28/02/2025 - For its 123th session, the Wallonia regional investment fund has selected seven projects for a total sum of €1,226,000

Director Thomas Ancora, whose new project L’Ordre Pourpre has been selected

Wallimage recently held its first session of 2025, during which seven film and series projects received support for a total sum of more than 1.225.000 euros, which should generate investments of up to 8 million euros in the region.

Standing out amongst these projects is the Belgian initiative film L’Ordre Pourpre (formerly Culte), the second feature by filmmaker and actor Thomas Ancora, whose debut feature, Losers Revolution [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], came out in March 2020 just before cinemas closed due to the lockdown. With this new film, he is in line with the ambition of the Belgian film industry to invest in genre cinema – a trend validated by the line-up at the latest Magritte awards, where Night Call [+see also:
film review
interview: Michiel Blanchart
film profile] received no fewer than 10 prizes (read the news). L’Ordre Pourpre therefore belongs in the slasher category. A year after a student baptism that ended badly, a group of students finds itself chased by a mysterious killer, determined to kill them one by one. In the cast, we find Belgian singer Mentissa, in her first film role, as well as French actor Victor Meutelet (who played Johnny Halliday in Monsieur Aznavour [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]) and Belgian actor Nicolas Godart (seen in Paris, 13th District [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]). The film is produced in Belgium by Les Gens, which after making its mark in television (the series The Club [+see also:
series review
series profile], Attraction and Marie Antoinette) is therefore starting out in cinema. It is co-produced in France by the Amsto label of company Newen Studios.

Wallimage is supporting another genre film, the Spanish horror film Upiro by Óscar Martín (Amigo [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]), which takes us to Spain in 1755. A young woman is sent to a cloistered monastery where several novices suffer from a strange blood illness. An unconventional Franciscan investigates these troubling events. Everything seems to point to an ancient story that the new Enlightenment society would prefer to forget. A blood-thirsty “upire” seems to have infiltrated the monastery. It will star Belgian actress Pauline Brisy, as well as established Spanish actress Ángela Molina (seen recently in They Will Be Dust [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Carlos Marqués-Marcet
film profile]). The film is produced in Spain by El Ojo Mecánico and co-produced in Belgium by Okayss, which had so far dedicated itself, and successfully so, to supporting the works of Belgian filmmaker Karim Ouelhaj (Megalomaniac [+see also:
film review
interview: Karim Ouelhaj
film profile]).

The fund is also supporting a French comedy, Justin le Juste by Eric Barbier, who therefore continues his literary adaptation streak after Small Country: An African Childhood [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] and Promise at Dawn [+see also:
trailer
film profile], with this reinterpretation of the novel by Jean Pompougnac, set in the trenches of the Second World War. The cast will include Alban Ivanov, Alexandra Lamy and Stéphane de Groodt. The film is produced by Vertigo in France, and co-produced in Belgium by Scope.

Finally, Wallimage is on board for the sequel to the Icelandic film L’Envol de Ploé, released in 2018. The young plover hero of the film is this time flying to the North to confront the terrible Snow Queen. The film will be directed by Gunnar Karlsson and Freek Quartier, produced in Iceland by Gunhil, and co-produced by ViviFilm (Belgium) and SagaFilm (Iceland). The other supported projects are the animated series Schalotte Oignon produced by 20 Pictures to Midnight, and L’Académie des Monarques directed by Sophie Roy.

(Translated from French)