Australian International Documentary Conference 2023

Overview

All truth, no fiction: if that's how you like your movies, then you'll want to hit up the Australian International Documentary Conference when it returns to Melbourne for 2023 from Sunday, March 5–Wednesday, March 8. Each year, this celebration of factual filmmaking hits up the Australian Centre for the Moving Image in Federation Square to talk about the format and screen flicks — and its 2023 lineup is mighty impressive.

This year's Oscar-nominees for Best Documentary Feature are a big highlight in a variety of ways, including three of the directors getting chatting — and responding to AIDC's 2023 theme 'agents of change. So, you can hear from Fire of Love filmmaker Sara Dosa about how she made one of the best movies of 2022; from Canadian helmer Daniel Roher, who'll talk through compelling political doco Navalny; and from Indian director Shaunak Sen about the Cannes and Sundance award-winning All That Breathes.

Some sessions are only for conference delegates, with pass details varying. But there's also a number of public screenings that you can snap up individual tickets to, including of fellow Academy Award contender All the Beauty and the Bloodshed — the 2022 Venice Film Festival Golden Lion-winning documentary about queer artist Nan Goldin, her life and career, and her battle against the billionaire Sackler family.

Or, you can check out wild New Zealand doco Mister Organ, which tells a tale so chaotic it can only be true, and hear from filmmaker David Farrier about the whole ordeal captured in the film.

You Can Go Now, which explores Richard Bell art and career alongside the history of First Nations activism over the past 50 years, is also on the jam-packed lineup.