Screen Locarno 2015

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festival del film Locarno 2015

CHEVALIER A

B U D D Y

a film by

M O V I E

Athina Rachel Tsangari

W I T H O U T

T H E

B U D D I E S

FESTIVAL DEL FILM

LOCARNO 2015

PIAZZA GRANDE

JOHANNES KRISCH CORINNA HARFOUCH BIRGIT MINICHMAYR

JACK POET LOVER KILLER

A FILM BY ELISABETH SCHARANG

Screenings

World Sales

August 7 – Press Screening: 23:00 (Kursaal) August 8 – Public Screening: 23:30 (Piazza Grande, World Premiere) August 9 – Industry Screening: 16:45 (Rialto 1)

Picture Tree International GmbH Zur Börse 12 / 10247 Berlin / Germany E-Mail: yuan@picturetree-international.com Phone: +49.30-420 82 48-0 www.picturetree-international.com

Attending

Andreas Rothbauer Mobile: +49.151-544 58 921 Moritz kleine Bornhorst Mobile: +49.176-814 38 759

Press Contact

Michaela Englert E-Mail: englert@thimfilm.at Mobile: +43.699-194 63 634

Locarno Film Festival UK office MBI, Zetland House 5-25 Scrutton Street, London EC2A 4HJ Tel: +44 (0) 20 3033 4267 US office 8581 Santa Monica Blvd, #707, West Hollywood, CA 90069 E-mail: firstname.lastname@screendaily.com (unless stated) Editorial Supplement editor Sarah Cooper Editor Matt Mueller +44 (0) 20 3033 2944 Contributors Martin Blaney, Melanie Goodfellow, Wendy Mitchell, Louise Tutt US editor Jeremy Kay +1 310 922 5908 jeremykay67@gmail.com News editor Michael Rosser +44 (0) 20 3033 2720 Asia editor Liz Shackleton, lizshackleton@gmail.com Reviews editor and chief film critic Finn Halligan +44 7798 571 270 Group head of production and art Mark Mowbray +44 (0) 20 3033 2817 Group art director, MBI Peter Gingell +44 (0) 20 3033 4203 peter.gingell@mb-insight.com Chief reporter Andreas Wiseman +44 (0) 20 3033 2848 Reporter and web assistant Tom Grater +44 (0) 20 8102 0841 Contributing editors Sarah Cooper, John Hazelton, Wendy Mitchell Contributing reporter Ian Sandwell Advertising and publishing Commercial director Nadia Romdhani +44 (0) 20 7391 4518 Sales manager Scott Benfold +44 (0) 20 7391 4533 International account manager Pierre-Louis Manes +44 (0) 20 8102 0862 UK, France, Spain, Portugal, South Africa, Middle East, Latin America, Australia, New Zealand Scott Benfold +44 (0) 20 7391 4533 Germany, Scandinavia, Benelux, eastern Europe Gunter Zerbich +44 (0) 20 3033 2930 Italy, Asia, India Ingrid Hammond +39 05 7829 8768 ingridhammond@mac.com VP business development, North America Nigel Daly +1 323 654 2301 / 213 447 5120 nigeldalymail@gmail.com US sales and business development executive Nikki Tilmouth +1 323 868 7633 nikki.screeninternational@gmail.com Production manager Jonathon Cooke +44 (0) 20 3033 4296 jonathon.cooke@mb-insight.com Festival and events manager Jessica Stacey +44 (0) 20 3033 2870 jessica.stacey@mb-insight.com Group commercial director, MBI Alison Pitchford +44 (0) 20 3033 2949 alison.pitchford@mb-insight.com Subscription customer service +44 (0) 1604 828 706 help@subscribe.screendaily.com Sales administrator Justyna Zieba +44 (0) 20 3033 2694 justyna.zieba@mb-insight.com Chief executive, MBI Conor Dignam +44 (0) 20 3033 2717 conor.dignam@mb-insight.com Screen International is part of Media Business Insight Ltd (MBI), also publisher of Broadcast and shots

Art and labour Once again, Locarno Film Festival promises another impressively savvy and diverse programming mix, representing all corners of cinema: from smart entertainment as demonstrated by Jonathan Demme’s opening night film Ricki And The Flash (which will premiere on the magnificent Piazza Grande) to provocative, challenging work from across Asia, South America, Africa and the Middle East as well as Europe and the US. Carlo Chatrian’s line-up shows the Locarno festival director has his finger on the pulse.

From Sam Peckinpah to Marco Bellocchio, the always-brilliant retrospectives deliver further enticement, and the prospect of Michael Cimino descending on this gorgeous lakeside setting to receive the Pardo d’Onore Swisscom will be a thrill for any cineaste. The festival’s vibrant Industry Days, too, run by Nadia

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2 Beyond borders

16 The Grande reveal

Locarno’s annual co-production lab will this year shine the spotlight on up-and-coming film-makers from the Maghreb region

Arthouse giants and Hollywood blockbusters jostle for space on the Piazza Grande and in International Competition

4 Open doors unlocked

20 First look at Israel

The 12 projects selected for this year’s Open Doors range from an Algerian mythological horror to a Libya-set feature documentary

Locarno’s post-production section has undergone a makeover, with a new name and a shift in regional focus

10 All voices welcome

Locarno 2015 will honour a select group of actors and film-makers, from Edward Norton to Marco Bellocchio

Locarno’s artistic director Carlo Chatrian tells how the festival gets its balance of diverse programming just right

14 Friends in high places Locarno’s sixth annual Industry Days is bigger than ever, thanks to the latest rollout of networking initiatives

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Dresti and her colleagues, continues to make Locarno a key destination for the industry.

Kudos to Chatrian as well for refusing to bow to pressure when a group of signatories petitioned the festival to withdraw the Israeli cinema focus for this year’s work-in-progress showcase First Look (formerly Carte Blanche). As he points out, the Israeli film industry is in a period of dynamism, with the country’s filmmakers exploring the difficult issues surrounding the political landscape with verve and rigour. While they benefit from the country’s generous funding bodies, and therefore indirectly the regime, surely their dissenting voices are to be encouraged, not stifled.

In standing firm, Chatrian embodies the artistic freedom that all film festivals should fight to deliver.

Matt Mueller, editor

22 A wild bunch

24 Forces of nurture Locarno continues its quest to support the next generation of directors, critics and now industry professionals August 2015 Screen International 1

Locarno overview

Beyond borders Locarno’s annual co-production lab will this year shine the spotlight on up-and-coming film-makers from the Maghreb region. Martin Blaney reports

Le Sacrifié

Pagan Magic

‘‘A

lot has happened since we last focused on this region in 2005,” says Ananda Scepka, head of Open Doors, about the decision to return to the Maghreb — Morocco, Algeria, Libya and Tunisia — for the 13th edition of Locarno’s co-production lab (August 8-11), which supports and highlights filmmakers from regions where independent cinema is vulnerable.

“The context has changed since 2005 and there is a new generation of film-makers emerging in these countries,” adds Scepka, pointing out that “the events commonly known as the Arab Spring have left their mark on each of these countries’ film industries in different ways”.

Of the Maghreb countries, 2 Screen International August 2015

Aller Simple

Morocco has the most established cinema exhibition and funding structure, although the Tunisian film industry has been on the rise since 2011 thanks to the establishment of a national CNC film fund in 2012.

Scepka adds that the whole region has been affected over the last decade by “the changes brought about by digital media, which have provided the chance to explore new formats and access tools for film-making”.

Back in 2005, Libya was not represented in the line-up of Open Doors projects, but 10 years later Libya-born, Cape Town-based filmmaker Khalid Shamis will present his political thriller The Colonel’s Stray Dogs, which explores his homeland’s past, present and future

through the eyes of some of those in charge and under threat.

“It’s exciting to have Libya on our Open Doors map,” says Scepka,who took over as head of Open Doors last year from Martina Malacrida.

“Libya is probably the place where the greatest changes have taken place. Previously there wasn’t any film culture, but 2012 saw the first film festival being staged and the new-found freedom of expression has really opened up something.”

Some 120 projects were submitted from the region, which were then whittled down to the final 12: four from Tunisia and Algeria, three from Morocco and one from Libya.

The directors and producers of the projects will attend the four-day

event, backed by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) of Switzerland’s Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, which aims to bring them together with European co-production partners through a series of round-table seminars, meetings and workshops.

While veteran Moroccan director Hassan Legzouli will be presenting his new project Dieu Reconnaitra Les Siens to potential co-production partners, Open Doors’ 2015 line-up has a much higher proportion of projects from first or second-time directors than in previous editions.

One of those debutants is Algeria’s Amin Sidi-Boumédiene, whose first feature Le Sacrifié focuses on the collective trauma experienced by his www.screendaily.com

nation during the civil war of the 1990s. Tunisia’s Mohamed Ben Attia, meanwhile, plans to make his feature directorial debut with Inhebek Hedi, a story of love at first sight set in post-revolutionary Tunisia.

Despite the challenges facing women directors in the Maghreb countries, two of the 12 selected projects are directed by female filmmakers: Aller Simple, the debut feature from Tunisia’s Nadia Rais, who has won several prizes for her animated shorts, and historical drama Le Fort Des Fous, the second feature from Algerian film-maker Narimane Mari.

Scepka notes, however, that women are better represented in the line-up as producers, with Nomadis Images’ Dora Bouchoucha and Lina Chaabane overseeing Inhebek Hedi; Corinne Castel co-producing Le Fort Des Fous with Narimane Mari; Louise Bellicaud’s new Paris-based company In Vivo Films handling Pagan Magic, the feature debut of Morocco’s Fyzal Boulifa; and Francesca Duca’s Le Moindre Geste set to produce first-timer Alaa Eddine Aljem’s Saint Inconnu.

challenging themes Since its launch in 2003, Open Doors has cast the spotlight on directors and producers from countries and regions in the south and east where cinema faces particular challenges, including Cuba, Argentina, Southeast Asia, India and — in 2014 — Sub-Saharan Africa.

