The Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Film Festival’s Toronto Documentary Forum (TDF) will welcome five projects as part of The Good Pitch at Hot Docs, inpartnership with the Channel 4 Britdoc Foundation and Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program and also supported by the Fledgling Fund and Working Films.

The Good Pitch was held for the first time in summer 2008 at Oxford-based Britdoc; this is the first year the Pitch will run in North America.

From 150 applications, organisers selected five filmmaking teams to pitch their social issue films and associated outreach campaigns. The audience for the live pitches on May 7 will include human rights organisations, foundations, NGOs, campaigners and members of the press.

The five projects and their subjects are Sean & Andrea Fine’s Resilient (signs of hope in women’s stories); Beth Murphy’s The Promise Of Freedom (a young American aid worker in Iraq); Mona Nicoara’s Our School (Roma children in Transylvania); Nic Dunlop’s Burma Soldier (a Burmese soldier who becomes a pro-democracy activist); and Marco Williams’ Untitled Immigration Project (a community torn apart by immigration issues).

‘The TDF is delighted to host the very first North American Good Pitch - it’s a perfect complement to our commitment to ambitious, global documentary filmmaking,’ TDF Director Elizabeth Radshaw said.

Katie Bradford of the Britdoc Foundation, said: ‘The span of human rights stories in this line-up is very exciting - these stories will take us to Burma, Iraq, Mexico, Romania and America to put the spotlight on issues such as immigration, education and the struggle for democracy.’

‘The Good Pitch facilitates early and important linkages between filmmakers and leading NGOs, leveraging the power of storytelling to create social change,’ added Cara Mertes, director of the Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program.

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