27/11/2023 - The initiative played host to two panels revolving around collaborating and comparing approaches, while eight projects with international potential were presented to decision makers

Vallo Toomla and Evelin Penttilä pitching their project Beatrice

As the name suggests, Boost IT Lab is an intensive, 4-day, co-production-focused workshop launched this year by TFL Italia’s TorinoFilmLab. It ended with a pitching session on 23 November and unspooled with the 6th edition of Torino Film Industry, as part of the Torino Film Festival.

The 8 participating projects - 4 Italian and 4 international – were presented to Italian and international decision makers, ahead of their one-to-one meetings. The idea was to connect international professionals looking for minority Italian partners with emerging Italian producers and directors heading up feature film projects in the development phase, which also had the potential for international co-production. An increasing number of independent Italian companies are investing in projects from all over the world, thanks to new funding initiatives introduced in Italy which are helping them to diversify their offer and discover new talent.

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After a preparatory, online script mentoring session with a focus on cash flows and co-productions, participants were given the chance to develop their understanding of the rules, mechanisms and opportunities inherent to the Italian production ecosystem, courtesy of a team of international experts led by Head of Studies Francesco Giai Via. “In order to boost this global dimension, TFL has established partnerships with the Montenegro Film Centre, Méditalents (France), Brasil CineMundi and Projecto Paradiso (Brazil) so that projects and participants from Montenegro, the Mediterranean region and Brazil can also take part”, explained Giai Via and TFL’s Managing Director Mercedes Fernandez.

The pitches were preceded by two panel discussions. In International co-production and European indie companies: real opportunity for growth or necessary evil?, producers Eilon Ratzvovski and Giovanni Pompili joined sales agent Marcin Luczaj to explore the potential and limitations of co-production between independent companies. In Tomorrow’s stories: how international co-production can become a breeding ground for new tales and stories, Alec Von Bargen (pitching trainer) and Nicolò Gallio (audience designer) focused on how co-production between independent firms can give life to new stories with vast appeal, and how training and development activities play a key role in testing and improving their own potential.

“These are two moments of reflection during which to ponder the meaning of what we do”, Francesco Giai Via remarked to Cineuropa. “Given that TorinoFilmLab is a platform which has always brought professionals from so many countries together in order to create projects based on a more or less consolidated model, in the face of so many sometimes radical changes within the audiovisual market and how audiovisual is consumed, we asked ourselves how we might correct and modify this model, if it’s still the best possible version, or whether we need to partially rethink it”. From the various experts’ contributions, it emerged that this basic model wasn’t just some sterile magic formula adapted to reality. “It goes hand in hand with the desire to collaborate, to share and to all take responsibility together”. Ultimately, there’s a fundamentally human aspect to co-production, because you’re working together to create a project, and not just financially.

The second panel discussion explored the stories which might come to light and the kinds of audiences these might appeal to, when highly different sensibilities and backgrounds come together to co-produce.  Here, too, the need to find an individual viewpoint, developed by comparing notes with people outside of our little world, and to work upon it intensely, was found to be crucial. “It’s the necessary basis for enriching projects and opportunities”.

The Italian projects on the agenda were three works of fiction and one documentary: Disneilend, presented by director Loris G. Nese, whose various short films have been selected and rewarded in major festivals; The Fires by Fabio Bobbio, whose debut feature film The Cormorants [+see also:
trailer
film profile] was presented in the Visions du Rèel Festival and nominated for the Nastri d'Argento Awards; Incomparable by director, producer and director of photography Stefano Croci; and Pryvit Europe by documentary-maker Michele Aiello. The four international projects, meanwhile, all of which fiction feature films, were: Assa, a Fish in a Bowl, which is the first work by Dahlia Nemlich, who won the silver FIFOG and the Khayrallah Prize for her debut short film Roadblock; Beatrice by Vallo Toomla, whose first feature film Pretenders [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] was presented in the San Sebastian Film Festival and nominated for 6 Estonian Film Awards; Four Funerals and a Wedding by Nikola Mijovic, whose debut film Borders, Raindrops [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] took part in the Sarajevo Festival; and Recognition by Ondřej Novák, whose debut short Reconstruction took its first bow in competition at the Locarno Film Festival and was nominated for the EFA.

The selected projects are as follows:

Boost IT Lab

Pryvit Europe - Michele Aiello (Italy)
Production: Giulia Campagna (ZaLab Film)

The Fires - Fabio Bobbio (Italy)
Production: Chiara Andrich (Ginko Film)

Incomparable - Stefano Croci (Italy)
Production: Lorenzo Bagnato (Caucaso)

Four Funerals and a Wedding - Nikola Mijovic (Montenegro)
Production: Maja Kecojevic (Parangal Film)

Assa, a Fish in a Bowl - Dahlia Nemlich (France)
Production: Marine Vaillant (Special Touch Studios)

Disneilend - Loris G. Nese (Italy)
Production: Chiara Marotta (Lapazio Film)

Recognition - Ondřej Novák (Czech Republic)
Production: Dagmar Sedláčková (MasterFilm)

Beatrice - Vallo Toomla (Estonia)
Production: Evelin Penttilä (Stellar Film)

(Translated from Italian)