This Saturday I woke up with a very open-minded. At least I tried. I expected to spend all that morning in the theatre of the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona (CCCB) where an atypical audiovisual sample took place.
It was the twentieth edition of Miniput, a festival which presents the most interesting new international television formats. There were different programmes shown previously in the latest International Public Television Screening Conference (INPUT), organised in Helsinki in May. A meeting to share ideas between broadcasters and journalists.
The first example got me shocked. A young woman naked in front of two men who were looking at her and talking about their impressions. It is a Danish programme called Blachman and it was broadcasted in the public television, as impossible as it seems.
One of this men is the presenter, the famous musician Thomas Blachman -also part of the Danish jury of X-Factor. His male partner changes in every episode. A total of six acclimated on a dark studio with a spotlight and two design chairs.
But the most weird part of it were the deep thoughts raised in their conversation. Sexual doubts and problems related to the marriage and the fatherhood were a couple of examples.
During the sesion the public had the opportunity to ask some questions to the author of this show, Torben Steno, through a problematic Skype connection. This journalist presented his work as “art” and his words had a lot of controversy. He also explained the attacks that received his team around the world, even before of its premiere.
TV Programme Doorway to Adulthood
But that was just one of the most surrealistic examples of the day. The second sample was Doorway to Adulthood, a Japanese format to talk with teens about sex. It has a strange television set where the presenters explain their sexual experiences to the audience. But this place seems a typical space of a Spanish cooking TV programme. All with a manga aesthetic.
There is also a curious doctor, called Condom Master, who tries to inform to the spectators about how they should use the main contraception methods. It seems more like a comedy programme, but in Japan it is understood as an informative product. All the young participants talk on the street with the face and the voice distorted.
There were many of this TV programmes, but these two called my attention specially. Maybe because they present controversial issues in a different way. Without doubts, these formats are unthinkable in any of the Spanish or Catalan channels. And that is a pity.
Cooltural BCN 