January in Sweden may imply snow and low temperatures, but in Göteborg, it’s warm springtime when it comes to all things cinema. Between 25 January and 4 February, movie-theatre seats across the city are expected to be filled some 160,000 times, and on Friday night, brand-new Minister of Culture Amanda Lind proclaimed the 42^nd edition of the Göteborg Film Festival open.

“It was her very first official public appearance,” says artistic director Jonas Holmberg. “Needless to say, we were thrilled. The week before, Sweden didn’t even have a minister of culture.” Lind and her government colleagues went into office early last week, after over four months of a “hung” situation following an inconclusive election in the Swedish parliament in September. “The interest in her presence and what she had to say was enormous, not least from all of us in the Swedish film industry,” says Holmberg.

The Göteborg Film Festival hosts what has become the leading Nordic industry event, the Nordic Film Market, which is celebrating its 20^th anniversary this year and will run from 31 January-3 February. A total of 300 delegates are coming along for a packed programme bristling with new and upcoming films available for distribution, works in progress and projects in development from Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland and Iceland. Nineteen freshly finished feature films are set to be presented, including most of the titles playing in the festival's Nordic competition, among them opener Aurora [+lee también:
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entrevista: Miia Tervo
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entrevista: Måns Mårlind y Björn Stein
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The Works in Progress programme sports 16 contenders, with new material courtesy of Jesper Ganslandt (Falkenberg Farewell [+lee también:
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entrevista: Evin Ahmad
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entrevista: Grimur Hakonarson
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entrevista: J-P Valkeapää
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Other special events include TV Drama Vision (30-31 January), a two-day seminar and co-production event showcasing TV drama from the Nordic countries. As part of TV Drama Vision, the Nordisk Film & TV Fond Prize is presented. Six Nordic drama series are in the running for the €20,000 award, which goes to the main writer(s) of the series. Also due to be presented is the sixth edition of the Nostradamus project, a multi-year international initiative to document and analyse industry changes, and make projections for the future. 

Panels, discussions and seminars are taking place throughout the festival, focusing on topics such as “Into the Apocalypse” and “Critics with Issues”. Master classes with the likes of Ukrainian master animator Igor Kovalyov and legendary BBC producer Jon Plowman (Absolutely Fabulous [+lee también:
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entrevista: Björn Runge
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