Pjazza Teatru Rjal to showcase high-quality productions including festival winners, cult pictures and restored films.

Films originating from thirty-four small nations in Europe, Middle East and North Africa will be the only productions eligible to participate in the competitive strand of Valletta Film Festival.

The first edition of this competition open to feature-length films and short films will take place at the fifth edition of Valletta Film Festival to be held from Friday 14 to Sunday 23 June 2019.

Twelve feature films or documentaries will be competing for a number of awards in the feature length section of the festival and up to twenty-four short films will be selected to compete for best short film.

This competition will replace the general competition held in past four years. Two international juries will be adjudicating the films selected and awards will be announced at the closing night of the festival.

Explaining the decision to focus on cinema of small nations, festival director Oliver Mallia said that the introduction of this competition is intended to make of Valletta Film Festival a focal point for filmmakers from small nations.

“We want that from 2019 Valletta Film Festival becomes the home of Cinema of Small Nations and the place to go to if you a filmmaker from a small nation”.

Mr Mallia added that the realities of small nations are very similar. “Little funding, restricted opportunities and limited audiences are all common to filmmakers from small nations however there is an abundance of talent and creativity that is often seen in films produced by filmmakers from these nations to the extent that various directors and productions from small states made it big around the world”.

The screenings for the new competition will be held at Valletta Campus Theatre.

Co-Festival Director Slavko Vukanovic commented that the introduction of this competition will now allow the festival to present a more diverse non-competitive programme of films at Pjazza Teatru Rjal, the flagship venue of the festival.

Mr Vukanovic remarked that from 2019 the open-air theatre will host the main red carpet events of the festival with a selection of high-profile productions, festival winners, cult pictures and restored films.

This new approach to the programme of the 900-seat theatre shall open the festival to a more diverse audience that would enjoy new hits and classics in a magnificent and unique setting.

The fifth edition of Valletta Film festival will continue exhibiting a number of curated sections including Islanders that showcases film from or about islands, Without Borders that focuses on the cinema of a specific region or continent, Teens Only – a selection of coming-of-age films and Masters of Cinema, a retrospective of established directors and other talent. The festival will be also introducing Family Weekend, a space for parents and younger children to enjoy a weekend of activities and cinema made for kids.

More information about these and other sections of the festival will be announced in the coming weeks.

Film submissions for the 2019 Cinema of Small Nations Competition are now open.

The first documentary workshop organised by Valletta Film Lab will happen between Monday 18 and Saturday 23 March 2019.

Directors/writers residing in Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Iceland, Ireland, Estonia, Faroe Islands, Finland, Georgia, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Montenegro, Moldova, Norway, Northern Ireland, San Marino, Slovakia, Slovenia, Scotland and Wales can apply with a project to participate in any of the workshops organised by the lab.

Applications for participation are now open. Deadline for submissions is Tuesday 15 January 2019.

At the end of the submission period, an independent panel of adjudicators appointed by Film Grain Foundation will select the projects that will participate in the lab based on the following criteria:

– the quality & originality of the screenplay or treatment;
– the promise & viability of the project;

The selection will be announced on 7 February 2019.

Workshop Programme

Participants will be split into groups where discussions will focus on the development of the projects submitted, the production plan, promotion and distribution strategies and pitching.

Apart from the constant mentorship of the tutors, the programme would also include a number of special guests and experts who will attend to meet individually with the participants and help them prepare a financial plan, schedule and other elements of the production strategy.

Following the workshop in Malta the tutors will continue offering online consultancy to the projects for up to a period of six months.

Participants at the workshop will later be invited to attend a major documentary market and will be assisted to meet with potential co-producers, financiers, sales agents and distributors to pitch their projects.

The name of the tutors and special guests leading the workshop will be announced after the first selection is published in February 2019.

All workshops will be conducted in the English Language.

Participation Fees

Applicants must participate in all training activities held and be ready to submit, when requested, any written material such as questionnaires and evaluation reports. Representative of the selected projects will be asked to confirm their participation within 3 days from date of notification. Participants are to pay participation fees within 15 days from confirmation date.

