News

Sundance’s Kim Yutani, and Directors’ Fortnight’s Gabriella Trujillo, along with execs from sales companies. including mK2, Coproduction Office, Reel Suspects and Be For Films will be among the industry execs taking part in Polish Days, the industry platform of the New Horizons International Film Festival, taking place in Wroclaw from July 21-23.

The event will showcase new films by Polish directors Aga Woszczyńska, Lukasz Ronduda and Damian Kocur.

Additionally, there will be closed screenings of four completed Polish films.

They are Jan P. Matuszyński’s Minghun, starring Marcin Dorocinski and Daxing Zhang shot in Polish, English and Chinese...

Filmfest Hamburg has 17 films funded by Moin screening at the festival.

Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein’s regional film fund Moin will have a strong presence at this year’s Filmfest Hamburg.

17 films funded by Moin will screen at the festival, including international productions such as Nicolaj Arcel’s King’s Land and Alice Troughton’s The Lesson as well as Isabal Herguera’s animated feature Sultana’s Dream and Leiv Igor Devold’s Norwegian Dream.

Other Moin backed features include new works by German filmmakers ranging from Sven Halfar (Heaven Can Wait - Wir Leben Jetzt) through to Stephan Rick (The Roots...

Polish Days runs July 23-25.

New films by Jan P. Matuszyński, Jakub Piątek, Agnieszka Zwiefka and the makers of Loving Vincent are among 22 projects being presented at the 2023 edition of Polish Days, the industry event for Polish cinema running during New Horizons International Film Festival (July 20-30) in Wrocław.

Scroll down for full line-up

The event runs July 23-25 and is aimed at sales agents, distributors and festival programmers.

The line-up includes four completed Polish films, including Marcin Koszałka’s historical drama White Courage, produced by Warsaw-based Balapolis, and Amp Polska’s production of Edward Porembny’s docudrama The Life...

“Forest,” an Italian eco-themed animation film about deforestation, has scored some strong pre-sales for Rome-based True Colours at the Cannes Marché du film.

The still-in-production 3-D animation feature – the protagonist of which is a young mushroom named Fey – has been picked up for roughly 20 territories by Top Film Distribution which will distribute “Forest” in Ukraine, Cis, the Baltics, and Eastern European countries including former Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Poland, Czech and Slovak Republics, Romania, and Hungary.

Helmed by Luca Della Grotta and Francesco Dafano, the film is produced by Italy’s Al One, the same team that previously spawned 2020 similarly themed animation feature “Trash” that sold in more than 30 countries.

“Forest” – which is the first animation title on the True Colours slate and a rare case of an Italian animation feature film – was presented last year as an in-development project at specialized co-production platforms including Cartoon Movie in the French city of Bordeaux.

Leiv Devold’s fiction feature sells to Benelux, Spain and Israel, having agreed US, UK and French deals.

Italian sales agent True Colours has concluded more international deals for Leiv Devold’s fiction feature debut Norwegian Dream which won the Screen International Best Pitch Award at last year’s Polish Days.

The queer love story set in a Norwegian fish factory has now been sold to Cinemien for distribution in the Benelux, Spain and Israel.

After its market premiere at Berlin’s EFM in February, the film sold to Uncork’d Entertainment and Dark Star Pictures, which will handle joint distribution in the USA and Canada,...

Laetitia Casta will soon appear on the big screen as the former wife of an abusive southern Italian man whom she is accused of murdering in the thriller “A Dark Story,” directed by Italy’s Leonardo D’Agostini.

In “Dark Story” the French star, whose recent credits include “The Crusade” directed by her husband Louis Garrel, plays Carla (first look image above), the ex-wife of Vito Semeraro, a banker who beat her when they were together and is the father of her three children. She is accused of murdering him a few years after they split up.

Italian sales company True Colours is launching sales in Cannes on this psychological noir that marks the sophomore feature by D’Agostini whose 2019 debut drama “The Champion” – a soccer dramedy about a young male soccer star and a shy academic who becomes his tutor – sold widely via the same outfit. Andrea Carpenzano stars in “Dark Story” alongside Casta.

Italian sales company True Colours has closed a raft of sales following Berlin’s European Film Market. Italy’s box office hit “La Stranezza” (“Strangeness”) got picked up for a dozen territories and queer romantic drama “Norwegian Dream” also sold widely, including to North America.

Directed by Roberto Andò, “Strangeness” (pictured) toplines Toni Servillo (“The Great Beauty”) as Nobel-prize-winning playwright Luigi Pirandello. This tragicomic period piece about how Pirandello found inspiration to write his masterpiece “Six Characters in Search of an Author” has been a sleeper hit at the Italian box office, coming from nowhere to pull more than €5.5 million ($5.8 million) and becoming the local 2022 box office champ.

Now “Strangeness,” which is produced by Bibi Film and Tramp Limited with Rai Cinema and Medusa, will be playing in: Spain (Alfa Pictures); Poland (Aurora Film); Portugal (Il Sorpasso); Argentina, Chile, Uruguay and Paraguay (Zeta Film); former Yugoslavia (Stars Media); Taiwan...

The coming-of-age drama is set in a fish factory.

Leiv Igor Devold’s debut feature Norwegian Dream has received the Screen International Best Pitch Award as one of the works in progress presented at this year’s Polish Days, the industry event for the Wroclaw-based New Horizons International Film Festival (July 21-31).

The €1m Norway-Poland-Germany co-production by Spaett Film, Solo Film and Riva Film, is a coming-of-age drama about a 19-year-old Polish immigrant who works at a fish factory in Norway and is struggling with his feelings for his colleague. When a strike begins among the Polish workers at the factory,...