Film. Documentary. Video.
WE STAND WITH UKRAINE 🇺🇦
INVESTIGATIVE WORK
DOCUMENTARY RESEARCH AND INVESTIGATIONS
A&O Buero Film production, The Why Foundation
THE RECYCLING MYTH
Bulgarian research and production services. Undercover investigative documentary. Plastic is a revolutionary material. It’s durable, affordable and has numerous applications. But what makes plastic so great has also pushed our planet to the brink of one of the worst environmental crises in modern history. Directed by Tom Costello and Benedikt Wermter. In co-production with BBC, CBC, DR, NHK, NRK, SVT. RTS, SRF, RSI.
Pulse Films, Channel 4 | UK
David stepped in as assistant producer and researcher on this investigative documentary directed by Tom Costello.
BORDERS
KRO-NCRV | Netherlands
BORDER PATROL
Brandpunt Segment on Bulgarian vigilante paramilitary groups patrolling the Bulgaria-Turkey border.
KRO-NCRV | Netherlands
FATAL TRANSPORT
Brandpunt Reporter Segment on the Bulgarian smuggling network accused of trafficking the 71 refugees found suffocated in refrigerator truck by the side of an Austrian highway. Research and investigative work.
KRO-NCRV | Netherlands
FOREIGN ADOPTIONS – THE BULGARIAN CASE
Investigative Segment on Bulgaria as the biggest European export country of children for adoption. The journey of healthy Bulgarian children from their biological families to foreign adoptions and its underlying economics.
Buzzfeed News | USA
BULGARIAN ARMS TRADE
Research, fixer and investigative work for Buzzfeed News piece on arms trade in the Middle East and the involvement of Bulgarian state of the art - or not so state of the art - arms dealers in it.
Deutsche Welle TV | Germany
THE YOUNG TEACHERS
In the failing Bulgarian school system only 3% of teachers are under 30 and most of them are forced to keep a second job to support themselves: the economic consequences of EU’s poorest state neglecting education are dire.
Deutsche Welle TV | Germany
PRINCE OF ORPHANS
Segment on a Bulgarian priest’s shelter for the disadvantaged. Using record public donations after high-profile, televised clashes with state authorities looking to close down the orphanage, Father Ivan buys up scores of houses in a village in the economically devastated Bulgarian North-west, and begins a large scale socio-economic experiment. Providing shelter is one matter, but giving homeless people a path to ownership and a stake in building their own farm - something entirely different.
Deutsche Welle TV | Germany
THE BANK AND THE PRIME MINISTER
In the face of catastrophic political delegitimization with less than 8% support and the impossibility of making any public appearance without thousands of protesters blocking his escape routes, Prime Minister Oresharski appeared determined to survive all calls for resignation. However, the unexpected collapse of a major Bulgarian bank was to overwhelm his obstinacy. With 2 billion Euros (5% of GDP) in bad loans wiping out the deposits of citizens and State Owned Companies alike, the bank crisis finally bought Mr. Oresharski a shameful place in history as the shortest lived Prime Minister who wouldn’t know when to quit.
Deutsche Welle TV | Germany
ONE FENCE TO STOP THEM ALL
In the early days of the refugee crisis, Bulgaria found itself on the forefront of the problem with a sudden influx of more than 6 thousand refugees entering the country in the fall of 2013. With the Dublin convention requiring Bulgaria to register, care for and integrate new migrants within its own underdeveloped social economy, the government’s choice was to build a wall to keep them out instead.
Ekstra Bladet | Netherlands
EU SUBSIDIES: MILLION EURO RIVER PARK
In the poorest town in the EU, Lom, Bulgaria, a dying economy is relying on European subsidies in order to get a kickstart. The flagship project is the facelift of a park on the Danube at the cost of nearly 4 million Euros. When a visual inventory of the installed park features finds the project short of its proposed budget by a mile, the mayor of Lom is forced to reluctantly admit that much of the subsidy has gone missing.
KRO Brandpunt | Netherlands
FREE MONEY FROM HOLLAND 2
A follow-up segment on a 2013 story about a small village in Bulgaria, where an entire Roma neighborhood has found a way to register for Dutch social assistance using fake documents and addresses in Holland.
KRO Brandpunt | Netherlands
FREE MONEY FROM EUROPE
A road to nowhere, a water park without shade or water, a stadium in an abandoned village, a fancy foreign language program for people who can’t read and write. More than idiomatic oxymorons, these are projects financed by the EU in Bulgaria. Designed to support and grow key European industries, European subsidies soar to the tune of hundreds of billions of Euros per year. But what is the European taxpayer really buying?
Deutsche Welle TV | Germany
THE ART OF PROTEST
The peaceful daily protests against the corruption of the government of Prime Minister Oresharski, featured not just tens of thousands of people blocking the streets of Sofia all summer long, but some of the most inventive and humorous protest performance art seen in Bulgaria. This segment explores some of the creative faces and masks of the political summer of 2013.