«You have to find the man behind the mask»

Pushwagner:

Babycall | Company Orheim | Into the White | Escape | Back to the Square

4 | Pushwagner takes controlEven Benestad and August B. Hanssen has made a documentary on one of Scandinavia’s greatest living artists, Hariton Pushwagner alias Terje Brofors. But who has the right to stage whom?

6 | A thriller in daylightNoomi Rapace is one of a kind, says Pål Sletaune about the lead in Babycall. Six years after the box office success Next Door, Sletaune is back with a thriller movie

8 | A fighter from the first sceneMeet Ingrid Bolsø Berdal, Scandinavia’s most hard-hitting film actress. She has been busy with two new films: Roar Uthaug’s Escape and Tommy Wirkola’s Hansel and Gretel: Which Hunters

10 | When resistance causes angerCompany Orheim is the second book in Tore Renberg’ bestselling trilogy about Jarle Klepp, adapted for the big screen by Arild Andresen

12 | A chamber piece in the mountainsThrough mutual need, unlikely friendship bloom. War, after all, is absurd. On Into the White, Petter Næss has been working with an international team of acclaimed actors

13 | The polar pistolWhich are the new hidden treasures of Nordic crime fiction to be found and adapted for the big screen? Let us take a look at some of the names in Norwegian crime and thriller litterature

16 | 2011: Norwegian films succeeds abroadImpressive ticket sales at Norwegian movie theatres, heavy par-ticipation at festivals, and extensive sales of foreign rights. 2011 was good year for Norwegian films, says NFI’s Stine Helgeland

17 | Back to Tahrir SquareWhere will the Egyptian revolution end? In Back to the Square Torstein Grude and Petr Lom follow several people who have suffered injustice under the current regime

19 | Digital cinema: Year one Norway became the first country in the world where all ana-logue projectors in movie theatres were substituted with digital systems. How has the switch affected the smaller movie theatres?

20 | Pioneers in 3D– 3D is a new storytelling element, and that means new possibilites. Lasse Alsos is one of the producers of Norway’s first 3D-movie, Magic Silver 2

21 | Co-productions in the best sense Two Lives and Mercy are German-Norwegian co-productions. Producers Axel Helgeland and Kristine Knudsen are part of a rising trend

22 | The Troll hunter Producer John M. Jakobsen is a living legend of Scandinavian cinema, after 30 years in business and almost as many films. All of them regarded as box office successes

23 | The best Norwegian film of all timesErik Løchen’s The Hunt is voted the best Norwegian film of all times by critics. His grandson Joachim Trier’s film came in third

23 | Nominated: Academy Award for Best Short The graduation film Tuba Atlantic by Hallward Witzø won the Student Academy Award 2011, and is nominated for an Academy Award for Best Short

24 | SørfondSørfond will make it easier for Norwegian and international co-producers to take part in international co-productions. It is the only fund of this kind in the Nordic countries

24 | New Nordic FilmsNew Nordic Films is the annual market during the Norwegian International Film Festival in Haugesund. The film industry of France and the Benelux countries will be at focus this year

25 | Sci-fi and 3D After huge international success with, respectively, The Troll Hunter and The Last Norwegian Troll, André Øvredal and Pjotr Sapegin have both started new projects

25 | Levi’s Horse, Imagining Emanuel Levi’s Horse is in the Generation Programme at the Belinale. Imagining Emanuel will be screened at MOMA’s Documentary Forthnight 16-28th

26 | With ignorance as strategyMariken Halle and Clara Bodèn have finished their feature film The World is Waiting which is produced at their own production company, Vapen och dramatikwww.rushprint.no

New Norwegian Films a magazine by Editor: Kjetil LismoenContributing Editor: Pia EkelandTranslation: Dag SodtholtThanks to: Norwegian Film Institute (NFI)

Cover: Pushwagner. Photo: IndiefilmsDesign: Motorfinger, www.motorfinger.noPrint: PinguinDruck GmbHAdvertisement: Annette Gustavsen, mail: annette@rushprint.no

is the leading magazine for the film-and tv industry in ScandinaviaFor news in English: www.rushprint.no/english

© Zentropa International Norway

Pushwagner takes control

– The film starts out with the circus, then we peel that off to get to the human and brutal story, says Even Benestad, who directed Pushwagner together with August Baugstø Hanssen.

In Pushwagner we get to meet one of Scandinavia’s greatest living artists, Hariton Pushwagner alias Terje Brofos. The ini-tiative came from producer Carsten Aanonsen, who has for many years been fascinated with Pushwagner’s art. He con-tacted the shy artist through director Jens Lien, who used the painting Self Portrait as the point of departure for The Bothersome Man (2006).

Control is one of the main themes in the documentary, according to directors Even Benestad and August B. Hanssen. Not only is Pushwagner in a phase of life where he is trying to take control, but it also develops into a struggle between artist and filmmakers. Duels and conflicts drive a lot of good fiction,

and are devices that a documentary filmmaker would like to use. – I had to talk to Push and his co-operative partner Stefan

Stray for a long time to persuade them. They had bad experi-ences with other documentary projects where the co-operation did not work out. Push is hardly a person whom it is simple to follow over a long period of time. Directors Even Benestad and August B. Hanssen are still full of praise.

