The upcoming tenth edition of the Baltic Pitching Forum (BPF), the leading short-film industry event in the Baltic region, will take place in Vilnius between 5 and 8 October. This year’s forum will celebrate a decade of showcasing Baltic filmmakers, and will invite selected participants from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – alongside guest country Norway – to pitch their film projects to a number of international experts. The gathering will also provide open lectures that will explore the topics of short-film production, co-production and sustainability.

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In detail, Estonia will be represented by Sander Joon’s animated project Offside (produced by Aurelia Aasa), alongside two fiction projects – namely, Anna Hints and Tushar Prakash’s Sauna Day (produced by Johanna Maria Paulson), and Ragne Mandri and Sushant Bhat’s The Toilet (produced by Nevena Semova).

From Latvia, there will be three fiction projects: Amanda Grinberga’s Baranki (produced by Matiss Kaza), Tīna Zariņa’s Limo (produced by Alise Ģelze) and Kristina Martinuka’s The House (produced by Svetlana Punte).

Meanwhile, the Lithuanian participants include Antanas Skučas’ animated film Conductor, the hybrid-format project Displaced Childhood, helmed by Miglė Satkauskaitė and Giedrė Narušytė Boots (a Rasa Miškinytė production), and the fiction film SPA by Ieva Šakalytė, staged by Akvilė Žilionytė.

Finally, Norway will showcase three short fiction projects: Kasper Quintanilla’s Boys of Running (produced by Franziska Schminke), Hamza Kader and Aurora Nossen’s Growing Pains (produced by Fabien Greenberg and Bård Kjøge Rønning), and Carl Georg Rødsten’s Rocket to Freedom (produced by Kai Andre Sunde).

The selection criteria for the projects included their potential for co-production, their relevance for international audiences and the experience notched up by the production outfit. In anticipation of the BPF, the selected participants and projects will receive personalised consultations on their screenplays. During the event, the participants will take part in a pitching master class as well as a number of open lectures. They will also pitch their projects to a panel of industry experts, who will give feedback on the projects and confer a number of awards upon selected projects.

The BPF Panel will award two Baltic short-film projects with the right to participate in the Euro Connection European Short Film Co-production Forum, which is part of the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, as well as the Talents and Short Film Market (TSFM) and its “You Only Pitch Twice” pitching session.

The Baltic producers jury, consisting of three experienced Baltic producers, will select the best short-film project and reward it with the Baltic Producers MEDIA Award, consisting of a €1,000 cash prize.

Commenting on this year’s selected projects, Rimantė Daugėlaitė, head of the BPF and the Lithuanian Short Film Agency, said: “The 12 selected projects represent themes such as the intersection of different cultures, identity and the search for it, the influence of the past on people’s self-awareness, social norms and many other timely subjects. Every year, the Baltic Pitching Forum receives projects that react promptly to world events and respond to the social reality, and – as has been the case throughout its decade-long history – this year’s forum demonstrates not only the vitality of the short-film form, but also the skill and talent of the creators making films.”

The tenth BPF will be a live, in-person event, although the pitching sessions will be available online to industry professionals around the world. The event is organised by the Lithuanian Short Film Agency “Lithuanian Shorts”, in partnership with the Riga International Film Festival, the Riga International Short Film Festival 2ANNAS, PÖFF Shorts and the Estonian Short Film Center ShortEst. The sponsors of the event include the Lithuanian Film Centre, the Nordic-Baltic Mobility Programme for Culture, the Audiovisual Works Copyright Association “AVAKA” and the Vilnius City Municipality. Its partners are the Creative Europe Desks/MEDIA offices in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, the Norwegian Film Institute and the Vilnius Film Office.

You can find out more about the 12 projects here. The full list is below:

Estonia

Offside - Sander Joon
Producer: Aurelia Aasa

Sauna Day - Anna Hints and Tushar Prakash
Producer: Johanna Maria Paulson

The Toilet - Ragne Mandri and Sushant Bhat
Producer: Nevena Semova

Latvia

Baranki - Amanda Grinberga
Producer: Matiss Kaza

Limo - Tīna Zariņa
Producer: Alise Ģelze

The House - Kristina Martinuka
Producer: Svetlana Punte

Lithuania

Conductor - Antanas Skučas
Producer: Antanas Skučas

Displaced Childhood - Miglė Satkauskaitė and Giedrė Narušytė Boots
Producer: Rasa Miškinytė

SPA - Ieva Šakalytė
Producer: Akvilė Žilionytė

Norway

Boys of Running - Kasper Quintanilla
Producer: Franziska Schminke

Growing Pains - Hamza Kader and Aurora Nossen
Producers: Fabien Greenberg and Bård Kjøge Rønning

Rocket to Freedom - Carl Georg Rødsten
Producer: Kai Andre Sunde