25/01/2012

Grandma and the Eight Children, a Norwegian kid-pic classic written by and starring Anne-Cath Vestly will be revived as a musical by Norwegian director Lisa Marie Gamlem (pictured) in her feature debut, following two shorts competing in Berlin and Cannes and an Emmy-nominated TV series (Ping Pong).

The Norwegian Film Institute chipped in €1.4 million for the €3.3 million production from Finn Gjerdrum, of Paradox Spillefilm, when allocating a total of €5.7 million for four new features and two documentaries. Grandma and the Eight Children: The Musical is scripted by Birgitte Bratseth, of Twigson [+see also:
trailer
film profile] fame following Mona, who is too little to be old and too old to be little, and her grandmother, who both feel that they are being kept on the sidelines.

Gjerdrum and Paradox also received €1.5 million for A Somewhat Gentle Man [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Hans Petter Moland
film profile] (pictured) director Hans Petter Moland’s previosuly announced The Prize Idiot, Danish award-winning writer Kim Fupz Aakeson’s story of a family father and snowplough entrepreneur, who provokes a showdown in the local underworld. The total budget for the film, which is also backed by Eurimages, is €4.1 million.

Norwegian author Lars Saabye Christensens’s literary 1984 break, Beatles, depicting four 1960s’ teenagers about to enter the grown-up world, with their hopes and disappointments, boyish tricks, girls, falling in love and despair, but no group is better than The Beatles – will be adapted for the screen by Max Manus and Kon-Tiki directors Joachim Rønning and Espen Sandberg.

One of the best-selling novels in Norway of all time, Beatles will be scripted by Axel Hellstenius, who has previously adapted – among others - the Elling books for cinema. Jørgen Storm Rosenberg, of Storm Rosenberg AS, which most recently produced Magic Mountain franchises, was backed