– Pushwagner’s possibly most incredible quality is his lack of bitterness, Hanssen says. Having gone through everything he has and still be able to laugh and play the game! He has a sharp tongue, but is humble and attentive.

by ODA bhAr

© Indiefilm AS

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Even BenestadEven Benestad (b. 1974), hailing from Grimstad, a small coastal town in the southern part of Norway, studied cinematography at Oslo Film and Television Academy. He made his first feature-length documentary All About My Father in 2002, portraying Benestad’s relationship with his own father, a well-respected doctor and transvestite, and how his father’s choices, behaviour and self-realisation also affect his surroundings and family. The film was, for Benestad, an intensely personal film, which was screened at more than 100 international film festivals, and received both national and international acclaim.

Besides directing his second feature-length documentary Natural Born Star in 2007, Benestad has (in various capacities) also worked on several other documentaries, shorts and even features – perhaps most notably acting as himself as a behind-the-scenes-documentary filmmaker in the Norwegian romantic comedy “meta-film” You Said What? in 2011.

PushwagnerPushwagner is the fascinating, at times wild and tragic, life of the artist Hariton Pushwagner (aka Terje Brofos), providing insight into his life and art. Pushwagner is Norway’s most prominent representative of pop art. He enjoys international success: critics praise him, he has made a name at the biennales of Berlin and Sydney, and international museums are flocking to his Oslo stu-dio. Set against a backdrop of the trial against his former agent, Morten Dreyer – a dispute over an art collection now considered to be worth millions – Benestad, Hanssen, and even Pushwagner himself tell an enthralling, yet sometimes provocative, story about an unconventional man. Who controls the controller? This is a central theme in many of Pushwagner’s works of art. In the film we witness the power play between the main character and the film crew. Who is actually commanding who?

Genre: Documentary

Director: Even Benestad, August B. HanssenScreenplay: Even Benestad, August B. HanssenProduced by: Carsten Aanonsen for Indie Film AS Production Year: 2011

Pushwagner obviously has a role he is playing in public, Benestad says. Early on, he once went up to us and said: «Wonderful that you turned off the camera, because now I was really bored like shit with being a clown.» It took a long time before he learned to trust us.

What Pushwagner was most afraid of, I think, is to show emotion. If he does that, afterwards he tends to say that no, it was just play-acting.

How did they find the balance when it came to exposing him?

– It was about sorting the material. It was important to make something that revealed him as a human being. In the film he says: «You have to find the man behind the mask.» That has been a rule to us. We have an incredible amount of material, also stuff that shows Pushwagner at his craziest, but we never considered using that. In every single scene there is something sensible and likeable about him. He has a balanced attitude to his own pro-blems, even when he is talking about the drinking, about the

butterflies he tries to keep down. Around 2008, when the graphic novel Soft City was released,

it was even more excitement than usual around Pushwagner. For his book signing at Tronsmo, Norway’s largest comic book shop, there were enormous queues; at the opening at the Oslo Art Society, T-shirts were sold; he was interviewed on national TV shows and then there was the Autumn Exhibition, Norway’s major annual art event. In the documentary this period ends with a circus scene where he is cycling backwards through a burning portal.

– The films starts with the circus, all the pranks, Even Benestad explains. Then we peel that off to find a quite human and brutal story. People think it is great fun to watch the circus. But the clown he is playing would hardly be capable of creating the art he does.

The idea of using 3D animation came early. Pushwagner’s art invites for 3D.

– Seeing his pictures is a three-dimensional experience, Benestad says. Some of them make me dizzy. We wanted to find a technique that allowed us to enter the pictures.

Several times Pushwagner took control of the shooting of the film.

– We reinforced that by building the control room from Soft City, and let him sit there before the screen, August says.– Sometimes he even dictated what we were going to do,

Benestad says. Once he grabbed the camera away from me and pointed it towards me.

From the outset control was a main theme of the film. – It is about taking control and letting go of control, and who

has the right to stage whom. In a way, we actually got more control when he stopped being so concerned with it. As we got to know him, he gradually became more himself, as in the conver sation about one of his friends, the author Axel Jensen. Then he did not have any need to control things any more.

© Indiefilm AS

© Scanpix

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The idea for Sletaunes new thriller came from a newspaper. Six years after the critically acclaimed box office success Next Door, Pål Sletaune returns with a new feature film.

– I read a short item about someone overhearing an attack through a babycall. Who is hearing it? I thought. Then came the idea of Anna, a protagonist who is fleeing something, moving to an area of apartment buildings with her son. I had a strong intui-tion about who she was, but quite a few things had not surfaced yet. I wanted to find out what those were. Many write a full synopsis and treatment, but I prefer to join the characters into the writing process. I also did this on Junk Mail, You Really Got Me, Next Door and Babycall. In this way it becomes an exciting exploration for me while writing it, Sletaune explains.

For the main character he chose the rising star Noomi Rapace.– It was a long casting process even though the film has few

characters. Casting is all-important. We had to find Anna and her son, and also Helge, and ended up with the experienced Norwegian actor Kristoffer Joner. We auditioned many actresses and had many good alternatives. But if you change the main part it will become another film. Noomi came in quite early. She was enthusiastic about the screenplay. I wanted to work with people who have children themselves, who would have a feel for how that is like, actors with access to their own pain. She intuitively grasped the whole screenplay. It’s mood struck a chord, Sletaune says.

a He was extremely impressed with Rapace.– She is one of a kind. I watched her films, like The Girl with

A thriller in daylight– Noomi didn’t want to play Anna just a little – she wanted to be Anna. Her intensity during preparation and production was magical to behold, says director Pål Sletaune, who is airing his anxieties in Babycall. By JON INGE FAlDAlEN

Director Pål Sletaune

the Dragon Tattoo. She is visible on screen with an enormous presence. And when you meet her it becomes obvious why she is a star. She is exceptional and does the part with her entire being. She didn’t want to play Anna just a little – she wanted to be Anna. Her intensity during preparation and production was magical to behold.