“As always, there are some general themes that occupy film-makers in every country but they take on another meaning in this regional context, especially when one is speaking about gender-related issues and the place of women in society,” Scepka says of this year’s entries. “We have noticed film-makers addressing the emancipation of the individual, both male and female, and the relationship to one’s own [recent] history is a particularly dominant theme in Algeria. At the same time, there’s a different take here on the subject of migration compared to the rest of the African continent, with storylines focusing on the diaspora and its relationship to the country of origin.”

On the back of its partnerships with Ateliers du Cinéma Européen (ACE), European Audiovisual www.screendaily.com

OPEN DOORS 2015: FOCUS ON THE MAGHREB

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Entrepreneurs (EAVE) and Cannes’ Producers Network, around 50 international producers are expected to attend Open Doors, taking part in one-to-one meetings with the representatives of the 12 selected projects, over the course of two days.

EAVE producers confirmed to attend include Karim Aitouna (Haut les Mains, France), Milena Dzambasovic (This and That, Serbia), James Baillie (Bridge + Tunnel Productions, UK-France), Sébastien Haguenauer (10:15 Productions, France), Talal Al-Muhanna (Linked Productions, Kuwait), Palmyre Badinier (Les Films de Zayna, France) and Alexandre Charlet (Les Films du Cygne, France).

“This partnership has proven to be extremely popular among our producers,” says Kristina Trapp, CEO of the Luxembourg-based producers training programme. “They appreciate the opportunity to discover new talents and projects from the regions in focus.”

Breeding success Open Doors success stories include Burkina Faso film-maker Michel K Zongo, who picked up co-production partners at Open Doors in 2012 for his documentary Faso Fani, La Fin Du Reve, and presented the completed film — The Siren Of Faso Fani

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‘The events of the Arab Spring have left their mark on each of these countries’ film industries in different ways’ Ananda Scepka, Locarno Film Festival

(La Sirene De Faso Fani) — in the Berlinale’s Forum last February.

Denis Vaslin of Rotterdam-based Volya Films notes that Open Doors’ unique selling point is its specificity and he is considering becoming a co-producer on Armenian director and Rijksakademie graduate Nora Martirosyan’s feature debut Territoria, one of Open Doors’ 2013 South Caucasus projects.

He says: “There are many co-production markets these days — every festival seems to need to have one.

But Locarno’s winning formula for Open Doors is that it focuses on a particular region.”

Georgian producer-director Rusudan Pirveli, meanwhile, used the South Caucasus focus as a launch

pad for her second feature project Sleeping Lessons, footage of which was shown in a works-in-progress showcase during the industry programme of Odessa International Film Festival in July.

Fellow Georgian director Alexander Kvatashidze expects to deliver his documentary See You In Chechnya in August after completing the post-production in Paris. Recalling his time in Locarno two years ago, Kvatashidze says it was “a wonderful experience”.

“I had 20 one-to-one meetings with different people who were interested in my project. What was really helpful were the prizes I won — one from Open Doors and one from ARTE — that allowed me to finish the shooting.”

“We received very positive feedback from last year’s project representatives about their experiences of Open Doors,” says Scepka. “They say the producers come to the meetings very well prepared and are really interested in the potential of being a partner.”

Latest additions This year will see a new collaboration with the first pan-Arab independent studio umbrella MAD Solutions for an interactive exchange on different sources of financing in Europe and the Arab world.

MAD Solutions will also be sponsoring a prize that offers marketing and P&A support for Arab territories to one of the Open Doors projects.

Another innovation will be the presentation of a prize for development or post-production by a new EU-funded initiative, Investing in Culture & Art in the South Mediterranean. That will be in addition to the main Open Doors award of $52,000 (CHF50,000) and two further development awards from CNC for $10,900 (¤10,000) and ARTE for $6,500 (¤6,000).

Three of the producers of this year’s Open Doors projects will also have the chance to participate in Cannes’ Producers Network in 2016.

Still, for Scepka, 2015 is about building on the hard work of previous editions. “It’s all about consolidation and placing special emphasis on the workshops to make sure they are tailor-made to the needs of the s particular projects.” ■ August 2015 Screen International 3

LOCARNO OPEN DOORS

OPEN DOORS UNLOCKED The 12 projects selected for this year’s Open Doors range from an Algerian mythological horror to a Libya-set feature documentary. Louise Tutt profiles the film-makers and their projects L’Amour Des Hommes Tun- Fr Dir/scr Mehdi Ben Attia Prod co 4A4 Productions L’Amour Des Hommes is the story of young photographer Amel, happily married to Nabil, with whom she lives in a lovely apartment in a working-class district of Tunis. Successful in her profession, Amel often puts herself in her pictures in a series of fictional poses. When Nabil is killed in an accident, Amel claws her way out of her grief by turning the lens away from herself and on to street

Aller Simple Tun Dir/scr Nadia Rais Prod co Propaganda Productions This animated project will be Nadia Rais’ debut feature following a trio of award-winning shorts including L’Mrayet, which screened at Annecy International Animated Film Festival. Aller Simple is a loose adaptation of The Epistle Of Forgiveness by the 10th century blind Syrian poet and philosopher Abul ‘Ala Al-Ma’arri. A graduate of Tunis’s Institute of Fine Arts, Rais draws parallels between the chaotic time in which the poet lived when the ‘crime’ of free thought was punishable by death and the challenge faced today by many living in ArabMuslim societies.

Aller Simple is the story of three very different people, each on a journey to a new world and either an earthly or heavenly paradise:

4 Screen International August 2015

children. When she becomes increasingly attracted to one, as well as her colleague Sami, Amel finds she is at odds with her conservative middle-class Muslim family. Director Mehdi Ben Attia asks whether

Zied, a young artist who is in flight from his country and the stultifying dogma of his elders; the Sheikh, who believes he will enter Paradise and guzzle its carnal delights, and Mouldi, the contemporary, earthly embodiment of the Sheikh, who uses his religion as a social accessory.

Rais believes animation is the perfect way to illuminate the blind poet’s vision: “He had a great capacity for imagination when describing the garden of Eden, carnal delights, immortal virgins, birds, geese and also wild beasts,” she explains.

Now in development, Aller Simple is being produced by Imed Marzouk and Badi Chouka of Tunis-based Propaganda Productions.

Their credits include Nejib Belkadhi’s VHS Kahloucha and Bastardo, and Leyla Bouzid’s Oiseaux De Nuit. Production is expected to begin in October 2017.

Contact Propaganda Productions propaganda@ gnet.tn i.marzouk@ gnet.tn

the loss of someone so beloved can sometimes be a liberation of sorts.

“The project is extremely personal. I feel very close to Amel,” says Ben Attia, who co-wrote the script with Martin Drouot. “I want to talk about the concept of freedom. I feel free and emancipated, and at the same time I feel that I must keep freeing myself and emancipating.

The context is that of a Muslim society, but even in other contexts, we always need to free ourselves.

“And that is difficult, there is always a price to pay.”

Ben Attia is a renowned script-

The Colonel’s Stray Dogs Lib Dir Khalid Shamis Prod co Tuba Films Khalid Shamis’ father was one of Muammar Gaddafi’s ‘stray dogs’, hunted and vilified for 30 years as an opposition figure in exile, a member of the National Front for the Salvation of Libya. They plotted from an office in leafy south London, where the director grew up.

The Colonel’s Stray Dogs is a feature documentary about these exiles and the country they dreamed of creating. When Gaddafi fell in 2011, the Front members rushed to take up major positions in the government, intent on being there to build the new Libya. But as the country descended into chaos, it was clear Libya was traumatised by 40 years of dictatorship and was untrusting

writer, whose credits include Far and Unforgivable, both directed by André Téchiné. He has also directed two features, The String starring Claudia Cardinale, Antonin Stahly and Salim Kechiouche, and Je Ne Suis Pas Mort with Mehdi Dehbi, Maria de Medeiros and Emmanuel Salinger. Now in pre-production, L’Amour Des Hommes is produced by David Mathieu-Mahias of Parisbased 4A4 Productions, with Belgium’s Neon Rouge Productions co-producing.

Contact 4A4 Productions david. mathieu-mahias@4a4productions.fr

of the new government and the newly returned Front.

“Today’s Libya is not the one of which my father dreamt,” says Cape Town-based Shamis. “And out of the nightmare emerges unprecedented access to a political thriller and a personal story of secrets and sacrifice.”

The film is being produced by Shamis’ Tuba Films and Steven Markovitz’s Cape Town-based Big World Cinema, whose credits include Berlinale Teddy jury award winner Stories Of Our Lives.

The Colonel’s Stray Dogs will be Shamis’ second feature following 2011’s Imam And I, a feature documentary about his grandfather, the 1960s South African imam Abdullah Haron, who was an outspoken critic of Apartheid.

Contact Tuba Films gmail.com

tubafilms@

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LOCARNO OPEN DOORS

Concept image for En Attendant Les Hirondelles

Dieu Reconnaitra Les Siens Mor

Le Fort Des Fous Alg Dir Narimane Mari Prod co Allers Retours Films

Dir/scr Hassan Legzouli Prod co Zilis Films Morocco-born, France-based Hassan Legzouli is a renowned scriptwriter and script doctor who has previously directed two features, Testament in 2004 and The Golden Calf in 2012. The latter won the Cinema in Motion award at San Sebastian International Film Festival the same year. Dieu Reconnaitra Les Siens — which translates as ‘God Will Know His Own’ — is about a young man who has served 10 years in a fictional Islamist ‘army’ away from his family who believe he was killed in Bosnia.

