EXCLUSIVE: Martina Droandi’s Vienna-based sales outfit Odd Slice Films has taken world rights to Angelica Ruffier’s debut feature, La Belle Année, ahead of its world premiere in the Tiger competition of International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR) later this month.
All rights to the documentary essay film are available, excluding Sweden, where the film will be released theatrically by Folkets Bio on April 17.
La Belle Année is produced by Marta Dauliūtė and Brynhildur Þórarinsdóttir, with support from the Swedish Film Institute’s Wild Card scheme for emerging filmmakers.
The film follows the director as she clears her childhood home after the death of her estranged father and meditates on the passionate and solitary love she once had as a teenager for her history teacher. An intense desire grows in Angelica to meet this teacher again.
IFFR’s director Vanja Kaludjercic described the film as “sensitive and finely woven like a cobweb, yet touched with the glamour of French cinema’s 1970s heroines,” and as “a delicate journey of memory and desire.”
The film is produced by Sweden’s MDEMC, with Norwegian outfit Aldeles, Film Stockholm and Filmpool Nord. Further funding came from the Norwegian Film Institute, Western Norway Film Fund and the Swedish Arts Grants Committee.
“I deeply admire Angelica’s fearless openness and her ability to articulate complex, often uncomfortable feelings with honesty and sensitivity,” said Droandi. “Her storytelling goes beyond traditional non-fiction boundaries, creating an outstanding, emotionally driven film.”
Odd Slice, launched last summer, is a sales company for “bold, author-driven and wonderfully odd films,” she explained.
The company’s slate also includes Miguel Eek’s Amilcar, an award winner in IDFA’s Envision Competition, Olia Verriopoulou’s Stories Of A Lie, which also premiered at IDFA, Tom Adjibi’s upcoming comic documentary This Is Not A French Film, and media artist and critic Kevin B Lee’s Afterlives, a reflective documentary looking at the historical traces of extremist propaganda in the media.
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