31/01/2008

The four-day Nordic Film Market (NFM), held during the Göteborg International Film Festival (January 25-February 4), is opening its doors tonight to some 200 international buyers, festival programmers, sales agents, producers and filmmakers avid to discuss and discover the latest offerings from the Nordic region.

Although squeezed between Sundance, Rotterdam and Berlin, NFM has been able to keep the numbers of attendance regular over the last few years. “We’re trying to keep the number of participants the same each year, because 200 is a good number and we always have more people coming from the festival side or the TV drama seminar [January 31-February 1],” stressed NFM Coordinator Cia Edström. “A lot of international buyers and festival programmers who attend are in fact ‘en route’ to Berlin and with Göteborg between Rotterdam and Berlin it actually works quite well.”

This year’s registered non-Nordic buyers includes Australia’s Brennan Wrenn (SBS Television), Germany’s Christian Meinke (MFA Film Distribution) and Christian Krusche (ZDF), the Nertherland’s Pim Hermeling (A Film), Taiwan’s Gino Hsu (Cineplex Development), and the UK’s Edward Fletcher (Soda Pictures), Michael Lionello Boscardi (Velvet Octopus), and Chris Oosterom (Yume Pictures).

The key attractions for participants are Works in Progress, carefully selected by Edström for their potential on the international marketplace. This year’s crop includes four Danish films: Henrik Ruben Genz’s Frygtelig lykkelig (produced by Fine & Mellow), Nils Malmros’ period film Heartaches (Nordisk Film), Gert Fredholm’s One Way Ticket to Korsør (Zentropa) and Kasper Barfoed’s thriller The Candidate (Miso Film).

The four Swedish films are Colin Nutley’s Angel (Sweetwater), Ruben Östlund’s Involuntary (Plattform), Ella Lemhagen’s Patrik 1,5 (Filmlance) and Peter Pontikis’ Vampires (produced by Patrick Sobieski).

The two Norwegian films previewed are Eva Sørhaug’s Cold Lunch (4 ½) and Morten Tyldum’s Varg Veum-Fallen Angel (SF). Iceland’s representative is Country Wedding, the directorial debut of established editor Valdis Oskarsdottir (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), produced by Mystery Island. Hanna Maylett’s Indigo (Kinotar) is representing Finland.

Among the new Nordic films screening at the market are Niels Arden Oplev’s Worlds Apart (Denmark) selected at Berlin’s Generation 14+ sold by Trust/Nordisk, the Swedish vampire film Let the Right One In by Tomas Alfredson, just picked up by Bavaria Film International Sales, and Gunnar B. Gudmundsson’s Icelandic hit Astropia.