–Noomi is an extremely intelligent actress who can portion out her expression. She can play emotionally, using her techni-que only as a foundation. In a rehearsal with thirteen stops on marks, she hits all of them without anyone noticing. She has great insight into her own method and is a fantastic instrument. She will bring you to an emotional level where you haven’t been before, the director states.

He admits there is a risk in letting actors have control.– A lot of the direction is in the screenplay and we are not

talking about improvisation. But of course you are taking a bit of a chance. At the same time, it is supposed to look like it hap-pens for the first time.

In Babycall she plays against Kristoffer Joner.– Noomi demanded to know who she was up against. She

said that she wanted to rehearse with and approve all of the Scandinavian actors, with one exception: Kristoffer. She has seen his films and was a great fan. And it was fantastic to see them together. Kristoffer Joner is world class in my view. He has his own special method and works out things in a context. We improvised, for example, quite a bit at the office, Sletaune says.

b Babycall was shot in the classical way.– I wanted to shoot a lot from a dolly, not steadicam, which I have bad experiences with. We built the apartment so to be able to run a dolly through it. It gives an authority to the storytelling, where nothing seems accidental, he says.

He changed his mind during the process whether the film should have music.

– I wanted to make a film without music. But when we star-ted cutting it became too harsh. It needed music to acheive an emotional resolution. We worked a bit with one composer, but replaced him since our co-operation did not work out. Then we contacted Fernando Velasquez, who did the music for The Orphanage. He had a window between some American movies. We sent him the film in the evening, by mistake on a file without subtitles. He started to watch it anyway, with the intention to see ten minutes, but ended up seeing it all without translation. In the morning he started to write the music. Of course he was unable to understand everything, but got the most important: the mood. Over four days he wrote a stretch of seven or eight minutes which is now included in the film.

Sletaune realises that some will compare Babycall to Next Door, but the latter is different in many ways.

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BabycallAn over-protective mother moves to a secret address with her eight-year-old son after a difficult divorce. Anna and her son Anders are under a witness protection programme following a difficult relationship with Anders’s father. Anna buys a babycall to keep track of her son, but it seems to be activated from other apartments in the block. One day she overhears what she thinks is the murder of a child.

Genre: Thriller Director: Pål SletauneScreenplay: Pål SletauneProduced by: Marius Holst og Karin Julsrud for 4 ½ ASProduction Year: 2011International Sales: The Match Factory

Pål SletauneDirector, producer and screenwriter Pål Sletaune (b. 1960) holds degrees in literature, photography and art history from the University of Oslo, and has become one of Norway’s foremost directors for both feature films and commercials. Sletaune started his career directing the documentary Merz in 1991, before turning to short films with The Bingo Place in 1992. He made his feature film debut with the critically acclaimed comedy drama Junk Mail in 1997. All of Sletaune’s feature films have been screened at major interna-tional film festivals like Cannes, Venice and Toronto.

Sletaune is also a well-known director of commercials with several international awards, including Golden and Silver lions in Cannes. His features have sold very well internationally, with two of his feature films also selling remake rights to the US and Australia.

– Some think the film is some sort of female version of Next Door. But genrewise the two films are very different. Next Door was intended more like a meta film, with many quotations. This time I wanted a more sober, realistic film, a thriller in full day-light, not behind doors in the dark. Directing a film is a bit like a love affair: You have a preconceived notion about how it will be and you often want something else than what is working out. It is not a good idea, however, to go through with an idea if there is another one that works better. A film should appear by itself. It has to get its own life. Babycall is a highly visual film, with long stretches without dialogue. I had many strong ideas about those images, ideas previously unrealised in my body. I am not interested in making a film that I know exactly how is going to turn out, the director says.

c The film is a mix of various genres.– Babycall is hovering between the drama and thriller genres. I wanted to find out whether a film could do that. I am a very impatient person and like suspense. But I also want to tell a story. The film has, for example, two very long dialogues. I think such scenes are the most fun to write and shoot – I love to tell things in dialogues that there is not room for elsewhere in the film. Then one can include some digressions while there is an unease beneath it all, he says.

The director is happy that Babycall is finding the emotions of the audience.

– When a film strikes people they become emotionally moved by it. I am very happy with that. To me this film is very personal, about my own anxieties and fears. Every character is very close to parts of myself, Sletaune says.

After Babycall he wants to get going with a new project immediately.

– I have to work. I am a filmdirector and this is is how I make a living. I want to work on interesting projects, but I am not the

Actress Noomi Rapace playing Anna in Sletaune’s Babycall (2011). © Agnete Brun 4 1/2 AS 2011

hired gun type. Going forward, I would prefer to make a film every second year. I will soon be finished with a screenplay, which in a couple of months will be ready as a basis to apply for money. It is called Thou shall kill. It will be a kind of satire, Woody Allens meets Tarantino, Sletaune concludes.