The participation fee for directors-writers from outside Malta is €1000 (exclusive of VAT). This fee includes accommodation at a three-star hotel in Valletta, full-board lodging and ground transportation.

Producers attached to the project can also attend the workshop for an additional fee of €250 (exclusive of VAT). This would provide producer a shared accommodation with director-writer, full board lodging and ground transportation.

Participants must pay all air-travel costs.

Many countries provide bursaries and scholarships for this kind of training so kindly consult your country’s film or culture agencies for more information.

The participation fee for Malta-based directors-writers or producers partners to Valletta Film Lab is €250 (exclusive of VAT). The fee for non-partners is €400 (exclusive of VAT).

This fee excludes accommodation and ground transportation but includes lunch and coffee breaks for up to 2 people.

In case of cancellation three weeks prior to the starting date of the program, there will be a 50% refund of the participation fees.

There shall be no refund in case of cancellation less than three weeks from the starting date of the program.

Venue

The workshops of Valletta Film Lab will be held at University of Malta’s Valletta Campus.

The Campus, housed in in the Old University Building, dates back to 1592 and serves as a prestigious setting for the hosting of international conferences, seminars, short courses and summer schools.

Further information

Valletta Film Lab is managed by Film Grain Foundation and is supported by Arts Council Malta through the Creative Industries Platform.

For any enquiries please email the foundation on This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call +356 2713 3081.

Film Grain Foundation is pleased to announce the creation of VALLETTA FILM LAB, a training and development platform open to filmmakers from Malta and other European small nation states.

The platform, the first of its kind in Malta, is being set up with the financial support of Arts Council Malta through the Creative Industries Platform. The project was one of five selected for funding following a public call in 2017.

Starting in 2019, the lab will be organising two workshops per year open to documentary and fiction films and various networking and promotional events held throughout the year and during Valletta Film Festival. The first international workshop for feature-length documentary films will be held in Valletta between 18-23 March 2019.

Commenting about this initiative, Oliver Mallia, one of the founders of Film Gain Foundation, said that Valletta Film Lab will provide the beneficiaries of various film development and production funds in Malta and other small European countries the possibility to attend first-class workshops that would help them transform their ideas into high-quality projects.

“The idea to create a training and development platform open to filmmakers from small nations stemmed from the Cinema of Small Nations conference held at Valletta Film Festival in 2016. We understood the need for  platform that focuses on small nations given that film production companies from small countries experience similar difficulties because of limited economies of scale.”

Mr Mallia continued that the activities to be organised by the Lab are intended to help producers from small nations to develop productions that would reach international financiers, producers, distributors and broadcasters and potentially help them reach audiences beyond their own territories.

Film Grain Foundation co-founder Slavko Vukanovic added that ten local companies and individuals all active in film production have already partnered the platform and committed to participate in the development workshops that the Lab will be organising. Mr Vukanovic remarked that one of the aims of Valletta Film Lab is to ensure that by 2021 a minimum of 18 feature-length projects from Malta would have received support by the lab and reached advanced development or pre-production stage.

Production companies and individuals from Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Iceland, Ireland, Estonia, Faroe Islands, Finland, Georgia, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Monaco, Montenegro, Moldova, Norway, Northern Ireland,  San Marino, Slovakia , Slovenia, Scotland and Wales can apply to participate in the Valletta Film Lab workshops and events.

The guidelines and application for the first workshop to be held in March 2019 will be made available online at www.vallettafilmfestival.com on Wednesday 7th November 2018.

The following grants were announced by the Bulgarian National Film Center on 30 November 2018.

Feature films supported by the Polish Film Insitute in the 3rd session of 2018

 

EU Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD)

28/11 : EU Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) published in official EU Journal – Official Journal of the European Union

Creativity Works!

22/11: ‘Technology is not culture’: how platforms can help shape a healthy ecosystem online – Creativity Works!