But although he longs to see his younger brother and to reunite with his family, including his childhood sweetheart, his tentative return home to northern France is more about murder than nostalgia.

Inspired by a trip to New York and the site of the Twin Towers memorial, Legzouli says the project is an attempt to understand how the events of September 11, 2001 could have happened and what motivated the perpetrators. “I cannot imagine these characters believe in paradise and virgins. They were too ‘in life’, they had everything to enjoy life,” says Legzouli. “My aim is to explore the modern terrorist killer and the final act of their terrorist mission. For me the subject of the film is the question, ‘What brought him here?’”

Dieu Reconnaitra Les Siens is produced by Mohamed Ulad’s Zilis Films (formerly Les Films de Brooklyn), which is based in Asilah, northern Morocco. It previously produced Legzouli’s Quand Le Soleil Fait Tomber Les Moineaux in 1999.

The film-makers are hoping to find an international co-producer at Open Doors.

Contact Zilis Films

aderj@aol.com

6 Screen International August 2015

En Attendant Les Hirondelles Alg Dir/scr Karim Moussaoui Prod co Taj Intaj Karim Moussaoui is a former film programmer and assistant to directors Tariq Teguia and Nadir Mokneche. He is developing his debut feature, En Attendant Les Hirondelles, which translates as ‘Waiting For The Swallows’, with producer Jaber Debzi of Algiersbased production and distribution company Taj Intaj. It is the story of three people at turning points in their lives. All are living with the legacy of Algeria’s civil war in the 1990s that left some 200,000 dead and thousands more displaced.

The story’s protagonists are

Mourad, a businessman who puts work before his wife and son; Aicha, who is travelling across the country with her father and a neighbour to begin her marriage to a man she has never met; and Dahman, a doctor who is waiting for promotion before he proposes to the woman he loves.

“The new decade brought with it hopes of change,” says Moussaoui of Algeria in the 2000s. “Could we get over this national tragedy? We decided to believe we could, having seen death close up, we were going to cling to life. But another kind of distress persists, the kind that lingers, never learning from the mistakes of the past.

“The intention is to portray the relations between men and women,” he continues. “Their places within society, and to single out their responsibilities in building a modern Algerian society and working towards changing it for the future.”

En Attendant Les Hirondelles is set up as a co-production with France’s Les Films Pelléas and is looking to shoot in June 2016.

Contact Taj Intaj gmail.com

djaberdebzi@

Narimane Mari is an Algeria-born, France-based film-maker who has forged a career working in the sphere of visual arts and multimedia. She founded Allers Retours Films in 2010 through which she made her debut feature, Loubia Hamra in 2013.

Le Fort Des Fous is her follow-up and is a co-production with Corinne Castel of Centrale Electrique. It is a rich meditation on the metaphorical idea of utopia. Beginning in 1860 but unfixed in time, the Algerian Sahara is a pristine wilderness coveted by colonial powers of the day that are unable to conquer it.

Instead, it is inhabited by an eclectic group of people who believe in its mystical powers. These include Africans, Europeans, nomads from Asia and abandoned slaves. But in one night the human capacity to destroy is fully revealed.

“I deal with power and domination as fatal powers,” says Mari. “I provide them [humanity] with an extensive and pristine geographical space, the Sahara desert. I do so to allow them to move and unfold in all of their dimensions and express both their rational and irrational violence and ferociousness. The story carries history and the present without distinction.”

Mari says she has been partly inspired by France’s colonial presence in Algeria. “So-called scientific expeditions were launched to conquer the Sahara in order to conduct ‘taming campaigns’,” Mari explains.

“But it is also about continuing my exploration of cinema.”

Le Fort Des Fous is set to shoot in Algeria later this year.

Contact Allers Retours Films narimanemari@gmail.com

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GUILLAUME SENEZ CONCORSO CINEASTI DEL PRESENTE

PROD: IOTA PRODUCTION SALES: BE FOR FILMS August 6th August 7th August 8th August 8th August 9th

4.45 pm 11.00 am 11:30 am 4.15 pm 11.30 pm

A DIVISION OF

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LOCARNO OPEN DOORS

Inhebek Hedi Fr-Tun Dir Mohamed Ben Attia Prod co Nomadis Images

Pagan Magic Mor Dir/scr Fyzal Boulifa Prod co In Vivo Films Pagan Magic is the feature debut of UK-Moroccan film-maker Fyzal Boulifa, following two well-received shorts. The Curse screened in Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes in 2012 where it won the Illy prize for best short film as well as playing at Sundance and picking up a Bafta nomination. Short Rate Me screened in Directors’ Fortnight in May. To be shot in black and white, Pagan Magic is the story of 70-yearold Hayat and 14-year-old Soussen, who travel to the city. Hayat has a strong belief in pagan rituals, but when the girl falls in love with the son of her new European employer, a blossoming Soussen believes Hayat is using magic to keep them apart so attempts a spell of her own.

Pagan Magic is based on stories told by Boulifa’s mother, recounting her childhood in Morocco working as a maid from the age of 10. “She told me stories about witchcraft, which is still hugely popular in Morocco,” says Boulifa. “Pagan Magic began as a fable-like retelling of her childhood.

But when researching the realities of child labour in Morocco, with girls as young as five working as maids, that distance seemed wrong. So it has become a contemporary film, but still exploring witchcraft as a subversive and particularly female power.”

The project is in the early stages of development and is being produced

by Louise Bellicaud’s Paris-based In Vivo Films. Open Doors is the project’s first co-production event. The film-makers are looking to receive feedback on the work-in-progress script and are keen to secure further development funds to research child labour and witchcraft in Morocco.

Contact In Vivo Films invivofilms.com

Louise@

8 Screen International August 2015

“This story is an assessment of Tunisian youth today,” says film-maker Mohamed Ben Attia. “There are no weapons, no demonstrations, no heroes climbing over barricades offering their chests to bullets. My intention is to lift the veil on this [generation] that is groping, moving forward and back.”

Inhebek Hedi is the story of an aimless young man called Hedi. His mother arranges his marriage, his boss sends him on a work trip, and his older brother lectures him on how to behave. But when Hedi meets a woman called Rim while away on business, he falls in love as the wedding preparations continue apace back home.

“Like many others, Hedi attempts to free himself from tradition and finally chooses to change things from the inside,” says the director.

“By telling a story of characters trying to do what they can with what they have, I wanted to paint the portrait of Tunisia today, a country in the throes of deep social, religious and economic changes.”

Concept image for Inhebek Hedi

The project is the directorial debut of Ben Attia following five short films, most recently Selma, which was selected to play in competition at the International Short Film Festival in Clermont Ferrand in 2014. Dora Bouchoucha and Lina Chaabane of Tunis-based Nomadis Images are producing the film, which is in pre-production with shooting due to start in September.

Contact Nomadis Images nomadis.images@gmail.com

Le Sacrifié Alg Dir Amin Sidi-Boumediene Prod co Thala Films Production After graduating from Paris’s CLCF film school in 2005, Amin SidiBoumediene worked as an assistant director and made award-winning short Demain, Alger? in 2011. Le Sacrifié, which translates as ‘The Sacrifice’, is his feature directorial debut and is set in 1994 during the Algerian civil war.

Two childhood friends head into the Sahara desert, apparently to search for a dangerous terrorist called Alou Leila. For one, Lofti, the goal is to take his traumatised friend, Samir, away from the violence. But when they reach a village where several people have been murdered, Samir is convinced Alou Leila is to blame. The villagers, however, cannot believe such horrors were caused by a man so

claim it to be the work of a wild beast.

Sidi-Boumediene was 10 years old in 1992 when Islamist terrorism erupted in Algeria. “After a decade of violence, it left behind hundreds of thousands of victims. That period is essential to my generation because it provided the inevitable backdrop to our youth,” says the director.

“Le Sacrifié tells first and foremost of the traumas undergone by the whole Algerian people.

Understanding the psychological basis for that period leads one past the specifics of individual debates to embrace the deep underlying causes of an absurd level of violence, which we experienced at close quarters.”

Le Sacrifié is produced by Faycal Hammoum of Algiers-based Thala Films, with plans to shoot in October 2017.

Contact Thala Films faycalhammoum@gmail.com

www.screendaily.com

Retina Tun

Saint Inconnu Mor

Dir/scr Nejib Belkadhi Prod co Propaganda Productions Lofti is a Tunisian immigrant happily living in Marseilles, working in an electrical-goods store and enjoying life with his French girlfriend. But when his wife back home in Tunisia is taken seriously ill, he must return to collect his autistic nine-year-old son whom he hardly knows. A bonding journey begins but it is a difficult one as the child refuses to acknowledge the existence of his father.

“The idea came from a series of photographs done by American photographer Timothy Archibald, in which he took amazing pictures of his autistic son,” writer-director Nejib Belkadhi explains. “I began by imagining the storyline and I started reading about autism. I contacted a children’s association and followed 15 autistic kids and filmed them in their everyday life at the centre. It was a very enriching experience and I linked emotionally with those fascinating children. It was a very valuable approach.”

As he explores the father-son relationship, Belkadhi is keen to craft a

Ruqya Alg Dir Yanis Koussim Prod co Mille et Une Productions It was a mosaic at a hotel in Hammamet in Tunisia, representing Imam Ali, nephew of the Prophet Muhammad, fighting a demon or a monster, that was the genesis of Ruqya, a horror project based on mythology and Muslim demonology. “We suffered 10 years of Islamic terrorism [during the Algerian civil war],” says Algerian filmmaker Yanis Koussim. “The nightmare is reality, terrorism, fear.

