European Film Promotion (EFP) and its member organisations are delighted to announce theEuropean Film Promotion (EFP) and its member organisations are delighted to announce the2018 line-up for EFP PRODUCERS ON THE MOVE. 20 of the most promising, up-and-comingEuropean producers have been selected to take part in EFP's high-profile networking platform atthe Cannes Film Festival (May 8 - 19, 2018). During the five-day event between May 10 - 14, the
exclusive group will take part in a tailor-made programme in order to foster international co-productions, intensify the exchange of experiences and help create new professional networks.
EFP's longstanding programme is financially backed by the Creative Europe – MEDIAProgramme of the European Union and the participating EFP member organisations.
Fabian Massah - Germany
Fabian founded his company with Marc Malze, a fellow graduate from Berlin's DFFB, in 2004 and has has (co-)produced several award-winning films including Men On The Bridge, Atlantic, All Of A Sudden and Oblivion Verses which premiered in Venice and Toronto in 2017. His most recent production, Johannes Schaff's Symphony Of Now, will be released in summer 2018. Fabian has also worked for many years on producing commercials and is a board member of the German Film Producers Association.
Peter Badač - Slovakia
A graduate of the film schools in Bratislava and Prague, Peter set up his own company BFILM in 2010 and has produced several shorts, including the animated short Pandas which was one of the winners in the Cinéfondation Selection competition at Cannes in 2013. In 2017, his production of Tereza Nvotová's debut Filthy premiered in Rotterdam, while the co-production of Jan Speckenbach's Freedom screened in Locarno. Peter is currently developing Magda H., a biopic of the wife of the former Czechoslovakian president Gustáv Husák.
Radovan Síbrt - Czech Republic
Prague-based Pink was established in 2009 to produce author-driven documentaries and fiction films for the international market. Radovan served as a co-producer on Alexandru Belc's documentary Cinema, Mon Amour and Adina Pintilie's Berlinale Golden Bear-winning fiction debut Touch Me Not. He also produced Jan Gebert's first feature documentary When The War Comes (opening film Berlinale Panorama Dokumente 2018) and is developing Iranian director Mohammadreza Farzad's new documentary Don't Gaze Long Into The Abyss. Radovan also directs documentaries (On Decency and The Tap Tap).
Veselka Kiryakova - Bulgaria
Veselka has worked with director Milko Lazarov since his award-winning feature debut Alienation which premiered in the Venice Days sidebar in 2013. She also produced and edited Lazarov's second feature Ága which premiered 'out of competition' at this year's Berlinale. In 2016 she additionally served as a co-producer on Kristina Grozeva and Petar Valchanov's award-winning film Glory. Veselka is now developing new projects by Grigor Antonov (Dora, based on an idea by Milko Lazarov), Dimitar Sardzhev (Son) and Nikolay Vasilev (Driver).
David Herdies - Sweden
David founded Momento Film in 2011 as an independent platform for new talents with challenging and brave film projects and has produced several award-winning shorts and documentaries. In 2014, he moved into fiction film production with Simón Mesa Soto's short Madre competing in Cannes in 2016. He is currently working on a slate of fiction and documentary projects such as Soto's feature debut Amparo and the drama Madame Luna written by Suha Arraf. David was also the co-producer of Tinatin Kajrishvili's Berlinale Panorama 2018 title Horizon.
Katrin Renz - Switzerland
Katrin has been working as a producer for tellfilm since 2007 and founded its German branch with Stefan Jäger and Oliver Schütte in Berlin in 2013. A year later, she became a shareholder at tellfilm in Zurich and has successfully produced several films for the cinema. These include Jäger's Big & Little, Greg Zglinski's Berlinale Forum title Animals, and Lisa Brühlmann's Swiss Film Award winner Blue My Mind which had its world premiere in San Sebastian's New Directors sidebar in 2017.
Nicolas Anthomé - France
Nicolas has produced more than 50 shorts, fiction films and documentaries since launching Bathysphere in 2006 to promote films with an artistic vision by such filmmakers as Guillaume Brac, Emmanuel Gras and Arthur Harari. Gras' feature documentary Makala won the Grand Prix at the 2017 Critics' Week in Cannes, while Brac's July Tales screened 'out of competition' at the Locarno Festival the same year. Nicolas also served as producer on Abel Ferrara's documentary Alive In France and Berni Goldblat's multi-award-winning Wallay.
Luisa Romeo - Spain
Luisa co-founded Galicia-based Frida Films in 2009 to produce quality auteur films with commercial potential and worldwide relevance. Her productions to date have included David Valero's feature documentary The Incredibles and Adan Aliaga's Spanish-Argentinian co-production El Eternauta's Wife as well as Nely Reguera's Maria and Everybody Else. Luisa and director Juanjo Giménez pitched his second fiction feature project Three at the Berlinale Co-Production Market 2018.
Oliver Sertić – Croatia
Oliver is a documentary producer and festival programmer who also has a background in journalism and events organisation. To date, he has produced around 30 feature and short documentaries and experimental films including Bojana Burnać's My Life Without Air, Damian Nenadić's observational documentary Days Of Madness and Igor Bezinovic's The Blockade. Oliver is also the founder of the RESTART organisation where he established Restart Laboratory, Dokukino and Restart Label.
