, he obtained assignment as writer/director for Israel: A Nation is Born (1989). When I asked Alan if he had some new thoughts about doc­umentary to share with ID readers, he

Changes in the media and the culture have brought about greater use of home movies in documentary today. We witness: a rise in appreciation of independent artistic expression by media artists who originate on small gauge and an increase in advocacy for them and the home moviemaker; the co-optation of artists' expression by the mainstream media—anyone who loves experimental cinema can testify to the continuous referencing, plagiarism, appropriation or excoriation of artists' work in commercial music videos and advertisements; the desire for greater diversity in representation—today's producers

Talking with Toni Treadway recently, about her article to appear in this issue, really got my mind stirring. Toni's a thinker, a wanderer, who likes to probe the implication of something rather than be content with mere information. Such folks are stimulating, refreshing, challenging. "What about funding?" she asked, as though I might have the answer. "I mean, with PBS and NEA under fire, what 's the implication of turning over funding to organizations that don't want to pay for the kind of serious research that a good documentary needs?" Certainly we're already seeing a marked drop in per

You know what? It is the 8mm movie that will save us. Blind as we are, it will take us a few more years to see it, but some people see it already.... They see the beauty of the sunsets taken by a Bronx woman when she passed through the Arizona desert; travelogue footage, awkward footage that will suddenly sing with an unexpected rapture; the Brooklyn Bridge footage... the Orchard Street footage—time is laying a veil of poverty over them. Jonas Mekas, April 18, 1963 The big screen or mainstream media has created a center outside of which persevere other forms of filmic art and expression

Now in its 19th year, the Asian American International Film Festival took place July 19-28 at the Alliance Française, a New York City cultural landmark. Produced annually by Asian Cinevision, a national not-for-profit media arts center headquartered in New York's Chinatown, the AAI FF screens new films by or about Asians and Asian­ Americans. Programs later tour to Miami, Washington, DC, Philadelphia, Honolulu, other cities. Of AAIFF's fifty titles, a significant minority were documentaries. The Gate of Heavenly Peace (88 min.), by Richard Gordon and Carma Hinton, about the Tiananmen massacre

Two of Chicago's international film fests—the 30 year-old Chicago International Film Festival and the 16 year-old Chicago Lesbian & Gay International Film festival—pre­sented their annual ration of documentaries last fall. Although neither festival signals any discernible curatorial vision in its documentary picks, both consistently screen a notable spectrum of titles. Second only to the older San Francisco fest, the 10-day Chicago Lesbian and Gay International Film Festival is run by Chicago Filmmakers, a non-profit cinematheque and co-op. Executive director Brenda Webb spotted one striking

This year, there were 1,597 documentary professionals from 34 countries attending the seventh issue of Sunny Side of the Doc. The growing number of participants (1,420 in 1995) might suggest that documentary is doing well; yet, comments from independent filmmakers and producers suggest some mixed feelings about the state of creativity, independence—and above all—qual­ity. In France, 739 hours of documentary were produced in 1995, compared to 389 the previous year; still, filmmakers worry that documentary production is driven by the targeted needs of the TV channels and, in the process, losing