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MARKET Norway

Welcome to sales, for Rune Denstad Langlo’s third feature

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- The Norwegian director’s migrant comedy Welcome to Norway!, which was world-premiered and awarded at Göteborg, has already been sold to several countries

Welcome to sales, for Rune Denstad Langlo’s third feature
Welcome to Norway! by Rune Denstad Langlo

Norwegian director Rune Denstad Langlo’s Welcome to Norway! [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Rune Denstad Langlo
film profile
]
, which was screened last week (5 February) in the Dragon Award Competition at the Göteborg International Film Festival, before going on to win the Audience Award for Best Nordic Film, is likely to become a hot ticket for Germany’s Beta Cinema.

The Munich-based international sales agent has so far signed deals with Germany/Austria (Neue Visionen), Italy (Good Films) and Switzerland (Film Copy) for Langlo’s comedy, which will be released domestically on 4 March by Norsk Filmdistribusjon. Langlo, who attended the Göteborg presentation with his main cast, scripted his third feature himself; it was produced by Sigve Endresen for Oslo’s Motlys, whom he has been working with for 18 years.

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In the movie, Anders Baasmo Christiansen stars as Petter Primus, the owner of a mountain-resort hotel, where tourists have stopped coming. To save his business and his family, he converts it into a state-supported refugee asylum centre, in spite of his scepticism towards foreigners. And among the first 50 unruly arrivals, mostly comprising Muslims, is Abedi, from Congo, who annoys the hell out of his host.

Welcome to Norway! was Endresen’s last production as CEO of the Motlys production shingle, which he founded 33 years ago – on 1 January, he stepped down to continue as a consultant and head of the board (“and producer, if the right project suddenly comes up”), while also being associate professor at the Norwegian Film School and an adviser at the Stavanger regional film fund.

Meanwhile, Motlys’ Hans-Jørgen Osnes has just started principal photography in Colombia for Norwegian director Arild Andresen’s Handle with Care [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Arild Andresen
film profile
]
, about a Norwegian father’s search for his six-year-old son’s biological mother; the company is also producing Norwegian pubcaster NRK’s new football-based TV series, Home Ground.

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