Online platforms are an integral part of today’s digital economy. They increase the speed at which information is shared and introduce consumers to a wide variety of digital goods and services. But their dominant rise casts concern about the largely unregulated role they play in disseminating creators’ content and raises questions about what steps should be taken to safeguard a fair and competitive online ecosystem. The topic was debated at an event in the European Parliament hosted by MEP Christian Ehler.

EU Copyright Directive

29/11: Authors’ Group comments ahead of the Council IP Working Group - FERA

Ahead of the IP Working Party meeting held on November 30, the Authors’ Group called attention to several aspects of the compromise solution on the proposed Copyright Directive Chapter 3 “Fair remuneration in contracts of authors and performers”, which are of critical importance to the EU creative community.

The first module of the year-long CEE Animation Workshop will take place from November 30^th to December 6^th in Ljubljana and will focus on content development. Invited tutors who will guide the participants are two experienced script advisors Rita Domonyi and Phil Parker. The group sessions will be led by Ewa Puszczyńska and Ole Wendorff-Østergaard. The workshop will bring together 12 animated projects, including 4 feature films, 4 series, 4 short films, and 5 participants without project.

MEET THE SESSION EXPERTS

Two SCRIPT CONSULTANTS will work individually or in group sessions with the project teams, helping them to formulate the voice of their story in the best possible way in terms of dramatic structure, genre and story arc.

• Rita Domonyi started her carrier in animation at Varga Studio, where she became the Creative Development manager of the company. She is also the teacher of Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design, and gives script editing lectures on the Faculty of Animation Studies.
• Screenwriter and creative producer Phil Parker has developed original content in over twenty countries demonstrating there is a global capacity for new concepts. His clients have included Aardman Animation (the Oscar winning Wallace and Gromit – Curse of the Were-Rabbit and multi-award winning The Pearce Sisters), the Mob Film Company (Terry Prachett’s The Hogfather), Foreseesense and many others. Phil Parker, co-wrote Manou the Swift (2018) and is a co-founder and CEO of BCre8ive, a multiplatform online development company.

The GROUP LEADERS will be the closest collaborators to the participants. During all three workshops they will moderate the discussions and work inside the groups, but also bring their own feedback and offer their expertise on participant’s projects, drawing from a rich professional experience as leading European producers.

• Ewa Puszczyńska is an experienced film producer, including Oscar winning film Ida. For more than 20 years she was working for Opus Film, one of the biggest film production studios in Poland, successfully leading international co-productions and executing projects for international companies like Sony AXN, RatPac Enterntainmet – co-producing films with international cast including Jim Carrey, Charlotte Geinsbourg, Marton Csokas, Katie Outinen.
• Producer Ole Wendorff-Østergaard has large co-production and film finance experience from films such as Antichrist by Lars von Trier, The Model by Mads Matthisen and Another Day of Life. From 2007 to 2010 Ole was a financial producer at Zentropa and a part of the producer’s team of 9 features with a total budget of over 35 mil.

Within the first workshop, internationally renowned SPEAKERS will give an insight into the important issue of script writing and will share their valuable experience in the field.

» MASTERCLASS: Managing Creativity
Paul Young | Co-founder of Cartoon Saloon, an IFTA winner and Oscar and Bafta nominee. He produced the animated features The Secret of Kells, Song of the Sea, and The Breadwinner. Paul also produced two seasons of Puffin Rock, an original TV series which has been dubbed into over 25 languages.

» MASTERCLASS: The Truth and Myths of Transmedia Storytelling
Nuno Bernardo | Nuno is an award-winning and Emmy-nominated writer, producer and director and a bestselling book author. He created and produced Beat Generation, Flatmates, the Kidscreen Award-winner Aisling’s Diary, and the Emmy-nominated TV series Final Punishment, Beat Girl, and Collider.

» LECTURE: Polish Quality - How to Develop International Co-productions
Agnieszka Kowalewska-Skowron | Co-founder and associate at MOMAKIN, responsible for acquisition of films and TV content for distribution as well as programming for film projects and special events. She worked as advertising consultant, production and set manager for commercials and corporate videos.  