Ruqya is for me a way to exorcise the nightmare.”

This is Koussim’s second feature following Alger By Night, which he is currently editing. His award-winning short film Khouya screened at festivals including Locarno.

Ruqya is set during the 1990s Algerian civil war. Slimane is one of the five survivors of the Sidi-Salem massacre, at a farming village on the www.screendaily.com

Dir Alaa Eddine Aljem Prod co Le Moindre Geste

film that is both engaging and thought provoking. “I want people to connect with the characters and understand how difficult it is for a parent to deal with autism,” he explains. “The film is also about denial and repentance. The father faces a strong dilemma that will reveal the true nature of the character to himself and to the audience.”

Belkadhi is developing Retina through Propaganda Productions, the company he runs with producer Imed Marzouk. They hope to shoot in May 2016. It will be Belkadhi’s third feature following the awardwinning Bastardo and the feature documentary 7½.

Contact Propaganda Productions i.marzouk@gnet.tn

A young man pulls off a burglary and takes to the hills to hide the loot. But realising he is being pursued, he quickly buries the money and marks it with a circle of white stones, as if it were a grave.

Several years later, having served his time in prison, he returns to where he stashed the bounty only to find it has been turned into a site of pilgrimage for the villagers and is now known as the Marabout of the Unknown Saint. An entire industry has grown up around it.

“I have always wanted to work with the idea of rumour and the way it spreads,” says Alaa Eddine Aljem, who studied at film school in Brussels. His most recent short Les Poissons Du Désert, took the critics, screenwriting and grand prizes at the National Film Festival in Tangier, and has been invited to the Short Film Corner at Cannes.

“I find it fascinating how, in societies like mine, word of mouth can feed rumours and create legends out of nothing. There is something highly filmic in these little white solitary tombs that rise up on the tops of hills or just outside villages. My starting point is an absurd but realistic situation, out of which I develop a story with both dramatic and comic elements.”

Saint Inconnu, which translates as ‘Saint Unknown’, is in development and is being produced by Francesca Duca through her Casablanca-based outfit Le Moindre Geste.

Contact Le Moindre Geste fra.duca@gmail.com

dry high plains of eastern Algeria.

But all the survivors are amnesiac and Slimane does not know if he is a persecutor or a victim. He is taken into an old man’s house and taught the secrets of the Ruqya. Many years later he roams the country as a Raqi, an Islamic exorcist. But then the old man dies and a woman convinces Slimane her son is possessed and begs for his help. But he cannot rid the teenager of the devil, his powers have gone and he needs to find out who he is.

Ruqya is being produced by Fares Ladjimi at France’s Mille et Une Productions, whose credits include Joana Hadjithomas and Khalil Joreige’s I Want To See, starring Catherine Deneuve, which screened in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard in 2008; Paula Markovitch’s El Premio in 2011, which won the Silver Bear at Berlin in 2011; and David Perrault’s Our Heroes Died Tonight in 2013.

Contact Mille et Une Productions f.ladjimi@1001productions.net s milleetune@free.fr ■

Concept image for Ruqya

August 2015 Screen International 9

LOCARNO CARLO CHATRIAN

Selections include L’accademia Delle Muse by Jose Luis Guerin, about a professor’s lesson on love; Qui Jiongjiong’s Mr Zhang Believes, a visually arresting film from China about a man in a labour camp; and L’infinita Fabbrica Del Duomo, by Italian artists Massimo D’Anolfi and Martina Parenti telling the story of the Milan cathedral.

Look and learn

Carlo Chatrian, artistic director of Locarno Film Festival

All voices welcome Locarno’s artistic director Carlo Chatrian talks to Wendy Mitchell about how the festival gets its balance of diverse programming just right

L

ocarno is a special kind of festival that is known for showing a range of cinema: envelope-pushing new voices, inspired retrospectives and crowdpleasers in the Piazza Grande.

That kind of diversity is very important for artistic director Carlo Chatrian.

“I hope that every section has its own balance and its own way of representing the diversity of cinema. Each section can speak to different kinds of audiences.

Filmmakers of the Present is to discover new talent, so most of the films are very challenging in terms of storytelling or narrative forms but we have a few very straightforward films.

“For the Piazza Grande, we shift that balance. There’s more room for popular, commercial films,” he adds.

Of course, the main competition is a showcase for a number of important film-making voices. “The main competition will be composed of not only up-and-coming directors but also established ones,” Chatrian explains.

There are films by the likes of Hong Sang-soo (Right Now, Wrong Then) and Chantal Akerman (No Home Movie); Greek director Athina Rachel Tsangari’s Attenberg follow-up Chevalier; Alex Van 10 Screen International August 2015

‘I hope that every section has its own balance and its own way of representing the diversity of cinema’ Carlo Chatrian, Locarno Film Festival

Hong Sang-soo’s Right Now, Wrong Then

Warmerdam’s unusual comedy Schneider vs. Bax; as well as first timers such as Josh Mond’s Sundance title James White; and a collective effort, Heimatland, from a new generation of 10 Swiss directors.

Chatrian is also proud of the femalecentric stories in 2015’s programme.

The Piazza Grande will open with Jonathan Demme’s Ricki And The Flash, written by Diablo Cody. “The story is about a mature woman [Meryl Streep] who left her family to pursue a career in music. This is not the usual American dream, this is a different kind of woman,” Chatrian says. Judd Apatow’s latest film Trainwreck, Trainwreck written by its star Amy Schumer, also gets a showing, as does Catherine Corsini’s La Belle Saison, Saison a French drama starring Cécile de France, set in 1971 telling a love story between two women.

The Signs of Life section, which launched in 2014, turns the spotlight on cinema’s new voices. “These films are new experiments, not just ‘experimental films’ but looking at new ways of storytelling,” Chatrian explains.

There has been some controversy on the industry side, with a petition circulating against the Israel Film Fund partnering with the festival — Israeli cinema is the territory of focus for the First Look section (formerly Carte Blanche), which presents films to the industry as worksin-progress.

Chatrian said the festival stands by its plans. “This is a project that is devoted to helping Israeli film-makers to finish their films. Israeli cinema is one of the most interesting industries today. There is an interest from all the professional community — programmers, festival directors and buyers — in these projects.

First Look really doesn’t want to be pro or against the political situation; it doesn’t want to give a platform for political speeches.”

Locarno’s international reach also extends to a new co-operation with Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, which took place in the Czech spa town in July. The festivals share one film with each other: Karlovy Vary screened Tosca’s Kiss by Daniel Schmid, and Locarno will screen Invention For Destruction by Karel Zeman. As Chatrian says: “People may consider festiva l s c o m p e t i t o r s b u t f e s t i va l programmers know each other and when we have a chance to co-operate it’s a joy for us.”

Locarno also has a new collaboration with Art Basel. The festival has conceived a programme dedicated to Irish artist Duncan Campbell, and Art Basel will curate Voices From The Off, comprising five short films to screen at the festival.

All of these stimulating screenings return to that goal of cinema’s great diversity in 2015. “I try to find this difficult balance between cinema’s artistic value and its commercial one,” Chatrian says. “Without being the work of an artist the film and cinema is not so interesting, but without a commercial feedback, film doesn’t exist. This is the balance I try to look at in an ongoing s process every year.” ■ www.screendaily.com

GermanFilmsLocarnoScreen2015_PRINT 22.07.15 09:53 Seite 1

GERMAN FILMS & CO-PRODUCTIONS

Pardi di domani

© Giorgos Karvelas

Concorso Cineasti del presente

© OOO-Films

Piazza Grande

© zero one film/Martin Valentin Menke

LOCARNO 2015 THE PEOPLE VS. FRITZ BAUER by Lars Kraume

DER NACHTMAHR

FOUR CORNERS OF A CIRCLE

Pardi di domani

Signs of Life

Fuori concorso: Art Basel

© Karolin Meunier

by Katarina Stankovic (DE/RS)

© Orlin Ruevski

© Kamal Aljafari

by AKIZ

ZEUS

RECOLLECTION

ANFANGSSZENE

Concorso internazionale

I film delle giurie

Semaine de la Critique

by Lisa Blatter, Gregor Frei, Jan Gassmann, Benny Jaberg, Carmen Jaquier, Michael Krummenacher, Jonas Meier, Tobias Nölle, Lionel Rupp & Mike Scheiwiller (CH/DE)

by Laura Bispuri (IT/CH/DE/AL/XK)

by Eliza Kubarska (PL/GB/DE)

by Pavel Vesnakov (DE/BG)

HEIMATLAND

by Kamal Aljafari

SWORN VIRGIN

by Karolin Meunier

K2. TOUCHING THE SKY

Retrospettiva Sam Peckinpah

Panorama Suisse

by Sam Peckinpah (GB/DE)

by Nicolas Steiner (CH/DE)

PARADISE

THE CROSS OF IRON

TE PROMETO ANARQUÍA

PASSION & POETRY – THE BALLAD OF SAM PECKINPAH

DORA OR THE SEXUAL NEUROSES OF OUR PARENTS

Open Doors Screenings

IMAGINE WAKING UP TOMORROW AND ALL MUSIC HAS DISAPPEARED

by Sina Ataeian Dena (IR/DE)

by Julio Hernández Cordón (MX/DE) Concorso Cineasti del presente

SIEMBRA

by Ángela Osorio Rojas & Santiago Lozano Álvarez (CO/DE)

by Mike Siegel

CHOUF

by Imen Dellil (TN/DE/FR)

SUR LA PLANCHE Histoire(s) du cinéma: Exellence Award Moët & Chandon for Edward Norton

FIGHT CLUB

by David Fincher (US/DE)

by Leila Kilani (MA/FR/DE)

ABOVE AND BELOW

by Stina Werenfels (CH/DE)

by Stefan Schwietert (CH/DE)

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Locarno Industry Days

Friends in high places Locarno’s sixth annual Industry Days (Aug 8-10) is bigger than ever, thanks to the latest rollout of networking initiatives. Martin Blaney reports

‘‘ I

t is all about networking and exchanging views and ideas,” says Locarno’s head of industry Nadia Dresti about the sixth edition of the festival’s Industry Days.

