SMK Factory is an independent audiovisual production company formed by professionals in the film industry and in particular documentary film. The collective project was born in 2009, gaining its current form in 2019.
We believe in a cinema of social impact and this has always pushed us to grasp the urgency of storytelling and the need to share the meaning that the stories of our films express.
For us, producing a film means focusing on how our works are produced, made and distributed. We work to build community around the film and the story it tells, we set up crowdfunding campaigns and widespread distribution in the territories in order to nurture social and political dynamics.
This model, which sees popular co-production and distribution as two sides of the same coin, has allowed us to make 10 films in 11 years of our group's life, giving national relevance and diffusion to stories that otherwise would not have been told.
SMK Factory produced different movies with crowdfunding campains after “Tomorrow’s Land”: “Kosovo vs Kosovo” (2012), “Una follia effimera” (2012), “Green Lies” (2014), “Vite al Centro” (2014), “Quale Petrolio?” (2016), “The Harvest” (2017). “The Milky Way” (2020).
Nicola Zambelli (1981) is an Italian documentaries, reportages and artistic videos filmmaker. Graduated in Hermeneutic Philosophy with a thesis on the narrative identity of the Self in a comparison between philosophy, photography and documentary cinema, he obtains a Master in documentary at the IED in Milan. He is involved in directing, photography and camera.
He is one of the founders of SMK Factory, an independent production company with whom he has made several documentaries awarded at international festivals and screened all over the world. SMK is the creator of the independent distribution portal OpenDDB, a multilingual digital platform inspired by the open source philosophy that promotes documentary cinema and independent culture through VOD and non-theatrical circuitry, collaborating with cultural associations and independent cinemas.
He works on educational projects in the schools with which he wins the first prize in 2019 and a special mention at the “International audiovisual awards” on the days of the 76th Venice International Film Festival.
In May 2020 he won a special mention at the "EVA - excellence in visual anthropology awards" conferred by the Ethnocineca of Vienna for the film "Cracks" and the "Best Performance" awarded by the "Nil Art Gallery" of New York with the short film "The awakening hour".
Between November 2020 and January 2021 he realizes in the C.AR.M.E., Bunkervik and Nuovo Eden's spaces in Brescia his first personal multimedia exhibition "What makes us weaker,makes us closer" around the themes of pandemic and civil solidarity during the first lock-down with which he wins the prize "resilient communities" and the audience prize at the "Visioni urbane di Bologna" festival.
His latest documentary film "Sarura - the future is an unknown place" was selected in 2020 at the "Impact days" of the Human Rights Festival FIFDH in Geneva and at the "Industry days" of the Milan Festival "Visions from the World".