RIGA: Latvian director Signe Birkova has begun shooting her debut fiction feature film Lotus, a comical phantasmagory about a young woman in 1919 Latvia, who desires new challenges and expression of inner freedom. The film is produced by Roberts Vinovskis and Dominiks Jarmakovičs for Studio Locomotive (Latvia) and Uljana Kim for Studio Uljana Kim (Lithuania).

RIGA: Cinemas were allowed to re-open in Latvia on 15 November 2021. The closure of cinemas and all other cultural venues, among other restrictions, had been in place since 21 October. The four-week lockdown was imposed to fight the rapid surge of Covid-19 cases.

FNE spoke with Dita Rietuma, the head of the National Film Centre of Latvia, about how the pandemic has changed the situation of Latvian cinema, which had been flourishing in the last years with more funding and successful domestic productions in cinemas.

RIGA: The Latvian National Film Awards, initially set to take place 11-14 November 2021, have been postponed to 24-27 February 2022 due to the lockdown in the country. The event consists of screenings of nominated films, premieres and special programmes, with the main activity being the awards ceremony.

RIGA: The Lithuanian/Czech coproduction Runner / Bėgikė by Andrius Blaževičius has received the main award in the Feature Film Competition of the 8th edition of the Riga International Film Festival. The festival took on a hybrid format this year, with film screenings in cinemas and online, but had to move entirely online from 21 October 2021 when Latvia entered lockdown.

RIGA: Latvia went into lockdown on 21 October 2021 with a number of restrictions in place until 15 November 2021 due to the surge of new COVID-19 cases. As a consequence, all cultural institutions, including cinemas, had to close until mid-November 2021. The Riga International Film Festival, running from 14 to 24 October 2021, will move online.

RIGA: The Riga International Film Festival's industry activities, presented under the umbrella name of Riga IFF Forum, are focused this year on short films, XR and animation, showcasing new Latvian films and highlighting the role of women in the Baltic film industry. Panel discussions, talks and presentations run onsite in Riga and online from 15 - 21 October 2021.

RIGA: The Latvian director Signe Birkova is concluding postproduction on her documentary Ring of Fire / Ugunsaplis, which focuses on a group of four actors who have formed their own theatre company Kvadrifons and started to stage plays in the 130 year-old building of the Riga Circus. The film is produced by Uldis Cekulis for VFS Films.

RIGA: Estonia’s largest entertainment company Apollo Group will open two leisure centres with cinemas in shopping malls in Riga in October 2021, with an investment amounting to 11 m EUR.The first Apollo kino venue belonging to the company was opened in Latvia in 2019 at the shopping mall Akropole.