“Best Documentary”

“Best Director”

“Best Cinematography”

★★★★★

“Ora is truly deserving of every accolade it receives. ”

Éric Dargent, Jérôme Bonellli and Benoît Moreau: three lives, each their own handicap but more importantly one commun passion: surfing. A documentary taking us along the history of these three peoples discovering how they overcome theirs obstacles through ocean. This hunger of constantly moving forward is going to take the three of them to Tahiti to share their experiences, their knowledge of prosthesis fit for the purpose and rise awareness to make accessible to others!

Let’s start off by saying this is not the first film we’ve seen from director Michel Garcia, and it’s not the first award we’ve given him! Garcia follows up his previous film ‘Believe’ with the truly powerful and meticulous documentary film ‘Ora’. We couldn’t be happier to see the progression in Garcia’s work and the opportunity to see this incredible film. Ora is truly deserving of every accolade it receives.

The decision to focus on not one but three surfers was a triumph in itself. Most filmmakers may play it safe and find one subject to focus their story on, each surfer being fully deserving of that distinction. Each of their stories are remarkable and worth telling, but Garcia crafts each of their stories into each other and creates a bond between them which is truly inspiring and helps to expand on the core of the story. It’s a mammoth undertaking and Garcia has created a documentary that won’t put off audiences simply because of subtitles, this deserves to be seen by audiences around the world.

With any documentary filmmaking, the editing is a major part of the process as you’re working with so much material. In this case it seems Garcia has captured enough to make this a two hour feature. However, the run time keeps the pace of the film going and engaging. The logistics in working with so much footage and assets is a huge accomplishment which can easily scale out of control. The clear direction and creativity shines here as it’s clear that Garcia knew the film he wanted to make.

The music really stands out and makes the dramatic stories all the more memorable. The modern style of tracks used helps to give this film a distinct look and style which matches Gacia’s direction.

Capturing the film is Garcia and Mathilde Saint-Arroman who don’t just film in the background, they take hold of the scenes by creating incredibly cinematic shots which are not for the inexperienced filmmaker. There is a huge mix of filming styles here from fly on the wall coverage, interviews, underwater scenes, aerial shots and surfing in the sea. This is something only an experienced pair of camera operators would attempt, which we expect pushed them creatively. The visuals really stand out in this film and proves the level of experience and ability Garcia and co. have.

Our subjects Éric Dargent, Jérôme Bonellli and Benoît Moreau are all great on camera. This isn’t something that should be overlooked, as not everyone can truly be themselves on camera. We would think that each of them had a good relationship with Garcia and co. so that the filmmaking process went smoothly. The extensive visuals and unique shots shows that each of them were willing to try ideas Garcia had and the film certainly benefits because of it.

Ora has a powerful message behind it and is something that needed to be captured and we’re lucky to have such a well-made film to explore these stories which we hope audiences from around the world get to see…

— APEX Film Awards