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Few Scandinavian actors can match Ingrid Bolsø Berdal’s expe-rience from acting in horror or action movies. In Cold Prey the horror movie series, she excelled in bloody physical exertion among the Norwegian mountains, interpreting the most famous “final girl” figure in Scandinavian horror cinema. Since then, in between her stage work, she has played more psychologically rea-listic characters, like in House of Fools and I Travel Alone.

Over the last year she has been busy with two new film pro-jects: Roar Uthaug’s action drama Escape and Tommy Wirkola’s horror comedy Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters. Berdal has just returned from Serbia and the shooting of the horror film The Diary of Lawson Oxford, by Paranormal Activity producer Oren Peli.

Flight is an action drama set in the 14th Century. It seems like a brutal and spectacular story?

– Yes, it is at times brutal, but not more than you can bring your popcorn into the dark and sit back and enjoy the film. Conditions of life were tough in that age. My character in the film is a gang leader named Dagmar who is leading her people with an iron hand. Until a certain point – and then all hell breaks loose. The role is very far from everything I have played before. It was especially interesting to work on the psychology for the part – why on earth does she act the way she does?

The Cold Prey films were physically demanding, a classic hor-ror film part. How would you compare that part with the one in Escape?– I ran a lot in Cold Prey, and run a lot in Escape as well – but the similarities stop there. Jannicke in Cold Prey was a typical “girl next door” figure, just in a little stronger version, perhaps, who in the course of the film realised that she has to fight back. Dagmar is a fighter from the first scene. In some scenes she is like an animal, she may bite before she speaks. But Dagmar also has a heart, she also has people she loves. What happens when people like Dagmar feel betrayed? I thought that was an interesting issue.

From a brutal medieval drama to a horror comedy about Hansel and Gretel. Ingrid Bolsø Berdal is Scandinavian cinema’s most hard-hitting film actress.

A fighter from the first scene

by KjETil lismOEN

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What is the greatest challenge acting in horror movies?– The horror movies have doubtless been my most exhausting projects. You have to deal with extreme emotions, while it is also often very physically demanding. But – I have made drama films that took a much longer time “to get out of the system” after the shoot. It is hard to do horror films, but there is no genre that is more fun to see the result of afterwards. If that result is good, of course.

This is yet another job with director Roar Uthaug. How would you describe him as a director?

– Roar gives us actors a great deal of freedom. We contri-bute to the development of characters and relationships. And he is very clear if he disagrees with something. Roar is visually very strong and good at doing action sequences. I really like that he wants to “take it further”, he dares to try big things and enter an epic landscape. I like to work in a subtle scale, especially if I act in a psychologically realistic project, but sometimes it is great fun to play it big as well.

You also have a part in Tommy Wirkola’s Hollywood film Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters. There you play a witch attacking Jeremy Renner and Gemma Arterton. How was that experience?

– I haven’t worked on such a Hollywood production before, so it was a new experience to me. The transition was overw-helming compared to a Norwegian production, where we are 30 to 40 people on set and everyone knows everyone. Here there were 200 people on set at all times, even the second unit was double the size of a Norwegian main unit. But the job is basically the same. When the camera starts rolling, it is exactly the same job that is to be done. Both Gemma and Jeremy are very generous actors and that made me feel safe. But in the beginning, compared to before, it was much more creepy to risk “ruining” a take in front of hundreds of people with an idea that maybe came out of left field. I discussed this with Jeremy and he said that I never should think about how big or small a production was. He became very eager when he stressed that you should always be as brave as usual.

What kind of film is it? It seems to be an unusual genre hybrid?– Tommy Wirkola is a director with a sharp sense of humour. The film is brimming with cool action scenes, tough witches, even tougher heroes and wonderfully exaggerated violence. I think it will be a riot of a movie. Tommy really has so many fun ideas. The film is a mix of many things, and it is probably a bit rougher around the edges than much of the streamlined stuff from Hollywood.

You are also in the horror movie by Paranormal Activity pro-ducer Oren Peli, The Diary of Lawson Oxford.– It was very exciting to be part of. We shot it in Serbia and I must admit that I have never been present at so special – and creepy – locations before. I think this could be a horror film that we have never seen the like of before. I was never afraid on the set when we made the Cold Prey movies. In Serbia I was, honestly speaking, often scared. I say no more!

Ingrid Bolsø BerdalIngrid Bolsø Berdal started studying music and singing in high school and after graduating she continued her music education at the University of Trondheim (NTNU), studying jazz singing and improvisation for two years. She moved to Oslo and was accepted at Oslo National Academy of Dramatic Arts (KHiO), where she studied acting for three years.

Since graduating, Ingrid Bolsø Berdal has been employed at The Norwegian Theatre in Oslo. After her first year at the theatre she received the Hedda Award (The Norwegian Theatre Award) for Best Debut of The Year. On stage she has played both classical and contemporary plays.

Ingrid Bolsø Berdal has also been working with radio theatre, TV and film: I Travel Alone (2011) by Stian Kristiansen, Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013) by Tommy Wirkola, and Bradley Parker’s The Diary of Lawson Oxford (2013). In 2006 she received the Amanda Award (The Norwegian Film Award) for Best Actress.

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The novel Company Orheim came in 2005 and is Tore Renberg’s second book about Jarle, his alter ego. Previously, two novels in the series have been adapted, The Man Who Loved Yngve (2008) and I Travel Alone (2011). They were about Jarle’s life at high school and as a student in Bergen, but Company Orheim goes back in time to meet him at a younger school stage. The director of the two previous films was Stian Kristiansen, while Company Orheim (2012) is by Arild Andresen. To Andresen it is important to emphasise the independency of the new film.

