Lotte From Gadgetville number one
by Annika Pham
The children’s animated film Lotte from Gadgetville [+see also:
trailer
film profile] is beating every box office record since its domestic premiere on September 1. The Estonia/Latvian co-production is by far the number one local title in 2006 and the third most popular film among all domestic releases this year.
“We expect the film to outperform The Da Vinci Code, which has 60,000 admissions,” said the film’s producer Riina Sildos and sales agent Solveig Langeland (Sola Media). “We have 54,000 admissions after seven weeks and are still going strong”.
Lotte’s new adventures, brought to the screen by animation specialists Janno Põldma and Heiki Ernits, has outperformed many Hollywood children’s films released in Estonia in recent years, such as The Incredibles (29,000 admissions) and Cars (28,000). It has also beaten last year’s most successful film, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (46,616 admissions) as well as and last year’s top local title Mat The Cat (29,863).
The film follows the adventures of Lotte the Dog, Bruno the cat, Albert the rabbit and Susumu the Japanese bee in a town where inventing new things is a hobby and a way of life. It was produced by Eesti Joonisfilm in co-production with Latvia’s Rija Films, with support from the MEDIA Programme and Eurimages.
Sola Media/Atrix Films, who are handling sales, have already sold it to Austria, Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Norway and Sweden, and Germany (MFA Film Distribution, which will release it on February 27, 2007).
Other Estonian films have done very well at the box office this year: Katrin Laur’s children’s film Ruudi, produced by Allfilm in co-production with Finland (MRP–Matila Rohr Productions) and Germany (Filmkollectiv), is the second most popular local film with 39,299 tickets sold; followed by Jüri Sillart’s Golden Beach (9,000 admissions), produced by Taska Film; and Elmo Nüganen’s Mindless, which has already sold 6,372 tickets since early October.
This year, a total of eight Estonian feature films have premiered in theatres.
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