The MIDPOINT international script development programme is joining forces with experts from the Sundance Institute and the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival for the second time in order to offer an opportunity for deep analysis of feature-film scripts for emerging talents in the region at MIDPOINT Intensive @ KVIFF. This year, the organisers have picked six projects from first- and second-time feature writers and directors that will benefit from individual script counselling provided by professional script editors Erik Jendressen and Naomi Foner, while the participants will also have the chance to partake in the industry and networking opportunities that the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival offers.

This year’s Intensive batch consists of the Bulgarian project From Space with Love by writer-director Yassen Genadiev (produced by Gergana Stankova), following the 14-year-old protagonist who, owing to her ability to heal people with her special energy, becomes entangled in a plot devised by her mother, who has recently lost her job. This plan is just as mystical as the protagonist’s power, and involves the emergence of a new world order triggered by the arrival of extra-terrestrials, which her mother believes will play a crucial role in proceedings. Meanwhile, Serbian filmmaker Vuk Ršumovič, who was behind the gripping orphan drama No One’s Child [+lire aussi :
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fiche film], brings his latest story, Living, to Karlovy Vary along with his producers Mirko Bojovic and Miroslav Mogoric. Ršumovič is working on an equally gripping drama revolving around a child left to die, framed within the topic of immigration. Promising young Czech director Štepán Altrichter, of Schmitke [+lire aussi :
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fiche film] fame, is working on an adaptation of National Street, a novel by Jaroslav Rudiš nicknamed “the lonely man’s fight club”. The main character, Vandam (whose moniker stems from the name Jean-Claude Van Damme), is a history buff who likes to get into fights and “teach people a lesson”.

Another project comes from Azerbaijan: writer-director Ismail Safarali and producer Maria Ibrahimova’s Night Tide is set in a tiny Azerbaijani fishing village that falls victim to several tragedies, which the locals attribute to Sara’s unwillingness to bury her father, who was lost at sea, until she sees proof that he is dead. Ukrainian filmmaker Dmytro Sukholytkyy-Sobchuk will be consulting on his feature-debut script, Pamfir [+lire aussi :
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interview : Dmytro Sukholytkyy-Sobchuk
interview : Dmytro Sukholytkyy-Sobchuk
fiche film], in Karlovy Vary, which sees the eponymous protagonist engaging in the illicit business of smuggling, just so he can earn the remainder of what he needs for his son’s eye surgery. The 2017 Intensive session concludes with a Macedonian project, The Candlemaker by Svetozar Ristovski, which recounts the story of a woman who starts getting paranoid that her husband is hurting her while she sleeps. Soon, she finds herself trapped in a nightmarish world of uncertainty and guilt.

Naomi Foner will give a keynote lecture on script doctoring and its essential role in film development as part of the Karlovy Vary discussion The Benefits of Guided Script Development, open to industry professionals on 4 July.