– We don’t consider Company Orheim as a follow-up film. It is a film you can see totally independent of the previous ones. I read the book when it came in 2005 and immediately wanted to film it. I have worked with this project for five years.

In the childhood story the protagonist is named Jarle Orheim, while he later takes the name Jarle Klepp. Company Orheim tells the story behind the name change: he no longer wants to bear his father’s name. The changes in the father/son relationship fascinated director Arild Andresen.

– Company Orheim is a powerful book with a wide range of emotions. It has humour and energy, but also dark sides. Jarle’s presence in the story is intense and I thought it was suitable for cinema. It is a story of growing up and liberation, but also rec-onciliation, Jarle’s road back as an adult.

a From youth film to coming of ageArild Andresen has previously made his mark as a director of films for children and youth. His best known work is the feature The Liverpool Goalie (2010), with an international pre-miere in Berlin in 2011. It won the Crystal Bear as best film of the Generation Kplus programme, as well as a special mention from the adult jury. For the government channel NRK Andresen has made the children’s and youth series Gutta boys (2006), the first Norwegian production to be nominated for an Emmy. Company Orheim is primarily aimed at adults. It premiered at the Gothenburg Film Festival in 2012, where it competed in the Nordic programme, Dragon Awards.

– In youth films you tend to give the world of adults less space, the most important is how the youths look at things. A grown-up audience will require more focus on the adult charac-ters, but age does not at all need to be a barrier. The most important is to portray the characters with nuance, but with desires and emotions we can recognise. After all, no one has forgotten how it is to be fifteen – on the contrary, we are full of memories and references.

The adaptation process was about making the story more concentrated and sharp, when it comes to time and conflicts. This resulted in a framing story where the adult Jarle (played by Rolf Kristian Larsen from the previous films) learns that his father is dead and attends his funeral. The rest goes on in 1985-88, with Jarle (here played by young Vebjørn Enger) attending school. He discovers music and politics, but has constants conflicts with his father.

– His father’s problem is that he cannot stand being contra-dicted. He wants to teach his son the important things in life, overruling him instead of supporting his son having his own ideas. When Jarle talks back it becomes even more important to be right, the opposition is a trigger for his father to insist: You must learn, you must listen to me!

b His father and the warJarle discovers other political values than his father, who doesn’t share his son’s interest in music. Already in the first sequence we see how Jarle would rather be home and watch the famous Live Aid concert, but his father forces him to go on a biking trip to

When resistance causes angerCan a father instill values in his son without provoking him? We have spoken to director Arild Andresen about Company Orheim, a film about anger, liberation, politics and music – and about the place of mountain hiking in Norwegian cinema.

By ODA BHARCompany Orheim Best Nordic Feature at Gothenburg Film Festival

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show him a war memorial. Why is the war so important to Terje? He constantly talks about it, idealising the struggle against the German occupants. Once he takes his whole family mountain hiking in the footsteps of the famous heavy water saboteurs.

– The heavy water incident at Rjukan is part of the national consciousness and to Terje Orheim it expresses basic values. In hindsight, there was a debate as to how successful the mission was: the Germans rapidly rebuilt the plant and the Americans had to bomb it. As a sabotage mission it is still unique. A few brave young men go in and blow it up, get out, no one gets hurt, no one is captured. It is the perfect sabotage mission. Terje isn’t the only one to be fascinated, just consider the American block-buster Heroes of Telemark with Kirk Douglas. Terje Orheim is preoccupied by bravery, loyalty and the will to fight, exert oneself and go that extra mile. I guess it is also about masculin-ity, the idea of men and their courage. I think that Terje believes that it must have been simple to show courage at that time, because the world was clearly defined. You had to choose sides and then struggle. He experiences his own time as more chaotic and unclear, Arild Andresen thinks.

c The mountains in Norwegian cinemaNorwegian filmmakers have always used the mountains to cre-ate drama, from Erik Løchen’s new wave film The Hunt (1959), recently chosen as the best ever Norwegian film, to Ole Giæver’s lesbian relationship drama The Mountain (2011), screened in the Panorama section at the 2011 Berlinale. The mountain hike in Company Orheim becomes dramatic as well. What is so attrac-tive about the mountains?

– The mountains are close to us. Norwegians are a mountain people, «mountain apes», as the Danish call us. The mountains also represent challenges that are dramaturgically interesting.

In this case Terje wishes to express his values through the mountain trip, but his dream becomes the others’ nightmare. I have been hiking in the mountains a lot and know the chal-lenge. Hiking with a girlfriend, for example, if everything is not working optimally… Latent conflicts will often surface. People are small and the distances are great, every choice has big con-sequences. If you can’t stand walking with your hiking compan-ion you have to walk home alone. It will take a lot to leave the other one. Challenging circumstances put the relationships under stress, Arild Andresen says.

Company OrheimJarle is 24 when a phone call rouses him from his drunken sleep. It is his mother, telling him that his father is dead. Instead of sadness, Jarle is filled with anger and a sense of relief. Based on contemporary writer Tore Renberg’s bestselling novel, Company Orheim is a strong, human tale about a boy growing up with an alcoholic father, but also an energetic story about teenage lust, pain and passion, about liberation and redemption. Company Orheim is the third chapter in the trilogy about Jarle Klepp, which started with The Man Who Loved Yngve (2008) and I Travel Alone (2011).

