EAVE project SOUVENIRS OF WAR is in post-production

In Production and in Post-production February 2023

In production

MAMIFERA by Liliana Torres, producer: EAVE graduate Carla Sospedra is in production. MAMIFERA, which is the Spanish word for a female mammal, centres on an unwanted pregnancy. It focuses on Lola, who accidentally gets pregnant at a time when Spanish law required women to reflect for three days before proceeding to terminate a pregnancy. The law, dating from 2010, was rescinded in 2022. The feature spans three days in Lola’s life, supported by her partner. The film is produced by Miriam Porté at Distinto Films, the company behind Avelina Prat’s Vasil, and co-produced with Carla Sospedra’s Edna Cinema. Sospedra is a producer of Isabel Coixet’s documentary THE YELLOW CEILING. “I want to contribute to de-stigmatising non-motherhood by explaining some of the inner reasons that can lead to it. I would also like this project to serve as a mirror for other women who have decided not to be mothers and who feel alone and misunderstood,” Torres said. MAMIFERA is Torres’ first purely fiction feature with a professional cast. Her two previous titles were hybrid drama - documentaries.

EAVE project MARIA’S SILENCE by Davis Simanis, producer: EAVE graduate Gints Grube, co-producer EAVE+ graduate Kestutis Drazdauskas is in production. The film tells the story of the Latvian-German silent film actress Maria Leiko. The film is a co-production between Latvian Mistrus Media, Lithuanian Broom Films and France’s Lilith Films. Supported by the Lithuanian Film Centre, Valsts kulturkapitala fonds.

LARGO WINCH: THE PRICE OF MONEY by Olivier Masset-Depasse, producer: EAVE graduate Jacques-Henri Bronckart is in production. This cinematographic opus has been adapted from volumes 13 and 14 of the comic hit series The Price of Money, and The Law of the Dollar, which return to their comic book roots by dragging the hero into a complicated investigation against a backdrop of globalisation and other mergers and acquisitions, confronting him with his own contradictions. Devastated by the kidnapping of his 15-year-old son, Largo Winch is trying to hold it together when one of his associates brutally takes his own life in the middle of a press conference. Just as the world seems to be turning against him and his industrial empire folding, he discovers that the two events may be linked: if he finds those responsible for his bankruptcy, maybe he’ll see his son again? Largo doesn’t yet realise that his quest will lead him directly to hell. The film is carried by Belgian producer Jacques-Henri Bronckart on behalf of Versus Production and Nathalie Gastaldo Godeau for Pan-Européenne (France). Shooting kicked off on 6 February in Bulgaria.

IRON BOX by Julia von Heinz, co-producer: EAVE graduate Agnieszka Wasiak is shooting. Heinz’ first primarily English-language film. Shooting begins on location this month for what’s described as a “multi-generational comedy”, where Stephen Fry and Lena Dunham will play a father and daughter who return to the former’s home of Poland, from where he escaped the Holocaust. A co-production between Germany, the USA, Poland and France, the film will be produced by von Heinz and Fabian Gasmia for Seven Elephants and Dunham herself for Good Thing Going. Further producers are Kings & Queen, Lava Films and Haïku Films. Additional financing comes from national media institutions such as Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg and the CNC. Adapted from Australian writer Lily Brett’s novel Too Many Men and set in the mid-1990s, the plot finds the two main characters, Ruth and Edek, with opposing motivations as they decamp to Poland. The former wants to explore her family history in more depth, whilst Edek has his own particular agenda, one “filled with distraction and entertainment”. This is all set against the backdrop of a country itself in transition, shaking off its socialist past. The story also evokes the director’s prior film, which saw a young German woman travelling to Israel, where she discovers much about her grandparents’ experience in World War II.

In post-production

EAVE project SOUVENIRS OF WAR by Georg Zeller, producer: EAVE graduate Moritz Bonatti is in post-production. A generation after the official end of the conflict in Bosnia, SOUVENIRS OF WAR explores how three men search in touristic activities for a way to catharsis. For Muhamed, the encounters with his guests in Srebrenica are moments of relief in the enduring tensions between survivors and deniers of the genocide, Adnan, after two decades of hard-core reconciliation work, sees a chance for a lighter narrative in his new job as a „war-tour“ guide, whereas for Adis, his air-soft ground on authentic battlefields makes come true a childhood dream. Set in the romantic landscapes of the hidden gem of the Balkans and on the background of male friendships, paternity and masculine role models in a post-war society, the film is tragic and comic at once and reveals how human encounters may be the key to a peaceful future.

THE OUTRUN by Nora Fingscheidt, co-producer: EAVE graduate, TTB group leader and German National Coordinator Jonas Weydemann is in post-production. Academy Award-nominee Saoirse Ronan is set to star in director Nora Fingscheidt’s adaptation of Amy Liptrot’s best-selling memoir THE OUTRUN. Ronan stars as Rona who, fresh out of rehab, returns to the wild Orkney Islands after more than a decade away. As she reconnects with the dramatic landscape where she grew up, memories of her childhood merge with the more recent challenging events that have set her on the path to recovery. Fingscheidt’s debut feature SYSTEM CRASHER premiered at the 2019 Berlinale where it won the Silver Bear Alfred Bauer Prize. The film later won eight German Film Awards including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Screenplay among many other international awards. THE OUTRUN has been developed by Sarah Brocklehurst’s Brock Media, which will produce the feature alongside Ronan, Jack Lowden and Dominic Norris under their recently founded banner, Arcade Pictures, and with Mogambo’s Ignacio Salazar-Simpson and Ricardo Marco. They are joined by co-producers Jonas Weydemann and Jakob D. Weydemann of Weydemann Bros. BBC Film and Screen Scotland supported the development of the project. Protagonist Pictures is executive producing and arranging the financing.

SUNLIGHT by Claire Dix, producers: EAVE graduates Katie Holly and Lesley McKimm has finished post-production and will premiere at the Glasgow Film Festival in March. Described by the creative team as an “emotional, uplifting heart warmer”, the picture follows former addict Leon (Ward), who loves his best friend Iver (Carney) more than anything else in the world. Iver’s the reason he’s clean and romping about the place like a wild pinball. So when Iver gets a terminal diagnosis and decides to leave this Earth early, Leon’s not about to let him go without a fight, even if it means being a royal pain in the arse. He forces Iver to agree to one last day in Dublin, hoping to convince him to live. Will he succeed? The outcome knocks both of them off course: some things are so wrong they’re right… SUNLIGHT receives funding from Screen Ireland’s POV Female Creative Talent Scheme. It is being executive-produced by EAVE graduates Katie Holly and Yvonne Donohoe for Blinder Films, and Lesley McKimm and Niamh Fagan for Screen Ireland.

Page published 28 February 2023.