» LECTURE: TV Programming and Media Psychology
Martina Peštaj | Martina is the Head of Children’s and Youth Programme at RTV Slovenija, where she has worked for a number of years as a creator, editor, and scriptwriter. As a Media Psychologist, she manages the Research Laboratory for analysing children’s programmes in different target groups.

» CASE STUDY: Chris the Swiss (dir. Anja Kofmel, 2018)
Siniša Juričić | Siniša founded Nukleus Film Croatia in 2003, Nukleus Film Slovenia in 2012 and service production company Jaako dobra produkcija (JDP) in 2013. Sinisa´s focus is on producing films and helping talented filmmakers from the CEE to achieve their full international potential.

» PANEL: Creating and Producing Immersive Experience
Marc Bertrand | Marc joined the French Animation Studio as a producer in 1998 and has since produced more than 100 films, including such notable successes as the award-winning series Science Please! (2001), Noël Noël (2003), or two Oscar nomination with Sunday (2011) and Vaysha the Blind (2016).
Uri Kranot | Uri’s work has expanded beyond the traditional: his art straddles experimental genres and unfamiliar mediums. He has been honoured with the top industry awards, including the Lumen and Fipresci Prize, the Oscar Academy shortlist and the Danish Statens Kunstfond award for the performing arts. He is also the creative director of ANIDOX with Michelle Kranot.

» DISCUSSION PANEL: Co-producing Animation in the Balkan's Region
Vanja Andrijević, Bonobo studio, Croatia | Tina Smrekar, Finta studio, Slovenia | Ana Nedeljković and Nikola Majdak, Serbia | Mladen Đukić, Aeon Production, Bosnia and Herzegovina | Danijela Radulovic, Film Centre of Montenegro

The selected PROJECTS and PARTICIPANTS for the CEE Animation Workshop 2018/2019 are: 

FEATURE FILMS:

• Gentle Jaco (David Toušek, Hana Lehečková; Czech Republic)
• Hello Isabelle (Siniša Juričić, Marjan Alčevski; Croatia)
• Lady Pirates (Miljana Dragičević, Dorotea Vučić; Croatia)
• Twice Upon a Time (Vojin Vasovic, Milorad Kocić; Serbia)

SERIES:

• The Adventures of Tubby and Stretch (Mladen Đukić, Dejan Mijatović; Bosnia and Herzegovina)
• Koyaa (Kolja Saksida, Sara Živkovič; Slovenia)
• Rabbit From a Tin Hat (Ivan Bereš; Serbia)
• Summer Kingdom (Yana Palamarenko, Roman Kepkalo; Ukraine)

SHORT FILMS:

• Grandpa is Sleeping (Helga Fodorean; Romania)
• Letter to Milena (Sabine Andersone, Zane Oborenko; Latvia)
• Noah’s Tree (Gabor Osvath, Peter Vácz; Hungary)
• Viskovitz (Ioana Lascar, Serghei Chiviriga; Romania)

PARTICIPANTS WITHOUT PROJECT:

• Belina Jano (Animated Society, Albania)
• Levan Lapachi (Highwayvfx, Georgia)
• Kumelj Polona (Invida, Slovenia)
• Danijela Radulovic (Film Centre of Montenegro, Montenegro)
• Orsolya Sipos (SALTO Films Ltd., Hungary)

The week will also feature special events around outreach - including networking opportunities, screenings of participants´ short films, a visit of the Slovenian ZVVIKS Studio (Koyaa, TV series) and last but not least various events organized by Animateka – International Animated Film Festival (December 3 – 9, 2019).

The CEE Animation Workshop will continue with the second module from March 20^th to 26^th in Budapest (HU) and will concern production and financing. The last session taking place from May 3^rd to 9^th will be organized alongside the CEE Animation Forum (formerly VAF Třeboň) and will focus on accessing the market.