Genre: DramaDirector: Arild AndresenScreenplay: lars Gudmestad, Arild Andresen, based on Tore Renberg’s bestselling novel Company OrheimProduced by: yngve Sæther og Sigve Endresen for Motlys ASProduction Year: 2012International Sales: NonStop Sales

Arild AndresenArild Andresen (b. 1967) has directed more than 100 commercials for the Moland Film Company since 1999, and has received numerous national and international awards for his work in this field, as well as for other commissioned films he’s directed. While commercials may have been his bread and butter, Andresen also worked on other productions before making his debut as a feature film director. He directed the short film Mary in 1999, and both wrote and directed the two shorts Poker Face (1996) and Sit Tight (2003).

Andresen also directed the television series The Boys in 2006, which became the first Norwegian television series ever to be nominated for an Emmy Award, and was sold to TV channels and networks all across the world. Andresen made his debut as a feature film director with the highly acclaimed youth comedy The Liverpool Goalie in 2010. The film had its international premiere at the international film festival in Berlin in 2011, where it won the Crystal Bear for Best Film in the 14plus section of the Generation Competition, and received a Special Mention from the Generation International Jury of the Deutsches Kinderhilfswerk.

Kristoffer Joner plays Jarle’s alcoholic father in Company Orheim

© Motlys AS

Director Arild Andresen and Kristoffer Joner on the set

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On 27 April 1940, during the German invasion of Norway, bad weather separates a German plane from its squadron. The German pilot catches sight of a British plane and the two planes shoot each other down. Some are injured, but due to the ability of the pilots, both planes land intact. When the three Germans fight their way through the snow to seek cover in a cabin, they realise to their astonishment that the two Englishmen have arrived before them.

– This war incident was not decisive for the outcome of his-tory, but Churchill heard about it and commented upon it at the House of Commons. He called it ”an anachronism of war”, and was angry with the Englishmen because they had not done their job, Næss says.

Næss points to the fact that not all stories about Norwegians during World War II, are stories about heroes of war. In Into the White the Norwegians represent the logic of war and become the threat from the outside. The film is based on an incident that is not wholly unknown. The two pilots each wrote a book about what happened, and the young Norwegian in the ski patrol described his mission in a short report.

a Two empiresThe two pilots represent the German and British empires, and the two authorities are forced to share a cabin at Strynefjellet to survive the frigid temperature of their Norwegian surroundings. The five men desperately try to avoid becoming friends.

– The meaninglessness of war is also about alleged hostility between nations. People who have been taught that if you are a German you are like this, and if you are British you are like this. We want to reveal that human beings on a personal level are very much the same shit after all. There is much absurdity in the story, and a sense of humour in how the men are portrayed. One’s sense of humour can also be a powerful weapon, Næss says.

The cast is a team of experienced young actors. The German Leutenant Horst Schopis, military officer in the fifth generation, is played by Florian Lukas, one of Germany’s most acknowled-ged actors of his generation. Navigator Sergent Wolfgang Strunker, a man of few words, is played by Stig Henrik Hoff,

known from such films as Hawai,Oslo, The Kautokeino Rebellion and The Thing. The Mechanic Josef Schwartz who grew up with Hitler as an ideal, is played by David Kross, known from the Academy Award -winning film The Reader. The British Royal Air Force Fighter Pilot Charles P. Davenport is a British gentleman played by Lachlan Nieboer, known from the science-fiction series Torchwood and Downtown Abbey. British Royal Navy Gunner private Robert Smith, a wise guy from the streets of Liverpool, is played by Rupert Grint, known from the Harry Potter-films.

b A chamber pieceInto the White is written as a chamber piece, and Næss has plans on making a stage version. When doing the interior scenes in a studio in Trollhättan, Sweden, all shooting was cronological. Næss would throw out the crew and direct the scenes together with the actors who also were allowed to improvise. They arranged for the crew to come in and watch a few times every day, and the actors would also learn from this response.

– I directed a film in USA some years ago, and I made a film in Sweden with children from Kurdistan – who did not under-stand a single word of what I said. As a director you have to know which story you want to tell. When I know the meaning of a scene, I can accept input from the actors and there is no prestige in where the ideas come from.

In Norwegian you can also lack words, and it can be difficult to explain an intuition, that can happen in any language. Then I choose – as I have worked as an actor before – to show it and say: Look at me and do not do as I do, but watch and see what it can contain.

Næss admits that it was a big challenge to shoot in the snowy mountains, but it gave him a taste for more. The production was delayed only once, when the windy weather became too cold for the camera and the lens froze.– I am a nature lover. When I have time for it, I love to go skiing from cabin to cabin, so it is actually a bit strange that I have not made a film in the countryside before. It is truly impressive out there.

A Chamber Piece in the Mountains– In the history books this was a small

event, but on a human level it is a important one, says director

Petter Næss. Into the White is inspired by a true story.

by PiA EKElAND

© Z

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Petter NæssPetter Næss (b. 1960) started his career as a produc-tion assistant in television, and worked as an actor before he started as a director at Centralteatret, an Oslo theatre. After directing several successful stage plays, he made his debut as a film director with the comedy drama Absolute Hangover in 1999. In 2001 he premiered the film Elling, to unison critical acclaim and some of the best ever Norwegian box office fig-

ures. The film won numerous awards at film festivals, and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign language Film. In 2005 Næss directed Love Me Tomorrow, the final film of the Elling trilogy.

