News

In a move that promises to create a new indie production powerhouse in Belgium, Caviar, the company behind The Sound Of Metal, War Pony and The Rider, has taken 45% of the shares of leading Belgian outfit Versus Production and its two sister companies Inver Invest and O’Brother Distribution.

The remaining 55% of the shares will stay in the hands of Versus founder Jacques-Henri Bronckart. Together, the aim is to develop larger-scale, international-facing projects across film and television.

Founded in 1999, Versus is one of Belgium’s most respected production outfits, known for its work with directors like Bouli Lanners and Joachim Lafosse...

Moresnet is a storied town and the setting for a European mystery thriller of the same name about a group of friends who dig up a time capsule buried two decades earlier, only to find their names listed inside with dates marked for their death.

Boris Van Severen (Salamander) is the chain-smoking Ben, who returns to Moresnet to bury his father. His homecoming sets in train events that inexorably lead to Thalamus, a huge neuro-technology corporation that in turn holds the key to a darkly secretive project known as Eterneco.

Leonie Benesch (Babylon Berlin) stars as the granddaughter of mysterious Nobel Prize-winning scientist Robert Rolin (Pierre Bokma) and is his successor as CEO at Thalamus.

When Benesch sits down with Deadline she has just seen the finished show for the very first time at its international launch at Canneseries – the big-ticket drama event on the Côte d’Azur. “I loved every second…...

Mystery thriller “Moresnet,” which had its world premiere this week at TV festival Canneseries, is set in a sleepy village in Belgium, Moresnet, but underneath the placid surface dark forces lurk.

Variety spoke to writer Jef Hoogmartens and director Frank Van Passel about the show, which is being distributed by Newen Connect.

The series centers on a group of adults who used to be friends when they were children, but were traumatized when one of them, Daan, murdered another for no apparent reason.

Two decades later the friends – minus Daan, who is locked up in the local asylum – gather in the village again after Daan’s brother Ben returns for his father’s funeral. The friends decide to dig up a time capsule they buried on the night of the murder. In that, they find Daan’s diary. On the last page, Ben discovers a list of names… with the death dates of his friends.

‘Girl’ and ’Close’ director Dhont will select five emerging filmmaking talents for The Future Five.

Flanders Image’s annual film and TV showcase Connext (October 9-10) will present new work from the region’s creatives including Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, and see Lukas Dhont curate the first edition of new talent showcase The Future Five.

Girl and Close director Dhont will select five emerging filmmaking talents for The Future Five, who will be presented to international industry attending Connext in Antwerp on the event’s first day. The initiative is in association with Screen International.

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‘Girl’ and ’Close’ director Dhont will select five emerging filmmaking talents for The Future Five.

Flanders Image’s annual film and TV showcase Connext (October 9-10) will present new work from regional filmmakers including Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, and see Lukas Dhont curate the first edition of new talent showcase The Future Five.

Girl and Close director Dhont will select five emerging filmmaking talents for The Future Five, who will be presented to international industry attending Connext in Antwerp on the event’s first day. The initiative is in association with Screen International.

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Among...

Belgium’s Panenka, producers of recent Vrt breakout hit “Two Summers” – which premiered last week to a jaw-dropping 51% market share in its prime-time slot and which will soon be released worldwide by Netflix – will virtually pitch one of their upcoming projects, “This is Not a Murder Mystery,” at Berlin Co-Pro Series.

One of 10 such projects set for this event, Co-Pro Series marks the first public pitch for “Tinamm,” with the creative team looking to the right co-production and distribution partner to help realize their murder mystery series. Panenka producer Kristoffel Mertens hosts the virtual Co-Pro pitch with co-creators Paul Baeten and Christophe Dirickx.

Baeten is a novelist, essayist and TV screenwriter, whose credits include two seasons of the acclaimed drama series “Over Water” and the aforementioned “Two Summers.” Dirickx has written and produced several feature films, including Cannes players “The Misfortunates” from director Felix van Groeningen and Frank Van Passel’s “Manneken Pis.

A total of 46 films and 27 series will be showcased at the online-only event.

Lukas Dhont’s second feature Close and Olga Lucovnicova’s Last Letters From My Grandma are among the 46 feature and 27 series projects to be showcased at Re>Connext, the annual showcase for films and TV series made in Flanders and Brussels, Belgium.

Close is filmmaker Dhont’s follow-up to Girl, which won the Camera d’Or following its premiere in Un Certain Regard at Cannes in 2018. Last year, the project was pitched at Re>Connext under the title The Invisible.

For this edition, drama Close returns as a work in progress,...

New Europe Film Sales is representing the Bel-Swe-Nor-nl co-production.