At the centre of the three-day event, which this year runs from August 8-10, are the industry screenings at Locarno’s Rialto Cinema for international buyers and sellers, but the number of other initiatives in a packed timetable — which also has to find space for the parallel Open Doors co-production lab — has grown year on year.

This year sees the introduction of two new ventures: Match Me! and Alliance For Development. Launched as a pilot last year (under the name Carte Blanche Extra), Match Me! was created in response to calls from the heads of four national film institutions — Cinema do Brasil, Cinema Chile, Proimagenes Colombia and Mexico’s IMCINE — to be given the chance to return to Locarno after taking part in past editions of the Carte Blanche postproduction showcase (now known as First Look).

“They said Locarno is the best place for their producers to do networking,” Dresti says of the initiative, which will see the film bodies back a series of professional lunches called the Latin Corner to meet with potential co-producers and sales agents.

Alliance For Development, in contrast, is a platform aimed at fostering co-development and co-production specifically between four European countries — France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.

This year, the pilot phase will see funding executives from France’s CNC, Germany’s FFA, Italy’s MiBACT and Switzerland’s FOC (in the context of MEDIA compensatory measures) coming to Locarno along with the directorproducer teams of five projects recently supported by co-development funds 14 Screen International August 2015

established between France, Italy and Germany. As Switzerland is a natural coproducing partner for France, Germany and Italy, Locarno is a perfect match to offer a specific platform to contribute to the existing common effort of these four countries to intensify co-development at an early stage. The selected projects, which will be pitched to potential partners in one-to-one meetings during Industry Days, include Bille August’s biopic Vivaldi, to be produced by Cologne-based Pandora Film, and Annarita Zambrano’s Apres La Guerre.

Rather than a co-production market, Dresti describes the initiative as “more of an annual rendez-vous for professionals of these four countries to discuss projects, test their positioning/market potential and get to better know each other, including some country specificities such as talents, locations and regional support that can be crucial for the optimisation of the commercial potential in their respective markets and in Europe”.

Step forward Now in its fourth year, Industry Days’ interactive think tank StepIn will remain true to the increasingly international dimension adopted last year, addressing issues around arthouse distribution in Europe and further afield.

The discussion topics have been developed once again in close consultation with Europa International, Europa Distribution, Europa Cinemas and — for the second year — the Federation of European Film Directors (FERA).

Rather than focusing on market presentations, however, Locarno’s StepIn day on August 9 will concentrate on round-table discussions as part of a closed morning session for 50 participants, moderated by industry key players (including Sodec’s Monique Simard and Film Society of Lincoln Center’s

‘We are always looking for networking possibilities and a real exchange of ideas’ Nadia Dresti, Locarno Film Festival

Lesli Klainberg among others), followed by a public round-up of the discussions in the afternoon.

Europa Distribution will host one table examining the issues of copyright and territoriality in light of the European Commission’s proposed Digital Single Market strategy, while Europa Cinemas will be looking at the career of films starting from their first presentation at festivals.

Europa International, on the other hand, will focus on the parallels and differences in release strategies between the EU and the US. This will tie in with its MEDIA-supported project Set The www.screendaily.com

tion. “We always think of the audiovisual industry as an ecosystem in which each part is closely related, and the different parts of the chain can find new ideas and be stronger together.”

Following its premiere last year, the networking event StepIn.ch will again be held a day ahead of the main StepIn event as a forum for the Swiss film community present in Locarno.

Organised in association with Festival Tous Ecrans and Swiss Films, this year’s edition will again bring together European distributors and sales agents with leading players from the Swiss industry.

“Last year, we were discussing the international future for Swiss cinema after Switzerland’s immigration referendum shut us out of Creative Europe,” Dresti says. “The situation with Creative Europe hasn’t changed since then, so we decided to have the discussion about how one can give more visibility to Swiss films on national and international VoD platforms.

“We have to acknowledge the changes in the market because we still don’t have a very strong VoD platform in Switzerland and need to see how one can improve the marketing,” she adds.

The next generation

Trend!, which promotes an exchange of views between the US and the EU on developments in international distribution in the digital era.

New for this year is the introduction of ‘experimental tables’ that will see industry players from across the value chain have two hours to develop a marketing and distribution strategy for two films — one from the Concorso Internazionale line-up and one from the Filmmakers of the Present competition.

“By involving professionals from different sectors around the same table, StepIn has great think-tank potential,” says Clara Léonet of Europa Distribuwww.screendaily.com

(Top) Delegates register for accreditation; (above) Locarno presents unparalleled networking opportunities

After focusing on South American films for its previous four editions, the festival’s First Look showcase (previously Carte Blanche) turns its attention to six films in post-production from Israel.

Thanks to a partnership with the Israel Film Fund, producers including Gal Greenspan, David Silber and Marek Rozenbaum will be presenting their films to an audience of sales agents, funders, distributors and festival programmers.

In addition, a jury consisting of Karlovy Vary’s festival director Karel Och, Sundance programmer John Nein and Busan International Film Festival programmer Rhee Soue-won will award the best film with in-kind prizes worth more than $72,000 (¤65,000).

After a test run last year, Locarno’s Industry Academy (August 5-12) will be officially launched during the festival with the goal of catering to young industry professionals in the areas of distribution, sales, marketing, exhibition and programming.

“Looking at the number of applications, it has been a great success,” Dresti says. “We had a lot of sales companies and distributors wanting to send their young employees and had to extend the

number of participants from the original nine to 11.”

The academy’s first intake from 10 European countries includes representatives from distributors Soda Pictures (UK), Mozinet (Hungary) and Praesens Film (Switzerland) and sales companies New Europe Film Sales (Poland), Doc & Film International (France) and EastWest Filmdistribution (Austria).

In addition, a participant from the Mexican distribution company Mantarraya has been invited to attend as part of the organisers’ goal to open up the Industry Academy to professionals outside of Europe in the future.

“The Locarno Industry Academy aims to fill an existing lack of training programmes and workshops in the field of cinema-business jobs. It is also a true shortcut for young professionals to the industry and its key players,” explains its project manager Marion Klotz. “Locarno’s inspiring and relaxed atmosphere is the perfect festival context for our participants to feel they are involved and already a part of the industry, no matter how short is their experience,” she adds.

Tutors will include The Film Agency director Sarah Calderon, Memento Films International sales and acquisitions executive Nicholas Kaiser and European Film Market director Matthijs Wouter Knol.

Packed schedule Professionals at Industry Days will also have the chance to attend the presentation of the eighth Doc Alliance Selection Award, which is being held during Locarno Film Festival for the very first time .

Seven films were nominated by seven leading documentary festivals including DOK Leipzig, CPH:DOX and Nyon’s Visions du Réel for the $5,500 (¤5,000) prize to be decided by a jury of European film critics.

The 2015 finalists include Abbas Fahdel’s Homeland (Iraq Year Zero), Anna Roussillon’s I Am The People and Eliza Kubarska’s Walking Under Water.

EAVE’s Puentes workshop and Bridging The Dragon’s Sino-European project evaluation and market placement lab will also provide further networking opportunities.

This year’s industry schedule may be busier than ever but Dresti is not resting on her laurels. “The number of activities has grown from year to year but we are always looking for networking possibilis ties and a real exchange of ideas.” n August 2015 Screen International 15

LOcARNO PIAzzA GRANDE & INTERNATIONAL cOMPETITION

The Grande reveal Arthouse giants and Hollywood blockbusters jostle for space on the Piazza Grande and in International Competition. Matt Mueller, Andreas Wiseman and Tom Grater profile the titles set to get audiences buzzing PIAzzA GRANDE

Amnesia Switz-Fr

Ricki And The Flash US

Dir Barbet Schroeder

Dir Jonathan Demme

Schroeder’s drama, which premiered at Cannes, follows a young music composer (Max Riemelt) who moves from Berlin to Ibiza in the 1990s to become part of the nascent electronic music revolution. There he strikes up a friendship with an ageing ex-pat (Marthe Keller).

PIAzzA GRANDE OPENING FILM

Meryl Streep stars as an ageing rock star attempting to reconnect with her family, with Demme directing from a Diablo Cody script. Ricki And The Flash screens out

Contact Les films du Losange info@filmsdulosange.fr

La Belle Saison Fr Dir Catherine Corsini WORLD PREMIERE

Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes in 2012, this Bombay-set gangster drama traces the adventures of a street boxer and a beautiful jazz singer.

Set in 1971, French film-maker Corsini’s lesbian love story follows a French girl of humble origins (Izia Higelin) who becomes involved with a free-spirited girl from Paris (Cécile de France).

Contact Fox Star Studios India rohits@in.foxstarstudios.com

Contact Pyramide International distribution@pyramidefilms.com

Cimino’s Oscar-winning Vietnam war drama, starring Robert De Niro and Christopher Walken, is screening as part of the festival’s tribute to the US director, who will receive the Pardo d’Onore Swisscom this year.

Bombay Velvet India Dir Anurag Kashyap From the writer-director of Gangs Of Wasseypur, which premiered in

of competition, with S t r e e p ’s c o - s t a r Edward Norton receiving this year’s Excellence Award.

