Four shorts from the Nordic Factory to screen in Directors’ Fortnight
- For the second year running, the Residency, Workshop and Film Production Concept will unspool at Cannes, this time with films by Danish and Finnish directors
Two Danish and two Finnish directors have joined the Nordic Factory 2014, which will open the Directors’ Fortnight at the upcoming Cannes International Film Festival (14-25 May) with a programme of shorts, co-directed by international colleagues.
Instigated last year by the Cannes sidebar together with the Taipei Film Commission, the Residency, Workshop and Film Production Concept invites eight directors to develop ideas online, then meet at a script workshop before shooting their 15-minute shorts.
This year supported by New Danish Screen, the Copenhagen Film Fund and the Finnish Film Foundation, Danish directors Milad Alami and Kræsten Kusk have teamed up with Aygul Bakanova (Kyrgyzstan) and Natalia Garagiola (Argentina), and Finnish directors Hamy Ramezan and Selma Vilhunen have joined forces with Rungano Nyoni (Zambia) and Guillaume Mainguet (France).
After a three-day script meeting, the four crews and casts are currently (4-14 March) filming on location in Copenhagen, with Valeria Richter and Helene Granqvist producing. The results will be premiered on 15 May in Cannes, with the directors in attendance.
A 2011 graduate from the National Film School of Denmark, Alami is developing Void with Bakanova, while Kusk, who has directed 15 shorts since 1998, is making Sundays with Garagiola. Ramezan most recently competed in Clermont-Ferrand, and Vilhunen’s Do I Have to Take Care of Everything? was on the shortlist for this year’s Oscar.
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