Cloudboy has won the Works In Progress award - which comes with an $11,000 (€10,000) prize - at Flanders Image’s inaugural NeXT event. The story is about a Belgian boy who connects to his Swedish mother’s Sami roots during a summer trip to Lapland.

An international industry jury said, “We really want to see the special world that director Meikeminne Clinckspoor has created. We thought producer Katleen Goossens was very well prepared with her presentation, and both she and Meikeminne also told us about the heart of the story not just the plot. The story is both original and universal and we think it will appeal to wide audiences.”

Flanders Image had invited invited 13 projects in post-production – all backed by the Flanders Audiovisual fund — to pitch to the international industry in attendance.

The 13 projects in detail:

Blue Silence, wr/dir Bülent Öztürk, prod [link=nm...

The debut feature from Kenneth Mercken triumphed in a field of eight projects.

Coureur, directed by Kenneth Mercken and produced by Eurydice Gysel and Koen Mortier of Czar Film, has won the best project pitch at the inaugural NeXT in Ghent.

The Flanders Image event invited eight projects in development — all backed by the Flanders Audiovisual Fund — to pitch to the international industry in attendance.

Of Coureur, the industry jury said they were “especially impressed with Kenneth’s personal point of view in his own father-son story, and how he can tell this story of the cycling world from a very inside point of view in a unique way… We think it’s a film that will be quite personal to his experience but also can appeal to wide audiences.”

Ace and Lites donate $11,000 (€10,000) in facilities spend to each award winner. The prize also includes a media spend for advertising.

Details of the...

Two screenings in Brussels of the Toronto award-winner cancelled over age-rating dispute.

Amid turbulent scenes on Wednesday night in Belgium, Kinepolis Brussels had to cancel two screenings of controversial new Belgian movie Black because of rioting.

The film, which won the Discovery Award at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, is based on a children’s book and directed by Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah.

It tells the story of a 15-year-old girl in a gang in Brussels who must choose between loyalty and her heart when she falls for a Moroccan boy from a rival group.

The much-hyped movie, which opened in Belgium on Wednesday, has a 16 certificate. This meant that teenagers desperate to see the movie could not gain admission.

What many did was to buy tickets for other films and then attempt to slip into the auditoriums that were showing Black. But these screenings were already completely sold out and the youngseter...

Read More: Toronto International Film Festival Adds New Galas and Special Presentations, Including 'Mr. Right,' 'I Saw the Light,' 'Our Brand is Crisis' and 'Equals' In what looks to be a visually stunning and potentially disturbing tale of star crossed lovers, "Black", the second feature from directors Adil El Arbi and Bilal Fillah, is set to play at the Toronto International Film Festival this month. The film will also play at the 42nd Film Festival Gent this October.  The film comes from Caviar, who also produced the indie darling "The Diary of a Teenage Girl," with Bert Hamelinck, Frank Van Passel and Ivy Vanhaecke all producing the feature. The official synopsis reads, "Worlds collide when Mavela, a teenage girl with ties to Brussels' Black Bronx gang, meets Marwan, a member of a rival Moroccan gang, at a police station. Keenly aware of the consequences of...

Exclusive: Catherine Deneuve has joined the cast of Cannes award-winning director Jaco Van Dormael’s surreal comedy in which God lives in Brussels.

The Brand New Testament will star comedian Benoit Poelvoorde as God and Yolande Moreau as God’s wife. Deneuve, the Belle du Jour star who more recently starred in Potiche, also features.

The original story, co-written by Van Dormael and Thomas Gunzig, portrays God as an odious character who is disliked by his family.

His daughter, Ea, decides to run away from home but first hacks her father’s computer and lets everyone in the world know the date when they are going to die. God takes to the streets to find Ea and discovers the horrors of a world he created himself.

Produced by Van Dormael, Olivier Rausin, Daniel Marquet, David Grumbach, and Frank Van Passel, the film is set up as a Belgium, French and Luxembourg coproduction with an $11.4m (€8.3m) budget...

Chicago – One of the annual gems of the Chicago movie scene is the Siskel Film Center’s unmissable European Union Film Festival. It provides local movie buffs with the opportunity to sample some of the finest achievements in world cinema. For many of the festival selections, their EU appearance will function as their sole screening in the Windy City.

This year’s edition, running from March 2nd through the 29th, includes high profile films from world renowned filmmakers like Andrea Arnold (“Wuthering Heights”), Bruce Dumont (“Hors Satan”), Dominique Abel and Fiona Gordon (“The Fairy”), Abdellatif Kechiche (“Black Venus”) and John Landis (“Burke & Hare”). Moviegoers will have the opportunity to see the latest work from some of the world’s most acclaimed and beloved actors, including Léa Seydoux (“Belle Épine”), Tahir Rahim (“Free Men”), Colm Meaney (“Parked”), Noomi Rapace (“Beyond”), Andy Serkis (“Burke & Hare”), Isabella Rossellini (“Late Bloomers”) and Ewan McGregor...