The Deer Hunter UK-US Dir Michael Cimino

Contact Tamasa Distribution contact@tamasadiffusion.com

Contact Sony Pictures Releasing International www. sonypictures. com

Floride Fr Dir Philippe Le Guay WORLD PREMIERE

Jean Rochefort and Anamaria Marinca headline Le Guay’s comedy about an 80-year-old man struggling to cope with memory loss.

Guibord s’en va-t-en guerre Can

Fists In The Pocket It

Patrick Huard and Suzanne Clément lead the cast of Falardeau’s comedy about a politician faced with a monumental decision. Falardeau’s Monsieur Lazhar picked up Locarno’s audience award in 2011.

WORLD PREMIERE

Dir Marco Bellocchio Veteran film-maker Bellocchio, who will receive this year’s Pardo d’Onore, first made waves at Locarno in 1965 with Fists In The Pocket (I pugni in tasca), the story of

WORLD PREMIERE

16 Screen International August 2015

Contact The Match Factory info@matchfactory.de

Dir Philippe Falardeau

Dir Elisabeth Scharang

La Belle Saison

a young man who takes drastic measures to rid his dysfunctional family of its various afflictions.

Contact Gaumont International abuhl@gaumont.fr

Jack Aust

Floride

Heliopolis

Austrian director Scharang’s second fiction feature after 2011 Holocaust drama In Another Lifetime charts the true story of Jack Unterweger, a convicted murderer whose road to redemption, while imprisoned, was to write stories and poems.

Contact Picture Tree International pti@picturetreeinternational.com

Contact Films Distribution info@filmsdistribution.com

Heliopolis Braz Dir Sergio Machado WORLD PREMIERE

Machado’s latest film follows the young men of a real-life orchestra established for underprivileged children in Sao Paulo.

Contact Films Boutique info@filmsboutique.com

The Laundryman Tai Dir Lee Chung A contract killer haunted by the ghosts of his victims enlists the help of a female psychic. Black comedy www.screendaily.com

who devise a game that becomes increasingly competitive. Greek singer Sakis Rouvas features among the cast.

The Laundryman (Qing Tian Jie Yi Hao) marks Lee’s feature debut.

Contact Ablaze Image www.ablazeimage.com

Contact The Match Factory info@matchfactory.de

Me And Earl And The Dying Girl US

Dark In The White Light Sri Lanka

Dir Alfonso Gomez-Rejon Fox Searchlight splashed big on this Sundance hit about a high-schooler who has his outlook changed after befriending a classmate who has been diagnosed with cancer.

Dir Vimukthi Jayasundara WORLD PREMIERE

Contact Fox Searchlight www.foxsearchlight.com

Cosmos Fr-Port Dir Andrzej Zulawski

Southpaw US Dir Antoine Fuqua

WORLD PREMIERE

Jake Gyllenhaal steps into the ring as a grieving boxer at the heart of Fuqua’s redemption drama, which The Weinstein Company is currently rolling out internationally.

Contact The Weinstein Company www.weinsteinco.com

Der Staat gegen Fritz Bauer Ger Dir Lars Kraume Burghart Klaussner stars as Fritz Bauer, a German-Jewish attorney general determined to pursue through the German court system those who took part in the Holocaust.

Contact Beta Cinema beta@betacinema.com

Trainwreck US

alfamafilms@orange.fr

INTERNATIONAL cOMPETITION

Bella e perduta It Dir Pietro Marcello Italian director Marcello, known for 2009 documentary drama The Mouth Of The Wolf, brings to Locarno the surreal story of two servants, man and animal, who embark on a long journey across a lost and beautiful Italy.

Chant d’Hiver Fr-Geor Dir Otar Iosseliani

Entertainment US Dir Rick Alverson INTERNATIONAL PREMIERE

Georgian director Iosseliani’s first film in five years, featuring a cast made up largely of non-professional actors, charts the dramatic chaos following revolution.

Contact Les Films du Losange info@filmsdulosange.fr

Contact Stray Dogs, Epic Pictures Group sales@epic-pictures.com

WORLD PREMIERE

Chevalier Gre

Happy Hour Jap

Contact L’Avventurosa Film info@avventurosa.net

Dir Athina Rachel Tsangari

Dir Ryusuke Hamaguchi

Brother Dejan Rus-Serb

Tsangari’s first film as director since 2010 festival hit Attenberg follows a group of men trapped on a boat

Dir Bakur Bakuradze

Apatow directs this vehicle for Amy Schumer, starring as a commitment-phobic career woman who meets Mr Right.

Contact Film Council Productions filmcouncilproductions@gmail. com

En route to meet his estranged daughter, an ageing comedian plays a string of dead-end shows in the Mojave desert. Gregg Turkington stars alongside John C Reilly and Michael Cera in Alverson’s drama, which premiered at Sundance.

WORLD PREMIERE

Dir Judd Apatow

WORLD PREMIERE

WORLD PREMIERE

When a woman disappears after losing her case in divorce court, her three best friends are forced to

Brother Dejan (Brat Dejan), about a general of the Balkan war who is secretly transported to a detached house outside a mountain village, marks Bakuradze’s first effort as director since 2011 drama The Hunter.

Contact Universal Pictures International www. universalpictures international.com

La Vanité Switz-Fr Dir Lionel Baier Patrick Lapp and Carmen Maura star in Swiss director Baier’s latest, about an elderly architect determined to end his life.

www.screendaily.com

Contact Alfama Films

WORLD PREMIERE

WORLD PREMIERE

Contact Wide infos@ widemanagement.com

Polish veteran Zulawski returns to the director’s chair for the first time in 15 years with the story of a deaf-mute girl who is saved from suicide by an unusual encounter.

Jayasundara won the Camera d’Or in 2005 for his debut The Forsaken Land. Dark In The White Light (Sulanga Gini Aran) intertwines the stories of a Buddhist monk, a medical student, an organ dealer and a surgeon to paint a broader picture of life and death.

Southpaw

Contact Soul Food Distribution sonja. topalovic@ soulfoodfilms. com

Chevalier

» August 2015 Screen International 17

Locarno Piazza Grande & International Competition

Schneider vs Bax Neth-Bel

Dir Alex van Warmerdam INTERNATIONAL PREMIERE

Dutch writer- director van Warmerdam follows his 2013 Cannes Competition entry Borgman with this comedy thriller about a hitman who tries to assassinate a reclusive writer.

Tom Dewispelaere stars alongside the director.

Contact Fortissimo Films info@fortissimo.nl

Paradise

examine their own lives. Hamaguchi’s drama clocks in at 317 minutes.

Contact Doc & Film International sales@docandfilm.com

Production company Fictive LLC hh.fictive.jp/en

Paradise Iran-Ger

Heimatland Switz-Ger Dirs Lisa Blatter, Gregor Frei, Jan Gassmann, Benny Jaberg, Carmen Jaquier, Michael Krummenacher, Jonas Meier, Tobias Nölle, Lionel Rupp, Mike Scheiwiller WORLD PREMIERE

The only Swiss film in this year’s competition is a compendium piece by 10 up-and-coming directors examining the notion of Swiss identity and how it relates to dependency on other countries.

Contact Wide infos@ widemanagement.com

Dir Sina Ataeian Dena WORLD PREMIERE

A frustrated Iranian schoolteacher is shocked when two of her female students are kidnapped. Paradise (Ma Dar Behesht) is Dena’s feature debut.

Contact Bon Voyage Films bonvoyagefilms@gmail.com

Right Now, Wrong Then S Kor Dir Hong Sang-soo WORLD PREMIERE

Right Now, Wrong Then (Jigeumeun

Matgo Geuttaeneun Teullida) follows the relationship between a director (Jeong Jae-yeong) and an artist (Kim Min-hee). The film-maker allows a friendship to develop before revealing to her that he is married.

The prolific Hong won Locarno’s best director prize two years ago for Our Sunhi.

Contact Finecut finecut.co.kr

cineinfo@

O Futebol Sp Dir Sergio Oksman WORLD PREMIERE

Oksman’s documentary short A Story For The Modlins stormed the festival circuit in 2012. This feature, set during the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, follows a father and son try-

WORLD PREMIERE

Contact Zadig Productions info@zadigproductions.com

The Sky Trembles And The Earth Is Afraid And The Two Eyes Are Not Brothers UK

Contact Artangel org.uk

Contact Memento Films International sales@mementofilms.com

18 Screen International August 2015

Suite Armoricaine Fr Dir Pascale Breton

Rivers’ previous feature, A Spell To Ward Off The Darkness, debuted at the 2013 festival. His latest, set in the Moroccan desert, is about a director’s descent into madness.

Martha Marcy May Marlene producer Mond makes his directing debut with this drama about a New Yorker (Christopher Abbott) trying to rein in self-destructive tendencies.

WORLD PREMIERE

Contact Dok Films guadalupebalaguertrelles@ gmail.com

WORLD PREMIERE

INTERNATIONAL PREMIERE

This documentary by the Belgian film-making veteran recounts the story of her mother, who arrived in Belgium from Poland in 1938, fleeing pogroms and violence.

ing to rekindle their relationship after 20 years apart.

Dir Ben Rivers

Dir Josh Mond

Dir Chantal Akerman

No Home Movie

Eleven years after her feature debut, French writer-director Breton’s second film follows an art historian and geography student as they face their demons.

James White US

No Home Movie Bel-Fr

Suite Armoricaine

info@artangel.

Tikkun Isr Dir Avishai Sivan

Te Prometo Anarquia Mex-Ger

INTERNATIONAL PREMIERE

Dir Julio Hernandez Cordon WORLD PREMIERE

Cordon’s second film in Locarno competition after 2012’s Polvo, is a Mexico City-set drama about two male lovers and blood traffickers

who attract the attention of a cartel. Diego Calva and Eduardo Martinez Peña star.

