Profile: Ilse & Femke van Velzen

Company name:
IFPRODUCTIONS

Company founding date:
March 2003

Place of business:
Amsterdam

Names of founders:
Ilse & Femke van Velzen

Current project:
‘Fighting the silence’, a documentary on sexual violence against women in the Eastern Congo. Two raped women and a rapist tell their heart-wrenching stories. The film will be shown at the 10e Amnesty International Filmfestival in The Hague and Amsterdam from 26 through 30 March.

Source of inspiration:
Human rights and women’s rights in the world

My big idea:
IFPRODUCTIONS wishes to use documentaries to create international awareness of the inequalities in the world.

Favourite tools:
The camera and the power of the film medium

Favourite website:
No specific website, but one that we obviously use a lot is google.nl.

Best advice I ever received:
Everything is possible as long as you believe and you are prepared to put a 100% effort into it.

Biggest blunder:
We learn from and become better through the mistakes we make. We have not made any major blunders yet: what is important is to dare to take risks – otherwise you will never get anywhere. We are not that scared of falling on our faces!

Tips for professional colleagues:
If you believe in your documentary concept, you should keep going until your film is done and your story has been told. You need to be extraordinarily resilient to do so, and you will need to overcome many obstacles along the way; but that will only make the story even more special in the end.

Company website:
www.ifproductions.nl

Company email address:

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