I moderated a Women in Film and Television International panel on new methods and old for financing features with:

Julie Baines

Producer, Dan Films, UK

has had an extensive career in the film industry. She founded the independent production company Dan Films in 1994. In 1998 she was named one of the Top Ten Producers to Watch by Variety. Since then, she has established herself as a leading figure in both British Films and international multi-party co-productions.

Julie most recently produced Christopher Smith's Triangle, a psychological thriller starring Melissa George, which is being distributed worldwide by Icon.

As well as producing with acclaimed directors including Nicolas Roeg, Peter Bogdanovich, Frank Van Passel, Michael Winterbottom, Mika Kaurismaki and Deepa Mehta, she enjoys discovering and working with new talent. Julie acts as the external examiner for the Ma Producing course at the National Film and Television School, Beaconsfield. In effect her final comment was that one must be clever to finance films today. Their U.K./ German coproduction uses funds, tax credits, distribution pre-buys and now private equity.

Christine Berg, Deputy Director, Ffa, German Federal Film Board has been deputy chairman of the German Federal Film Board (Ffa) since 1 February 2012. In this capacity she is responsible for all Ffa funding. She was previously project director of the German Federal Film Fund (Dfff), which was initiated on 1 January 2007 by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (Bkm) and coordinated by the Ffa.

In addition, Christine Berg, a native of Hamburg, headed up the Msh - Gesellschaft zur Förderung audiovisueller Werke in Schleswig-Holstein mbH (Society for the Promotion of Audio-visual Works in Schleswig-Holstein), was artistic director of the festival Nordic Film Days in Lübeck, as well as being director of the Hamburg Filmförderung Office and producer at Kinowelt. She announced she is soon going to a new job....but meanwhile, the Dfff is automatic. If 25% of the budget of a film with German distribution attached is spent in Germany then there is a 20% rebate on the spend. Not bad...

Debbie Elbin, Founder and President, The New York Picture Company launched launched Ps:usa, Inc. a subsidiary of The N.Y. Picture Company Inc., at the 2008 Berlin Film Festival. Specifically targeted at international producers interested in producing content in the U.S., Ps:usa, Inc. offers access to the new U.S. production incentives and tax credits. In 2007, Debbie was based in Berlin, Germany, where she served as production consultant during the prep phase of the Wachowski Brothers' picture Speed Racer. On tap for Joel Silver, Warner Brothers and Village Roadshow, she was asked to report on the January '07 German film incentive program, as well as local VFX capabilities.

Prior, Elbin was based in Moscow, Russia, where she held the position of VP Production, Sony Pictures TV International for the territories Russia and the Cis. Her mandate was to found a new Russian company for the studio and head it as General Manager. Other than investigating how to structure such an entity, this also entailed finding viable producing partners and building creative teams of local writers and directors. In addition to selling two comedy formats, one of which was Bete La Fea, which subsequently rated #1 for Ctc, she was in charge of six productions in various stages of development, production, or post production. Genre-wise, they ranged from telenovellas to comedy series and a game show. Among those were the highly rated Russian versions of Married with Children entitled Happy Together, The Nanny, and the original Talisman of Love and Nastia.

Fall 2004, Elbin founded the Dutch production company, The N.L. Picture Company B.V. in Rotterdam, Holland. Created to develop and produce international film and TV co-productions as an EU partner, The N.L. Picture Company B.V. Xtc, a U.S./Netherlands co-production, which was selected for the Holland Film Meeting sidebar of the Netherlands Film Festival, Utrecht, is the first film in development. The Kitchen, a television comedy series, was developed for Wdr in conjunction with Colonia Media. Debbie was Executive Producer of Germany's no. 1 rated prime-time series,Gute Zeiten, schlechte Zeiten (1992) (Good Times, Bad Times) for Rtl and Grundy Ufa. As show runner, she was responsible for the entire overhaul of the 10 year old series. She created twelve new lead characters, updated storylines and implemented new looks for everything from lighting to make-up, costumes and scenery. In addition she wrote the 10th anniversary week (five episodes), which dramatically increased audience share from 23% to 37%. In the U.S., she served as Co-Executive Producer of Sidney Lumet's 100 Centre Street (2001), A&E TV Networks first original drama series. This was the groundbreaker in 24p HDTV format production. 100 Centre Street was a co-production of Jaffe/Braunstein Films and Pearson Television Entertainment. Not only did the series receive critical acclaim, but it won the 2001 Koln Screenings Award for "Top Ten Dramas Worldwide". She is a member of the DGA as Director and Upm, serves as a member of the Directors East Coast Council and works on sundry committees, including the Special Projects and Disciplinary Committees. She is the initiator of the Global Cinema Initiative. She is also one of the first members of the Dean's Council of New York University and is the founder of the Dramatic and Comedy Writing Awards for Nyu Graduate and Undergraduate students.