Contact Latido Films latidofilms.com

latido@

Fresh off four awards at Jerusalem Film Festival, including best film, Sivan’s atmospheric drama is about an ultra-Orthodox scholar irrevocably changed after a near-death experience.

Contact Plan B Productions s ronenbental@gmail.com n www.screendaily.com

CONCORSO INTERNAZIONALE

WONDERLAND Directed by Michael Krummenacher, Jan Gassmann, Lisa Blatter, Gregor Frei, Benny Jaberg, Carmen Jaquier, Jonas Meier, Tobias Nölle, Lionel Rupp and Mike Scheiwiller

DCP/HD • 2015 • CH/GE • 99MIN • DRAMA/DISASTER

09/08 2.45PM Rialto 1 (Market Screening) 10/08 9AM Kursaal (Press Screening) 10/08 4.30PM Fevi (World Premiere) 11/08 9AM Fevi 12/08 6.30PM PalaVideo

A new generation of 10 filmmakers imagine how the Swiss would deal with the worst imaginable scenario: having to depend on foreign countries.

CONCORSO CINEASTI DEL PRESENTE

OUR LOVED ONES Directed by Anne Emond DCP/HD • 2015 • CANADA • 102MIN • DRAMA

08/08 4.45PM Rialto 2 (Market Screening) 11/08 5.30PM Kursaal (Press Screening) 12/08 11AM La Sala (World Premiere) 13/08 4.30PM L’Altra Sala 14/08 11.30PM Rialto 2

Guy is found dead in the basement of the family home. Years later, David, his son, now loving father of two children, secretly still carries the weight of this enigmatic tragedy.

ATTENDING GEORGIA POIVRE INTERNATIONAL SALES + 33 7 61 57 96 86 gp@widemanagement.com

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23/07/2015 18:10

Locarno First Look

A Quiet Heart

The 90 Minute War

Sand Storm

Hope

First Look at Israel Locarno’s post-production section has undergone a makeover this year, with a new name and a shift in regional focus. Melanie Goodfellow reports

woman when visiting her estranged son in hospital after a stabbing.

Unbeknown to Bina, the young woman is Palestinian and also her son’s lover. Producer Elad Peleg will be in Locarno with the rough cut.

His company Daroma Productions, based in the southern Israeli town of Sderot, focuses on minority voices not always heard in the mainstream media. His credits include Red Leaves, which was set within Israel’s ethnic Ethiopian community.

The sixth rough cut is Elite Zexer’s drama Sand Storm about a Bedouin mother and daughter testing the limits of their conservative community.

“There’s a strong appetite for Israeli films from buyers. We’re confident there’s going to be a good attendance at the event,” says Dresti.

Courting controversy

I

sraeli cinema is the focus of Locarno Film Festival’s annual territory-focused work-in-progress showcase this year. Rebranded as First Look, from Carte Blanche, the strand will premiere six works in post-production to industry professionals, with the onus on sales agents and festival programmers.

First Look on Israeli Cinema will be Locarno’s fifth work-in-progress event, following editions devoted to the cinema of Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Mexico.

“After focusing on Latin America, we decided to shift our attention to another region. Israeli cinema is of an excellent quality and regularly gets picked up for international distribution,” says Locarno industry head Nadia Dresti, who oversees the initiative alongside project manager Markus Duffner.

As to be expected from a territory as complex as Israel, the selection offers diverse stories and styles. It 20 Screen International August 2015

includes Eyal Halfon’s satirical mockumentary The 90 Minute War in which Israeli and Palestinian leaders decide to settle the Middle East conflict on the football pitch.

Assaf Amir of Norma Productions, whose credits include Fill The Void and Broken Wings, is co-producing alongside Germany’s Gringo Films, which also has experience in the Middle East having worked on Yuval Adler’s award-winning feature Bethlehem.

In a different vein, Eitan Anner’s drama A Quiet Heart explores the growing strength of the ultra-orthodox movement in Jerusalem through the tale of a secular concert pianist, played by Ania Bukstein, who moves to the city from Tel Aviv. Green Productions, which produced Tom Shoval’s Youth and is working on his next feature Shake Your Cares Away, is the lead producer on the film.

“Locarno is an amazing platform.

Everyone will be there,” says com-

pany co-founder Gal Greenspan, who will be in attendance.

In another contemporary tale, Meni Yaesh’s Our Father revolves around a tough Tel Aviv nightclub bouncer who tries to extricate himself from a debt-collection racket. It is Yaesh’s first film since his awardwinning God’s Neighbours, which premiered in Critics’ Week at Cannes in 2012. Veteran producer Marek Rozenbaum of Transfax Film Productions is producing.

In Haim Tabakman’s Ewa, an elderly man discovers his wife of decades, a Holocaust survivor, has been hiding their joint ownership of a property he did not know existed.

Producer David Silber of Metro Communications, whose credits include Hannah Arendt and Lebanon, will accompany the work.

In another tale that hinges on an untold secret, Miya Hatav’s Hope (Amal) follows Bina, an ultra-orthodox woman who bonds with a young

Locarno’s choice of Israel has not met unanimous approval. More than 200 directors and producers signed a petition last April calling on the festival to drop the focus as part of a cultural boycott of Israel to protest its ongoing occupation of Palestinian territories.

Locarno, however, decided to press on with the planned focus, in the name of “freedom of expression” and “artistic liberty”, and in the hope that the event will be an opportunity for debate and dialogue. “We’re happy to be welcoming Israeli filmmakers and giving them an opportunity to show their films,” says Dresti.

The protest petition, however, did prompt one change. It was the catalyst for the renaming of the initiative to First Look from Carte Blanche.

“We decided ‘Carte Blanche’ could be misconstrued and gave the impression that somehow the chosen territory had free reign over the festival, which isn’t the case,” says s Dresti. n www.screendaily.com

PIAZZA GRANDE

LA VANITE (VANITY) Directed by Lionel Baier

DCP/HD • 2015 • CH/FR • 75MIN • COMEDY DRAMA

10/08 4.30PM Rialto 1 (Market Screening) 12/08 9PM Kursaal (Press Screening) 13/08 9.30PM Piazza Grande (Premiere)

David Miller is so ill that he has decided to end it all. But despite his best efforts to choose the place, the date and the method, nothing works out as planned. David Miller has no choice but to rely on the help of complete strangers.

PANORAMA SUISSE WINNER

CINEUROPA AWARD CINELAB AWARD FOR BEST IMAGE Brussels Film Festival

DORA

OR THE SEXUALNEUROSES OF OUR PARENTS Directed by Stina Werenfels DCP/HD • 2015 • CH/GE • 90MIN • DRAMA

08/08 11AM Fevi (Premiere)

After her mother decides that eighteen-year-old mentally disabled Dora no longer has to take sedating drugs, the young woman dangerously begins to discover her sexuality…

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23/07/2015 18:20

LOCARNO SPECIAL HONOREES

A wild bunch Locarno 2015 will honour a select group of actors and film-makers, from Edward Norton to Marco Bellocchio. Wendy Mitchell reviews the recipients

bridge between classical cinema and the postmodern world… the poetry of his films surprised me when I watched them again.”

Impressively, Locarno will present the director’s complete filmography — with several films screened from newly restored prints — and a selection of his work for TV. There will also be discussions about Peckinpah’s career and an accompanying book edited by Fernando Ganzo.

Co-organised by the Cinématheque Suisse in Lausanne, and the Cinématheque Francaise in Paris, which will host the programme in September, the retrospective will be curated by film programmer and historian Roberto Turigliatto.

Marco Bellocchio

Sam Peckinpah (right) and cast on the set of Cross Of Iron

Sam Peckinpah Locarno’s major retrospective this year revisits the career of the American director, one of the great Hollywood rebels and the talent behind some of cinema’s greatest westerns, including 1969’s The Wild Bunch.

Peckinpah worked with a selection of the US’s most iconic actors including Dustin Hoffman (Straw Dogs), Steve McQueen (Junior Bonner, The Getaway) and James Coburn (Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid).

“Peckinpah is a director who is very well quoted by established film-makers such as Tarantino, Kitano and Michael Mann. But I’m not sure the new film-makers know his films,” Locarno’s artistic director Carlo Chatrian explains of the decision to pay tribute to the film-maker.

“He’s a man that makes a 22 Screen International August 2015

ANDY GARCIA THE CUBAN-AMERICAN ACTOR AND DIRECTOR RECEIVES THE LEOPARD CLUB AWARD

Born in Havana and raised in Miami, Andy Garcia had several small TV roles before being cast in 1987’s The Untouchables.

He co-starred with Michael Douglas in Ridley Scott’s Black Rain in 1989, followed by a role as Sonny Corleone’s son in The Godfather Part III, which earned him an Oscar nomination.

Garcia’s roles during the 1990s include Internal Affairs, When A Man Loves A Woman and Night Falls On Manhattan. A recurring role in the Ocean’s Eleven trilogy cemented his place on Hollywood’s A-list, and in 2005 Garcia co-wrote, directed and starred in The Lost City, which will screen in Locarno. The festival’s artistic director Carlo Chatrian says: “He has an elegance in his acting. He’s an actor that expresses something very American in films like The Untouchables but also he has a love for Cuba that makes you think about human geography from a different angle.”

The Italian director will be honoured with a Pardo d’Onore Swisscom and the festival will host a Piazza Grande screening of a restored print of Bellocchio’s debut film Fists In The Pocket, 50 years after it first played at Locarno. Funded by his family and shot at their own villa, it was the film that started the rich history between Locarno and the director.

In 1965 the jury kickstarted his international career by awarding Fists the Silver Sail (Vela d’argento).