Åshild Ramborg – Norway
Åshild graduated in Film Production from The Norwegian Film School in Lillehammer. She joined Maipo Film in 2009 after having produced several acclaimed short films. Her first feature was Anne Sewitsky's Homesick in 2015, and she has then produced Mikkel Brænne Sandemose's family adventure The Ash Lad: In the Hall of the Mountain King which became a huge box-office hit in Norway in 2017. Sandemose is working on a sequel, The Ash Lad: In Search Of The Golden Castle.
Marco Alessi – Italy
After beginning his career as a screenwriter for cinema and TV, Marco set up Dugong, a Rome-based production company committed to the development of cinema on the blurred line between fiction and documentary, in 2010. His productions include Stefano Savona’s Davide di Donatello-winning documentary Tahrir, Liberation Square and Yuri Ancarani's Locarno Special Jury Prize winner The Challenge. Alessi collaborated again with Savona on his feature-length animated documentary Samouni Road which was selected for Cannes' Directors' Fortnight in 2018.
Birgitta Björnsdottir – Iceland
After graduating with a MA in Filmmaking from the London Film School in 2009, Birgitta started working for the Icelandic production company Zik Zak Filmworks. In 2011, she co-founded Vintage Pictures and has since produced such films as Ása Helga Hjörleifsdottir's award-winning film The Swan and Benedikt Erlingsson's second feature Woman At War which premiered in Cannes' Critics' Week in 2018. Birgitta is now at the development and financing stage on Hjörleifsdottir's next feature A Reply To Helga's Letter.
Per Damgaard Hansen – Denmark
Per co-founded his production company Masterplan Pictures after graduating from the National Film School of Denmark in 2013. He produced internationally acclaimed short films before seeing his first feature film, Hlynur Palmason's Winter Brothers, premiering in Locarno's main competition in 2017 and going on to win more than 20 awards, including a Danish Academy Award for Best Film. Per is currently nearing completion on Carl Marott's The Blue Orchid and in production on Simon Staho's latest as-yet-untitled feature.
Aija Berzina – Latvia
A graduate of Ebeltoft's European Film College and the Latvian Academy of Culture, Aija founded Tasse Film with Alisa Gelze in 2011. Her first feature production, Renārs Vimba's Mellow Mud, premiered at the Berlinale's Generation14plus in 2016. Aija, who has headed up Latvia's Film Producers Association since 2013, is currently in postproduction on Mihael Idov's The Humorist and Juris Kursietis' Oleg in co-production with Lithuania's fellow PRODUCER ON THE MOVE Lukas Trimonis.
Frank Hoeve - The Netherlands
Frank had worked as a producer for several years before founding BALDR Film with Katja Draaijer in 2012. Since then, he has produced a number of award-winning films such as Morgan Knibbe’s Those Who Feel The Fire Burning, Brothers by Bram Schouw and, most recently, Ubiquity by Bregtje van der Haak. Frank is currently co-producing films by Alex Piperno, Alice Furtado and Janus Metz and raising the finance for Kaweh Modiri's Mitra which received the Eurimages Co-Production Development Award at CineMart in 2018.
Lukas Trimonis – Lithuania
A graduate from the Baltic Film and Media School in Estonia and the UK's National Film & Television School, Lukas set up his company iN SCRiPT in 2013 and produced Egle’s Vertelyte’s feature debut feature Miracle which premiered in Toronto in 2017. Fascinated by well-crafted scripts and strong characters, he is currently working on two co-productions: Juris Kursietis' second feature Oleg (with Latvian POM Aija Berzina) and Virginija Vareikyte and Maximilien Dejoi's feature documentary I’ll Stand By You.
Rok Sečen - Slovenia
After graduating from university, Rok initially worked as an advisor to the general secretary at the Ministry of Education before becoming a producer in 2012. He produced Sonja Prosenc's award-winning and critically acclaimed debut The Tree, which was Slovenia's Oscar entry in 2016, and continued the collaboration by producing her History of Love and developing the dark comedy drama Redemption. In addition, Rok is working with the Bosnian director Ines Tanović on her next feature Son.
Biljana Tutorov – Serbia
Working as a producer, director and film curator, Biljana studied Art History, Film Anthropology and Drama in Belgium and France. Her debut feature documentary When Pigs Come premiered in 2017 and she is now in postproduction on her next directorial effort Paper Boats Floating Into The Fragrant Night. True to her mission of producing new talents and strong voices from the region, Biljana is currently working with Croatian filmmaker Jure Pavlović on two projects (Mater and Lost Dream Team).
Miia Haavisto – Finland
Miia is a trained lawyer with a BA in Documentary Film Directing. In addition to producing, she was the CEO for two production companies - Helsinki-filmi and Elokuvaosakeyhtiö Suomi 2017 - before setting up her own company Tekele Productions in 2018. During her time at Helsinki-filmi, she produced such films as Pixadores, Headfirst, Gold Digger, Tom Of Finland and Miami, and then worked with producers Aku Louhimies and Mikko Tehunen on The Unknown Soldier in 2017.
Esko Rips – Estonia
As one of the founders of NAFTA Films, Esko has been producing films, TV series and commercials since 2007. His first feature film production was Margus Pasju's family adventure Secret Society Of Souptown in 2015, which has since become Estonia's most watched family film of all time. He is now developing a Souptown spin-off TV series, the political thriller Anti-Lebanon, a documentary about the birth of Skype and Ingomar Vihmar's family comedy Totally Boss as well as working again with Pasju on the spy thriller O2.