Kristine Knudsen, Producer studied film theory at the College of Lillehammer and worked for Nordisk Film & TV in Bergen, Norway. Later she studied film production at the Filmakademie Baden-württemberg in Germany, followed by the Mega Master in audiovisual management in Ronda, Spain.In 2006 she established the company Knudsen & Streuber Medienmanufaktur GmbH in Berlin together with German producing partner Tom Streuber. In 2010 she established the company Den Siste Skilling As in Bergen, Norway. Knudsen & Streuber Medienmanufaktur GmbH (est. 2006) develop and produce both prestigious and entertaining feature and documentary films, focusing on the German and Scandinavian market.

Currently the feature film Gnade (Mercy), written by Kim F. Aakeson and directed by Matthias Glasner is in the Berlinale Competition. It took one year to raise financing in Germany. They also have the documentary Atw – To Be or To Perform is in pre-production. Their previous films include the feature film Reine Geschmacksache (Fashion Victims).

Pati Keilwerth, of Patisserie Film, produced Utopia in Ethiopia , whose financing was done via crowd funding on The Fledgling Fund. Utopia in Ethiopia is an interactive web documentary about Awra Amba - a small, Ethiopian village whose way of life has become a model for development, gender equality and democracy worldwide. Founded almost 40 years ago by an illiterate farmer, who had a vision of a better world, Awra Amba is a thriving self-help community, comprised of 400 people from different religious and ethnic backgrounds. They have come together with the common belief that there is a way out of poverty by making women equal with men, by working instead of praying and by discarding ancient traditional practices. With such remarkable results without any external help, Awra Amba receives thousands of curious visitors every year, who come to learn from their way of life.

After finishing law school with a specialisation in Copyright Law, Competitive Law and Anti-Trust Law at the University Passau, Pati Keilwerth was hired to coordinate the protocol of the Berlin Film Festival. She continued working for the Berlinale in various departments and for the Broadcaster rbb, while studying Audiovisual Media Science at the Filmschool Hff “Konrad Wolf” in Potsdam-Babelsberg. Directly after her diploma with a thesis on international Co-Production she began employment with Wim Wenders.

After a three-year tenure as Wim Wenders’s Executive Assistant, she embarked on new terrain in the media industry and has been engaged in digital distribution, online and social media marketing, as well as branded entertainment ever since.

The discussion ensuing about how to treat monies raised via crowd funding, the need to account for 2,000 donors who do not get charitable tax write-offs and who must be accounted for as investors raised the level of excitement between panelists and the audience perceptively.

Hollywood Film Festival

Favourite Films, Dan Films, Isabella Films and Samsa Film

"Villa des Roses" is an exquisite postcard from the past. Belgian director Frank Van Passel and cinematographer Jan Vancaillie designed the film so that each scene -- indeed each shot -- unfolds like a photograph from the early 20th century. Some scenes are black-and-white with a lovely, pale color tint, while others appear as rotogravures from newspapers of that era. Shots of the Paris skyline are indeed stamped postcards come magically to life. This not only evokes a time and place but also gives the drama a melancholy mood as we watch a way of life in Europe about to come to a violent end.

The time is 1913, and the continent, after years of peace, is on the cusp of a war that will destroy a generation and usher in mass annihilation. The place is Paris, specifically a boarding house where a beautiful housemaid (Julie Delpy) joins the staff and with her very presence unsettles the delicate stagnation of its inhabitants. One man (Shaun Dingwall), a German, sets out to seduce her, only to do the one thing he cannot afford to do -- fall in love.

Everyone is, of course, doomed as World War I looms. (The film actually begins in the trenches, the carnage under way, as the German prepares to march to his fate carrying a photo of his beloved.) Christophe Dirickx's script, based on a novel by Willem Eisschot, is meant to illustrate the nonchalant way the modern age, with all its horrific instruments of destruction, crept upon the unsuspecting citizens of Europe. The overwhelming impression left by the film, though, is that of lives about to alter forever and for some to end abruptly.

After an initial scene in French, this Belgian film switches to English in a bid to increase its chances of North American distribution. While that is a long shot, this deserving film would certainly find a small but enthusiastic audience appreciative of the loving care that has gone into its dark, moody lighting and pristine though antique images of a lost world. It is a gorgeous film.