Mundruczo, Riklis projects selected for Berlinale Co-Production Market

In addition, the lineup of projects includes new feature projects by Polish filmmaker Urszula Antoniak, whose Nothing Personal was the big hit of Locarno in 2009, and Turkey’s Seyfi Teoman whose latest film Our Grand Despair will premiere at this year’s Official Competition in Berlin.

The official selection of 24 projects was made from a total of 352 submissions, two more than last year, while 11 projects by newcomers were selected from another 270 entries for the Talent Project Market which is organised in cooperation with the Berlinale Talent Campus.

One of the projects being pitched in the Talent Project Market is Russian actor-producer Dimitri Klepatski’s The Find, which was previously presented at the Moscow Co-Production Forum and Baltic Event last year.

In addition, the Berlinale Co-Production Market and Rotterdam’s CineMart have joined forces again for the Rotterdam-Berlinale Express where three projects have the opportunity to be presented at both co-production gatherings.

Speaking exclusively to ScreenDaily, project director Sonja Heinen explained that a new initiative, Company Matching, will be introduced on the last morning of the Co-Production Market in addition to the pre-arranged individual project meetings.

“We have picked three companies – Pandora Film in Germany, Morena Films in Spain and Amerique Films in Canada - who already have outstanding reputations both in their home country and internationally and we want to present them to other companies via this new initiative,” Heinen said.

“One might think that these companies already have their networks and enough projects, but when we spoke to the staff at these companies, we saw that they are always open to new connections and ideas. We have selected these three as an experiment and will present the companies each in a double page spread in the project catalogue.”

“Participants will be able to request meetings with these production companies, but we will have to ensure that people are not using these meetings to pitch their projects and are instead looking to identify structural similarities and the chances for prospective future collaborations ”.

According to Heinen, some 40% of the projects presented at the past seven Berlinale Co-Production Markets, i.e. 104 films, have since been made.

This year, for example, sees a previous participant, Israeli director Nir Bergman’s Intimate Grammar, and a former Talent Project Market entry, The Bad Intentions by Peru’s Rosario Garcia-Montero, both invited to screen in Generation Kplus.

“Looking through the catalogue for last year’s Co-Production Market, one can see that many of the projects have since gone into production or are completed,” Heinen observed. “The project which attracted the most interest – I, Anna by Embargo Films and Arsam International – starts shooting at the end of January and found [German producer] Michael Eckelt as a partner here last year. Only Son [by Belgium’s Entre Chien et Loup] and Montana [by M.G. Productions] have wrapped and My Sweet Orange Tree [from Brazil’s Passaro Films] is currently shooting.”

She added that Yuval Adler’s action drama Bethlehem by Israel’s Pie Films has closed its financing and should begin shooting soon, while Dito Tsintsadze’s psychological thriller Invasion, produced by Germany’s Twenty Twenty Vision and Pallas Film, and Talent Project Market participant Ami Livne’s social drama Central Station are both currently at the shooting stage.

A part of the European Film Market (EFM), the Berlinale Co-Production Market received substantial financial support from the German regional fund MDM and the European Union’s MEDIA Programme.

The official selection of projects for the Berlinale Co-Production Market 2011 (listed alphabetically by production company):

Love Isreal (dir: Julia von Heinz), 2Pilots Filmproduction, Germany

They Are All Dead (dir: Beatriz Sanchis), Avalon P.C., Spain

Saints (dir: Seyfi Teoman), Bulut Film, Turkey

Darkness by Day (dir: Martin Desalvo), Doménica Films, Argentina

The Woman Who Feared the Sun (dir: Javier Fuentes-León), Dynamo Producciones, Columbia; Neue Cameo Film, Germany & Elcalvo Films, Peru/USA

The Intriguing Art of Secrets (dir: Andy De Emmony), Element Pictures, Ireland

The Killing of Henry James (dir: Sylvain Archambault), Filmarto/BBR, Canada

Tove and the Mermaid (dir: Miikko Oikkonen), Fisher King Production, Finland

Wakolda (dir: Lucía Puenzo), Historias Cinematográficas, Argentina

The Way Home / La strada per casa (Dir: Bruno Oliviero), Invisibile Film, Italy

Balaton Submarine (dir: Orsi Nagypál), KMH Film, Hungary

A Green and Quiet River (dir: Alain Choquart), Le Bureau, France

Aurore (dir: Stéphane Vuillet), Les Films Du Présent, France

Headhunter (dir: Bastian Günther), Lichtblick Media & Lichtblick Film, Germany

The 90 Minute War (dir: Eyal Halfon), Norma Productions, Israel

The Devil’s Pool (dir: James Lapine), Open City Films, US & K5 Film, Germany

The Flying Man (dir: Kornél Mundruczó), Proton Cinema, Hungary

Broken (dir: Miika Soini), Public Films & Helsinki Filmi, Finland

Still Life (dir: Uberto Pasolini), Red Wave Films, UK

Watchtower (dir:: Pelin Esmer), Sinefilm, Turkey

Remainder (dir: Omer Fast), Tigerlily Films, UK

The Spider in the Web (dir: Eran Riklis), Topia Communications, Israel

Life According to Nino (dir: Urszula Antoniak), Waterland Film & Family Affair Films, Netherlands

2 Kidnappings (dir: Marcos Jorge), Zencrane Filmes & Migdal Filmes, Brazil

Rotterdam-Berlinale Express

Loud (dir: Aneta Lesnikovska), AKA Film, Macedonia

We Are Dead (dir: Tobias Nölle), Hugofilm Productions, Switzerland

The Cyclops (dir: Jukka-Pekka Valkeapää), Kinotar, Finland

Talent Project Market

(listed alphabetically by Talent):

Challatt of Tunis (prod: Habib Attia), Tunisia

Preservation (dir/prod: Nicole Brending), US

The Babadook (prod: Kristina Ceyton), Australia/Germany

Youth (prod: Gal Greenspan), Israel

Brian (dir: Angela How), Singapore/US

The Find (prod: Dimitri Klepatski), Russia

Greicekelly (dir: Rafael Lessa), Brazil

The South Is Nothing/Il Sud è niente (dir: Fabio Mollo), Italy

Woman of the Father (prod: Aletéia Selonk), Brazil

Bad Stock (dir: Rachel Tillotson), UK

The Here After (prod: Mariusz Wlodarski and dir: Magnus von Horn), Poland/Sweden