The Freedom To Speak (f2s) forum, which gave filmmakers an opportunity to express their views during February's Berlinale, is also to be created at the forthcoming Tribeca (May 3-11) and Cannes (May 14-25) film festivals.

"Our goal is to bridge the gap of communication between France, Germany and the US through an international community of filmmakers", say the f2s organisers.

The project, whose production is being coordinated in Germany by Vulkan Film's Boris Keidies and StoryLux's Simon Chappuzeau, plans to station a Speakers Corner with a camera crew at 4 White Street & West Broadway Loft 2A, and two roaming camera crews will be present throughout the festival and at evening events to gather opinions.

In addition, festival participants are being invited to submit "freestyle" shorts or video footage to incorporate into the film which would be shown in a rough cut version at the end of the festival.

Simon Chappuzeau told Screendaily that filmmakers Volker Schloendorff, Adolphas Mekas and Jim Jarmusch have already expressed interest in being involved in the "f2s-tribeca" film which will focus this time round on "a critique of the power of media and how filmmakers define themselves and their responsibility as well as looking at the reasons for their speechlessness vis-à-vis the war".

Another f2s team would then continue gathering material in Cannes to screen a "work in progress" of material from Tribeca, Cannes and Berlin on the final day of the festival.

In addition, a website and editorial team will be serving as a connecting point between the filmmakers so that they can discuss and work together on each other's contributions.

Over 100 filmmakers and festival guests including Dustin Hoffman, Eytan Fox, George Clooney, Jack Valenti, John Hurt and Minnie Driver were involved in the Berlinale's collaborative effort which was shown in a rough cut on the last day of the festival (Feb 16) in the Panorama section.

Two weeks later, the 70-minute documentary f2s-berlinale was aired by WDR's Third regional channel to over 100,000 viewers.

"The positive feedback that followed [the broadcast] encouraged us to expand the project to a global stage," the organisers explain.