Jensen, who was invited to Iran to hold meetings on documentary international marketing at the Cinema Verite Festival, said that EDF will support the development and distribution of documentaries on Iran in Europe during the first meeting.
EDF has over 1000 members from 60 countries that are mainly from Europe, Jensen explained about the network activities at the meeting.
He said that holding meetings, workshops and attending different festivals outside Europe is one of the main activities of the network. EDN also informs about possibilities for funding, financing, development, co-production, distribution and collaboration across borders.
The EDN also facilitate the access of members to archives for research via specific agreements, he added.
Jensen added that the membership in EDN is not limited to producers of documentaries, but other crew members associated with the documentary film industry can apply for membership.
EDN also holds video conferences in different countries and documentarians can actively participate in these conferences, so they will know whether financiers want to support their projects or not, he mentioned.
He said that the network is a shortcut for those film directors who have not had the chance to be introduced.
Jensen stressed on their activities in Asian countries saying that via the network, documentarians can get feedback on their productions in different countries.
The view of the documentarian is more important than the subject matter of the film, something which makes many Iranian documentaries interesting, he concluded.
The European Documentary Network facilitates interaction through workshops, seminars and conferences as well as through the two indispensable publications, DOX magazine and the EDN Financing Guide.
EDN started in September 1996 as a documentary organization for filmmakers, producers, production companies, distributors, associations, film institutions and boards, universities, festivals, broadcasters and film and television agencies.
The 4th Cinéma Vérité Festival was held from November 8 to 12 in Tehran. It is the main documentary film festival in Iran. The festival combined national and international program sections with a documentary market and a number of interesting side events.
SB/YAW
END
MNA