EFP Future Frames – Generation Next of European Cinema, the program for young European filmmaking talent, returns to Karlovy Vary International Airport. There’s a film festival next month.
Organized by European Film Promotion in collaboration with the festival and with support from Creative Europe, the European Union’s media program, this year it welcomes Allwin as its new main partner.
The lineup includes 10 recent graduates from European film schools, whose short films will be screened during the festival. Filmmakers, nominated by their respective national film promotion agencies and EFP affiliates and selected by KVIFF Artistic Director Karel Och and his programming team, will participate in carefully selected promotional programs, industry conferences and networking activities before and during the festival.
EFP said the filmmakers reflected “the creative diversity that will shape the future of European cinema”.
Some of the selected directors have already made an impact on the international festival circuit. Finnish filmmaker Helmi Donner’s “Lightning Rod” has been selected for La Cinéf, the Cannes Film Festival’s official category for short films made at film schools. This poetic horror drama follows a young mother who escapes a toxic relationship and reunites with her grandmother, who herself has been traumatized. This film is the result of Donner’s master’s degree at Aalto University’s ELO Film School in Finland.
Family, memory and unresolved history form one of the strong themes across the lineup. “Shallow Ground” (Zagreb Academy of Dramatic Arts), directed by Croatian director Jozo Schmuch, is about an elderly mother whose son, who has been missing since the war 30 years ago, suddenly appears at her door looking exactly as he did at the time of his disappearance.
Lithuanian film director Arunas Barciunas (Lithuanian Academy of Dramatic Music) explores emotional distance and family estrangement in “Beyond the Hill of Napoleon’s Hat.” The film depicts a son bringing his father home from a psychiatric hospital to an indifferent family. Most recently, Balchiunas was selected for this year’s Cannes Critics Week Short Film Competition.
In Ban Dal (Half Moon), Swiss-Korean director Hae Seop Shin (ZHdK, Zurich University of the Arts) looks at international adoption, following a Swiss adoptive mother and her son as they travel to South Korea to meet his biological mother.
Other films take more formally playful, genre-driven, or visually distinctive approaches to personal and social issues.
Spanish director Julia Caldwell Serra’s Nobody Barks (ESCAC) uses absurdist comedy and folklore to examine a woman’s guilt after she accidentally kills her nephew’s dog and invents a myth to cover it up.
Czech filmmaker Marie Lukáčová (UMPRUM) has world premiered her ecofeminist fairy tale “Orla,” which combines live action, 2D and 3D animation, and rap-inspired musical sequences, at IFFR in Rotterdam.
In Zampano, French director Teilo Quillard (La Fémis) draws on his circus background to tell a dreamlike tale of vertigo, inheritance, and the strong bond between son and father.
Questions about the body, identity, and growth are also central to selection.
Dutch director Oli Launspach’s Dutch Film Academy graduate film Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, an intimate and playful portrait of transition, anxiety and love built around conversations with his girlfriend Starr Mulder, premiered at the IDFA Short Documentary Competition.
Sister of Mine (Stockholm University of the Arts), directed by Swedish filmmaker Andre Vara (Stockholm University of the Arts), is a sensitive portrait of youth in the 2000s, depicting a yearning beyond the norm. Explores childhood, jealousy, and sibling rivalry through the story of 10-year-old Noel.
Self-Sown (University of Ljubljana, Academy of Drama, Radio, Film and Television) by Slovenian-American director David Champaign focuses on the pressures of young people, family responsibilities, and the social environment. Set in the scorching summer heat of Ljubljana, the film follows teenage Nikola as she navigates between life on the streets, caring for her mother, and the vulnerability beneath her tough exterior.
Allwin will again be awarding one-month scholarships in Los Angeles from this year’s Future Frames selection, with winners selected by a panel of U.S. talent agents from Range Media Partners and United Talent Agency.
A new partnership between EFP and Les Arcs Industry Villages will provide one participant with a wildcard entry into the Festival’s Talent Village program in December. The final selection will be made by the Industry Village team.
Variety is Future Frames’ primary media partner.