Since his film debut in 1999, Næss has established himself as one of Norway’s leading directors. His other films include the youth film Just Bea (2003), the Swedish children’s film Leaps and Bounds (2007), Gone With the Woman (2007) and his Hollywood debut Mozart and the Whale (2005). In 2008 he also made a rare return in front of the camera, playing the small role of Capt. Martin linge in the epic WWII film Max Manus (a.k.a. Max Manus - Man of War).

Into the WhiteInto the White is an anti-war movie. High above the harsh Norwegian wilder-ness, English and German pilots shoot each other to the ground after a violent chance encounter. Isolated, they must fight to survive the brutal winter. Though war has made them enemies, antagonism is hard to maintain as days go by. Through mutual need, unlikely friendships bloom. Somehow, they become comrades. War, after all, is absurd.

Genre: DramaDirector: Petter Næssscreenplay: Ole Meldgaard, Petter Næss, Dave MangoProduced by: Peter Aalbæk Jensen for Zentropa International Norway Production year: 2012language: Norwegian, English, Germaninternational sales: TrustNordisk ApS

Support and invest in film, tv and game productions within central Norway.We assist in finding locations and local staff.

www.midtnorskfilm.no

Support and invest in film, tv and game productions within central Norway.We assist in finding locations and local staff.

www.midtnorskfilm.no

Support and invest in film, tv and game productions within central Norway.Support and invest in film, tv and game productions within central Norway.

© Zentropa International Norway

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In the wake of the success of Stieg Larsson’s heroine Lisbeth Salander, Scandicrime and Nordic Noir have become terms to reckon with, and not limited to the Millennium trilogy. Distinguishing features of Scandinavian crime fiction are anti-heroes, powerfully drawn environments and a dark approach that goes deeper than the usual cops-and-robbers movies. Now the novels of Norwegian author Jo Nesbø are lined up, featuring the rough and self-destructive, but very capable and intuitive policeman Harry Hole. It was recently announced that Martin Scorsese is to direct the first film, based on Nesbø’s bestseller The Snowman.

Jo Nesbø is far from an unknown name to international crime readers, and last year he was at the top of the official bestseller list in Great Britain, something that has happened only once before to a translated author, and that was Stieg Larsson. Who are the other candidates for the next Nordic crime success? Where should filmmakers start looking for screenplay options?

a Psychological depthsSeveral bestsellers in Norwegian crime fiction since the 1990s are written by women. Important names are Karin Fossum, Unni Lindell and Anne Holt, all of them with psychologically-oriented plots that look deeply into dark souls. They are as concerned with what happens when madness takes over as with investi-gations and resolution.

Several novels by Fossum and Lindell have been adapted for films and TV. Holt has seen two adaptations so far, but the pro-duction company Yellow Bird recently bought options for sev-eral of her books. Yellow Bird produced the Swedish Millennium

films, as well as the Swedish and British TV series about Kurt Wallander (played by Kenneth Branagh in the latter). Writer Anne Holt has a versatile professional background, as a former police lawyer, practicing lawyer, TV news anchor and even Minister of Justice for a short period in the 1990s. Her most well-known books are about a lesbian police investigator, but Yellow Bird has decided to adapt one of her more recent works about a male police investigator and a female psychologist and lawyer with a background from the FBI.

Other writers in the psychological and socially aware field are Kim Småge, Pernille Rygg and Ingrid Berglund, the latter with a psychologist as the protagonist. A male example, Torkil Damhaug, is a psychiatrist himself and is actively using his expert knowledge, when dreams and repressed memories are used to build the suspense in books that are close to the psycho-logical thriller.

b Historical enigmasA kind of crime fiction that has received a lot of attention is the historical mystery thriller. The most prominent Norwegian prac-titioner is Tom Egeland, a well-known newspaper and TV jour-nalist who in 2001 broke through with Relic. This novel has also been named «the Norwegian Da Vinci Code», and some even suggested that Dan Brown had plagiarised Egeland, something which Egeland himself emphatically denies. He thinks that they simply have studied the same mythical material. Egeland’s pro-tagonist is the albino archaeologist Bjørn Beltø, who is especially fascinated by codes and myths of ancient Christian, Egyptian and Norse times.

By ODA BHAR

The polar pistolWhich are the hidden treasures of Nordic crime fiction to be found and adapted after the Millennium trilogy about Lisbeth Salander? Let us take a look at some trends within Norwegian thriller and crime literature.

Martin Scorsese is to direct a film based on Jo Nesbø’s bestseller The Snowman. © Aschehoung

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An senior Norwegian author with a similar field of interest is Gert Nygårdshaug, who in a series of crime novels about the food and wine connoisseur Fredric Drum takes us on journeys to far-away places like Italy, Egypt and Mexico to decipher old codes.

There are also writers who work with more recent history. The Danish-Norwegian Kurt Aust, who is writing historical crime fiction from, for example, the 18th Century Denmark-Norway. Vidar Sundstøl, who recently broke through with the so-called Minnesota trilogy, about a US policeman of Norwegian descent who during an investigation of a murder of a tourist stumbles upon Indian myths and a 100-year-old murder mystery.

c The international political thrillerThe most famous adaptation of a Norwegian spy thriller from an international scene is Orion’s Belt (1978), based on a novel by the leftist radical Jon Michelet, who is writing crime fiction in the tradition of Swedish authors Sjöwall and Wahlöö.