Bellocchio was also in competition at Locarno in 1976 with Victory March, was jury president in 1997, and in 1998 the festival mounted a retrospective of his work.

“The way he makes films — above all, in recent years — has a great deal to say to anyone living in Italy but also to those making films in the rest of the world,” Chatrian says.

The festival will also show a selection of his other work including Vincere, My Mother’s Smile and Good Morning, Night, while the director will take part in a public masterclass at the Spazio Cinema (Forum).

Marlen Khutsiev The Tbilisi-born Soviet and Russian film-maker will be honoured with the Pardo alla carriera.

“Khutsiev is kind of an alter ego of Peckinpah on the other side of the world,” Chatrian says. “They are two directors that work in the system but see it from a critical point of view.”

Khutsiev, a veteran of both the Odessa Film Studio and Mosfilm, made his debut in 1956 with the www.screendaily.com

box-office hit Spring On Zarechnaya Street. In 1958, he launched the career of actor Vasily Shukshin in The Two Fyodors.

One of his most influential pictures was 1965’s I Am Twenty (aka Lenin’s Gate), the film that best represented the Khrushchev Thaw.

This controversial portrait of Soviet youth won a special jury prize in Venice but was denounced by the Soviet government. His other credits include July Rain (1967) and Berlinale prize winner Infinitas (1991).

The film-maker is at work on a new film and he will show footage from it in Locarno.

MICHAEL CIMINO THE U.S. FILM-MAKER WILL BE HONOURED WITH A PARDO D’ONORE SWISSCOM

New York-born Michael Cimino is famous for his works that show the disillusion of the American dream.

Locarno’s artistic director Carlo Chatrian says: “He is a director working in modern cinema but his references are more classical cinema. His films tell us a lot about American society even today.”

The Yale graduate worked in advertising before moving into film, writing screenplays including Clint Eastwood’s Magnum Force, which encouraged the actor’s production company to buy Cimino’s script Thunderbolt And Lightfoot ; Cimino went on to direct the film.

The Deer Hunter, which stars Robert De Niro and Christopher Walken as Pennsylvanian mill workers who fight in the Vietnam War, won five Oscars, including best director and best picture. Cimino followed that up with the infamous Heaven’s Gate, which now has a critically acclaimed director’s cut. Locarno will screen Heaven’s Gate, The Deer Hunter, Year Of The Dragon and Thunderbolt And Lightfoot, while Cimino will participate in a discussion at the Spazio on August 10.

Walter Murch The US editor and sound designer will be the recipient of the Vision Award Nescens, which aims to recognise an individual whose skills have left a mark on film history.

Murch has worked collaboratively with top directors such as George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola — he won his first Oscar in 1980 for sound design on Apocalypse Now, before winning Oscars for both sound and film editing on Anthony Minghella’s 1996 The English Patient (he won similar double Baftas in 1975 for The Conversation).

Murch made his directorial debut in 1985 with Return To Oz. He is also the author of the 2011 film editing classic In The Blink Of An Eye. “He is not only a technician, he has made a difference to cinema,” Chatrian says. “If Murch hadn’t done the sound for The Conversation, that film would not have been possible. Or the work he did on Apocalypse Now. The films are well known but the audience seeing them in the presence of Murch is to see them from a different angle.”

Murch will talk about his work during a public masterclass and the festival will screen Touch Of Evil, Particle Fever and Return To Oz.

Edward Norton The US actor will receive the Excellence Award Moët & Chandon.

Chatrian says of Norton: “His portraits of contemporary times are not black or white. Sometimes American society is great but it can also be full of problems and the filmography of Edward Norton talks a lot about that.” www.screendaily.com

Bulle Ogier

No r to n’s f i r s t f i l m appearance in 1996’s Primal Fear earned him an Oscar nomination. He was also Oscar nominated for American History X (1998) and Birdman (2014).

His impressively diverse films include David Fincher’s Fight Club, Tony Gilroy’s The Bourne Legacy and Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom. He also turned to directing with 2000 film Keeping The Faith.

Locarno will

Marlen Khutsiev

Walter Murch

Marco Bellocchio

screen 25th Hour, Fight Club and The Painted Veil, and Norton will also participate in a public conversation at the Spazio.

Bulle Ogier The French actress will receive a Pardo alla carriera. The prize that has previously gone to Anna Karina and Jean-Pierre Léaud continues to pay homage to the Nouvelle Vague’s most emblematic figures.

Chatrian says: “ T h e f e s t i va l wants to pay tribute, not only to her Edward Norton extraordinary career

but also to a conception of cinema that embraces a freedom of expression that is sorely lacking today.”

Ogier moved from the stage to the big screen in Marc’O’s Les Idoles in 1968, leading Jacques Rivette to cast her in L’Amour Fou before the pair collaborated on several further features. She has also worked with other famed European directors including Alain Tanner, Claude Lelouch, Luis Buñuel, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Claude Chabrol, Daniel Schmid, Manoel de Oliveira and her husband Barbet Schroeder.

The festival will screen a selection of Ogier’s films including The Salamander, Obscured By Clouds (La Vallee) and Belle Toujours, and the actress will also take part in a public s conversation. ■ August 2015 Screen International 23

Locarno Summer Academy

L

ocarno may be famous for celebrating the old masters of cinema, but since the establishment of its Summer Academy in 2010, the festival has also become a hub for the film-makers of tomorrow.

As well as the Filmmakers Academy, the programme also includes a Critics Academy for up-and-coming film critics and journalists, a Documentary Summer School for producers and the Cinema And Youth programme for local college students, each of which run for the duration of the festival. New this year is the Industry Academy to support the next generation of European distributors, sellers, programmers and marketers.

“Each of the academies have their specific features, but we want all the young people to feel like they are part of one thing,” says Sophie Bourdon, head of Locarno Summer Academy’s training development.

During the festival, participants have access to high-profile film-makers, script advisers, festival heads and selectors, and in return the presence of the enthusiastic academy attendees brings a welcome injection of young blood to Locarno.

Agnes Varda — with Filmmakers Academy head Stefano Knuchel — addresses students on the programme

Forces of nurture Locarno continues its quest to support the next generation of directors, critics and now industry professionals, as Sarah Cooper discovers

Future film-makers Headed up by Locarno born and based film-maker and journalist Stefano Knuchel, the Filmmakers Academy is a boutique programme open to emerging film-makers from around the world, made up of workshops, round-table sessions and talks from established names including in previous years Agnes Varda and Werner Herzog.

This year, speakers will include director Michael Cimino and actor Edward Norton. Thanks to a partnership with Red Bull’s Music Academy, the participants will also be treated to a lesson in music supervision from Sofia Coppola’s regular collaborator Brian Reitzell, whose composing credits include Lost In Translation.

“We help them focus on finding their identities as film-makers and finding the right support to defend their kind of cinema,” Knuchel says of the main purpose of the programme.

This year only 18 film-makers — six of whom have already taken part in the Cannes Cinéfondation’s Résidence du Festival — are being invited to take part in the academy, instead of the usual 25.

“I want to know every single one of them and their work. I choose people who I think I can help,” says Knuchel who this 24 Screen International August 2015

year has selected participants from countries including Malaysia, Serbia, Bosnia, Taiwan, Morocco and Vietnam.

“Last year there were more male directors taking part, but this year there is a good balance and I have been particularly impressed by the women,” adds Knuchel, who says he always makes it his aim to introduce the budding film-makers to the right people.

“We want to give them the opportunity to have face-to-face meetings with the people who are really going to be interested in their work.”

Paraguayan film-maker Marcelo Martinessi, who took part in the academy in 2013 having made two short films (Karai Norte and Calle Ultima) describes the experience as “essential for meeting people and expanding my network and an ideal setting to rethink my own work”.

Industry ingénues Following a pilot last year, 2015 sees the official launch of Locarno’s Industry Academy, aimed at nurturing European professionals working in distribution, exhibition, sales and marketing, selected and tutored by project manager Marion Klotz. Eleven industry professionals will

‘We want all the young people to feel like they are part of one thing’ Sophie Bourdon, Locarno Film Festival

take part in a series of workshops, talks and networking events over six days.

“There are a lot of training initiatives but most of the time they are really focused on film-making and producing.

We wanted to provide an opportunity for the new generation of distributors, programmers and marketers and make sure young people know how exciting these jobs can be,” explains Bourdon, who has been impressed by the “entrepreneurial spirit and curiosity” of the applicants, who include representatives from France’s Doc&Film International and the UK’s Soda Pictures.

Along with talks and meetings, participants will take part in a workshop where they will be expected to create a marketing plan of one of the films being screened at the festival. And, crucially, there will be a crossover between the festival’s industry activities and the academy itself.

“All our participants will be invited to take part in key industry activities such as StepIn and the festival’s industry happy hour as well as having the chance to connect with others taking part in the academy,” says Bourdon. “It’s about creating a network of contacts that isn’t s exclusively in their own areas.” n www.screendaily.com

At less than hour’s drive from north to south, Ticino offers an incredible variety of locations: high mountains, hills, beaches, lakes, rivers, streams, industrial zones, railways, highways, mountain roads, towns, historic villages and castles.

Lugano - Ticino - Switzerland Lake Lugano and Mount San Giorgio, UNESCO World Heritage.

Simone Mengani Š Ticino Turismo

Locations available and manageable thanks to extremely straightforward, efficient and prompt public administration.

In addition Ticino boasts award-winning production companies, experienced and professional crews, and reliable service facilities.

Ticino Film Commission offers a free and confidential service to the film, television and commercial production community including: information and advice on locations and permissions; contacts for cast, crew and facilities; information on accommodation and recce support. www.filmcommission.ch info@filmcommission.ch