Activities Report > 2003-2004 Activities Report >

Report on the First Year of Activities

The first year of operation of the Documentary Network was characterized by measures relating to the founding of the organization: its incorporation, the adoption of a general regulation, initial funding and setting up a board of directors.

Discussions with the main professional associations members of our Board held during our monthly meetings have allowed us to establish ongoing dialogue between them, to develop a global vision of the state of documentary, to set out action priorities and to decide upon joint demands to the institutions.

We organized a number of meetings with institutions and organizations to introduce the Network and promote the concerns of its board. To this end, meetings were held with SODEC, Telefilm Canada, the National Film Board, Société Radio-Canada, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Astral-Canal D, UQAM, DOC, Hot Docs International Documentary Festival and the États généraux du documentaire in Lussas, France.

The Network took action on several issues, including:

• Triggering funding for feature documentaries by a distributor (meetings with SODEC and Telefilm);
• The presence of documentary on television (meetings with the Canadian Television Fund [CTF], SRC, CBC and Astral);
• The defence of credits allocated to documentary (with CTV, the CTF, Canadian Heritage and the Ministère de la Culture et des Communications du Québec);
• The defence of credits allocated to the Canadian Independent Film and Video Fund (with Canadian Heritage);
• The presence of arts and culture documentaries on Radio-Canada (press conference on March 17, 2004);
• Training for documentary filmmakers (with UQAM and as a member of the Documentary steering committee of the Cultural Human Resources Council of Canada);
• Defining reality television (establishment of a working committee and request to the SODEC for a financial contribution to our work);
• The creation of new documentary awards (Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television) and the protection of existing awards (Jutra Awards).

In addition, the Network was responsible for organizing Forum 2003, held in November 2003 during the Rencontres internationales du documentaire de Montréal (RIDM). The Forum examined the issue of theatrical distribution for documentaries. More than 150 professionals participated, including 18 national and international panelists and speakers. A report on the event is available on the Network’s Web site.

Attached is a detailed list of our activities during the 2003-2004 fiscal year.