A Distant Soil by Colleen Doran

Many comic industry documentaries coming out, with subjects ranging from Warren Ellis to Jeff Jones, scrambling for cash, raising nickles and dimes on Kickstarter.

The Ford Foundation has just announce that they are offering up $50 million dollars in grant money to documentary filmmakers.

The Challenge

With the explosion of digital media production over the past decade, there is far more film and video content available from which audiences can choose. But it remains a challenge for most documentary filmmakers to find support—and audiences—for works that address social issues in meaningful and compelling ways. JustFilms seeks to support courageous filmmakers to complete their important works and to help them reach a growing audience of engaged and socially conscious viewers.

What We’re Doing

We believe that visual narratives play an indispensable role in the search for justice in society. They inspire imagination and new understanding, encourage civic dialogue and engagement, and showcase the rich diversity of the human experience. JustFilms supports works that educate, motivate and create positive change in people’s lives by conveying stories that have the power to transform how we think and act.
We seek to:

* Enlarge the conversation on issues of importance by investing in documentary films that capture people’s imaginations and engage them in shaping their futures.
* Expand the community of independent documentary filmmakers and lift the voices of new and innovative filmmakers from around the world.
* Help filmmakers craft important stories, and also develop strategies for finding and building audiences across a variety of platforms.

New Ideas that Expand Horizons

Remaining open to new ideas wherever they may emerge, JustFilms will devote a third of its grants to projects that we discover through an ongoing open application process. This path will help ensure JustFilms stays tuned to creative and innovative trends and aware of emerging artists and ideas from around the world. You can read more about the inquiry process here.

The $50 million will be doled out over the next five years. Not sure whether all comic history documentaries meet the Ford Foundation goals, but I would be interested in seeing something about civil rights through the eyes of cartoonists, the gay rights movement as lived by people like Howard Cruse, creator rights as human rights, and the feminist experience via comics.

The trailer for the Jeff Jones documentary:

Trailer for the Warren Ellis documentary: