21/11/2023 - The 16th edition of the Torino co-production market will be held between Friday 24 and Saturday 25 November and will involve over 200 audiovisual professionals

Director Mihai Mincan, selected in the FeatureLab with his project Milk Teeth

The year of the TorinoFilmLab, organised by the National Cinema Museum, concludes as usual in November with a rich and diverse calendar of events showcasing its different souls. The TFL Meeting Event is the moment when the TFL community gathers in Turin to explore and encounter the stories of the future, in particular those created by international professionals involved in the ScriptLab and FeatureLab programmes. In addition, with the TFL Italy, a section created to feel the synergies between the national and global industries, the TFL shines a spotlight on co-production at the new edition of Torino Film Industry, during the 41st Torino Film Festival.

The co-production market – which will take place between Friday 24 and Saturday 25 November – will involve over 200 audiovisual professionals such as producers, sales agents and international distributors who in Turin will learn about the projects developed throughout the year. Amongst the 10 projects of the FeatureLab selected from 170 candidates are 7 debuts and 3 second features in advanced phase of development, presented by 10 creative teams, amongst which a director and a producer, who through the year have focused on writing, production, sound design, distribution and other aspects of filmmaking supported by 16 trainers along 3 online/residential workshops. In the 20 ScriptLab projects selected from 550 applicants, there are 9 first features, 8 second and 3 more mature films over the screenplays of which the 28 participants have worked, accompanied for 9 months by 5 tutors and 5 aspiring story editors in 5 online/residential workshops.

In this edition, the FeatureLab group includes Japanese filmmaker Chie Hayakawa, winner of the Camera d’Or special mention at Cannes 2023 for her debut feature Plan 75 [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Chie Hayakawa
film profile], who is working on Renoir; Chilean director Manuela Martelli – whose debut feature 1976 was presented in Directors’ Fortnight – who is developing The Meltdown; as well as Romanian filmmaker Mihai Mincan, selected in Orizzonti in Venice with his debut feature To the North [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Mihai Mincan
film profile], who is working on Milk Teeth.

Brazilian Anita Rocha da Silveira (her debut feature Kill Me Please was screened at Orizzonti in Venice, her second, Medusa, in Directors’ Fortnight) returns to the ScriptLab to focus on her third feature film, the tragicomedy Hot Blood; Indonesian director Makbul Mubarak as well, currently working on the thriller Watch it Burn, while his first feature film Autobiography [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] – FIPRESCI prize winner in Orizzonti 2022 – represents Indonesia as a candidate at the 2024 Oscars.

Amongst the 2023 participants are also some Italians: Adriano Valerio who – supported by a tutor and by his ScriptLab group – has been developing A Perfect Family; director Francesco Romano has been working on the project A White House within the FeatureLab, after having participated in the TFL Up & Coming Italia 2021 and Alpi Film Lab 2022 programmes; Marco Compiani, script reader and development assistant at Vivo Film, who has been working on the ScriptLab projects as trainee story editor.

In total, the 54 participants represent 31 countries from 5 continents. The ScriptLab welcomes 16 professional women, 15 men and 1 non-binary individual, while the FeatureLab brings together 9 men and 12 women.

The 30 projects will be at the centre of the TFL Meeting Event, which includes pitching sessions in front of a panel of potential partners who will meet the teams successively in one-on-on networking sessions or informally. The market will culminate on the evening of 25 November with the Award Ceremony, during which will be given various prizes to support development, production and sustainable filmmaking practices, for a total of 270,000 euros, assigned also in collaboration with international partners.

Four projects from the FeatureLab will receive production prizes (for a total of 180,000 euros), given thanks to the contribution of Creative Europe – MEDIA Programme, by a jury comprising of Olivier Barbier (head of acquisitions and development at mk2 Films), Purev-Ochir Lkhagvadulam (director), Andrew Mohsen (programmer of the El Gouna Film Festival), Mike S. Ryan (producer at Greyshack Films), Eva Sangiorgi (artistic director of the Viennale). The projects of the ScriptLab can benefit from the Eurimages award for the development of the co-production of 20,000 euros, the CNC award of 8,000 euros, and the EWA Network’s Writer Award (1,000 euros).

In a non-competitive section reserved for the Lab, the Torino Film Festival presents the Italian premieres of the six films developed by TFL between 2017 and 2021 that have screened in major international festivals: The Settlers by Chilean director Felipe Gálvez, selected in Un Certain Regard at Cannes 2023; The Quiet Migration [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Malene Choi
film profile] by Danish filmmaker Malene Choi, which debuted in the Panorama section at the Berlinale; Family Time [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Tia Kouvo
film profile] by Finnish director Tia Kouvo, presented in the Encounters section at the Berlinale; Puan [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Benjamín Naishtat and María…
film profile] by Argentinian filmmakers María Alché and Benjamín Naishtat, presented at the San Sebastián Film Festival; and two films presented at the IFFR, Luka [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Jessica Woodworth
film profile] by Belgian-American filmmaker Jessica Woodworth and Day of the Tiger [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Andrei Tănase
film profile] by Romanian director Andrei Tănas.

The list of projects:

FeatureLab

A White House - Francesco Romano (Italy) (debut)
Producer: Raffaella Pontarelli (Amarena Film)

Lionel – Carlos Saiz (Spain) (debut)
Producer: Ana Valls (Blur)

Milk Teeth – Mihai Mincan (Romania) (second feature)
Producer: Radu Stancu (deFilm)

Renoir – Chie Hayakawa (Japan) (second feature)
Producer: Eiko Mizuno-Gray (Loaded Film Ltd.)

Sealskin – Irene Moray (Spain) (debut)
Producer: Marta Cruañas (Vilaüt Films)

Skin Coat – Wei Keong Tan (Singapore) (debut)
Producer: Yi Peng Teoh (Giraffe Pictures)

The Beer Girl In Yangon – Sein Lyan Tun (Indonesia) (debut)
Producer: John Badalu (Hore Pictures Production)

The Meltdown – Manuela Martelli (Chile) (debut)
Producer: Alejandra García (Wood Producciones)

The Splendour of Life – Marianne Métivier (Canada) (debut)
Producer: Geneviève Gosselin-G. (Le Foyer Films)

The Visitor – Vytautas Katkus (Lithuania) (debut)
Co-sceneggiatrice: Marija Kavtaradze
Producer: Marija Razgutė (M-Films)

ScriptLab

A Perfect Family - Adriano Valerio (Italy) (second feature)
Screenwriter: Aude Py (Switzerland)

All The F**King Crows in The World - Yi Tang (Hong Kong) (debut)

Amari - Domien Huyghe (Belgium) (second feature)
Screenwriter: Wendy Huyghe (Belgium)

Brilliant Melody - Carlo Francisco Manatad (Philippines) (second feature)
Screenwriter: Jérémie Dubois (France)

Counting Cards with My Father - Lydia Rui (Australia) (debut)

Detour - Jakub Piątek (Poland) (second feature)
Screenwriter: Marta Bacewicz (Poland)

Eliza - Alexandra Brodski (Germany) (debut)

Happy Days - Floor van der Meulen (The Netherlands) (second feature)
Screenwriter: Bastiaan Kroeger (The Netherlands)

Harvest - Laura Herrero Garvin (Spain) (third feature or beyond)
Screenwriter: Jorge Gilm Munarriz (Spain)

Hot Blood - Anita Rocha da Silveira (Brazil) (third feature or beyond)

In The Shadow of The Horns - Ognjen Glavonić (Serbia) (second feature)

Mar De Leva - Mariana Saffon (Colombia) (debut)

Marriage By Abduction - Sophia Mocorrea (Germany and Argentina) (debut)

San Genesio - Jose Lorenzo Diokno (Philippines) (third feature or beyond)

Sun In Saturn - Ary Zara (Portugal) (debut)

The Fugue - Ruthy Pribar (Israel) (third feature)

The Missing Planet - Marouan Omara (Egypt), Tom Rosenberg (United States) (second feature)

The Shade of Your Shadow - Ely Chevillot (Belgium) (debut)

Watch It Burn - Makbul Mubarak (Indonesia) (second feature)

Who Is Afraid of God - Rosa Friedrich (Germany) (debut)
Screenwriter: Joshua Jádi (Germany)

(Translated from Italian)