More recent authors often write about environments of which they have first-hand knowledge, like Tom Kristensen, a financier who sets his John Grisham-like thrillers in the finance, oil, shipping company or aid industries. The retired pilot, engi-neer and airport manager Arild Rypdal had to flee the Germans to Great Britain as a boy during World War II, where his father got a position in the MI6. Rypdal’s childhood home became a haunt for agents, which inspired him to write spy thrillers focussed on the MI6. The promising newcomer Olav Njølstad helds a position as research manager at the Nobel Institute in Oslo, and his writings are based on international politics during the Cold War.

d The urbane – hard-boiled or realistic?The most usual type of crime fiction in Norway, by far, is con-temporary “whodunnit” novels, usually with a policeman or an investigator duo as protagonists. Private detectives are far more rare, something that mirrors the actual situation in Scandinavia. What distinguishes these novels from each other is often the environment. The story may take place in a certain city or use an exotic landscape, as in the “polar crime” novels of two excellent female writers: Glaciologist and polar explorer Monica Kristensen writes about Svalbard, while Jorun Thørring divides her writing between a series set in Tromsø about a Sami inves-tigator, and stories about a policeman from Northern Norway who works for the Paris police.

As genres, the police and detective novels fall into two types: the hard-boiled and the realistic ones. Two of the realism-ori-ented writers are themselves policemen: Jørn Lier Horst sets his action in his home town of Larvik, and Bjørn Bottolfs’s investiga-tor does not sit behind a desk but is on patrol in Oslo. Other popular examples are Jørgen Gunnerud, Magnhild Bruheim and Knut Faldbakken, as well as Jan Mehlum, who writes about a lawyer in Tønsberg. Interesting are also the advertising guru Kjetil Try and the successful musical and opera singer Øistein Wiik, who sets his crime stories on the European jet set scene.

The hard-boiled contemporary novels may lean towards noir or novels centred on criminals, emphasising the unsentimental and brutal. Most important in Norway is Gunnar Staalesen, who has written a number of bestsellers about the dishevelled pri-vate detective Varg Veum, many of them adapted. Other house-hold names to Norwegian crime readers are Kjell Ola Dahl, Fredrik Skagen, Morten Harry Olsen and Kjersti Scheen, who writes about a female private detective.

Trondheim inTernaTional Film FesTival

march 19–25 2012

Welcome to the 8th annual

kosmorama.no facebook.com/kosmorama twitter.com/kosmoramafilm

introducing the new directors award

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Ten months after the euphoria of Tahrir Square and Mubarak’s fall, Egypt’s revolution remains incomplete: more than 12,000 protesters have been arrested by the army and secret police, sentenced by summary military tribunals, and often tortured. It shows how the systematic use of violence and fear by Mubarak’s regime continues unchanged after the revolution.

Director Petr Lom and producer Torstein Grude of Piraya Film originally wanted to make a film about Mohamed ElBaradei, who at an early stage appeared as one of leading figures of the Egyptian revolution.

– I had come into contact with ElBaradei one year before the revolution. Someone had tipped me off about what could be brewing in Egypt. When the revolution became a fact I joined him going to Egypt. But I gradually realised that the film would not be about him. For various reasons, I became more interested in ordinary people’s lives in Egypt and how they reacted to what happened around them. I started to gather various human fates and their stories. After a couple of months we decided that the theme should be injustice.

It is still difficult to predict where the Egyptian revolution will end, Lom and Grude emphasise. Therefore it has not been easy to predict how the film will end. Much in Egypt is still the same, Lom explains.

– The lack of rights and the abuse have been going on for so many years that it won’t disappear like that. The stories we have decided to tell has something universal about them; they are about government abuse against individuals. In this way it can be a metaphor for every closed and restrictive society.

Making a documentary is about looking for and meeting people, Lom thinks. It was when he filmed a press conference with ElBaradi during the first week in Egypt that he started to

orient himself against the fate of regular Egyptians.– Some journalists tipped me off about the story of the blog-

gers Mark and Maikel Nabil, but also about another blogger who got arrested by Mubarak in 2005. The same with the story of 15-year-old Wally Hosni who was thrown into the turbulent ”Day of the Camel”, where riders on horses or camels entered Tahrir Square and beat up demonstrators. A central theme of the film is police brutality. I got permission from the Minstry of the Interior to visit a prison – as the first Western journalist. After a week I realised that much had stayed the same. And it was there we found another of the film’s stories.

Lom and Grude worked under the Chinese radar on On a Tightrope. But that was simpler in many ways, they say.

– It is always a risk connected to being present during the first days of a revolution. You get easily scared since you don’t know what is happening. It is a lot of suspicion towards foreigners in Egypt, especially towards those with a camera.

– When we have previously worked under totalitarian regi-mes, the opponent or the ”enemy” have been clearly defined, Grude says. – Here there was an upheaval that no one knew how would turn out, and where the threat picture was chaotic .

Grude has produced a string of award-winning documenta-ries about exposed human beings under totalitarian regimes. Yodok Stories is about prison camps in North Korea, Belarussian Waltz about the lack of free speech in Belarus, while On a Tightrope portrays the conditions of life for a persecuted Moslem group in China.

– During my entire adult life I have been concerned with human rights. But especially the co-operation with the Norwegian Rafto Foundation, which helped finance our the first three films, has been inspiring and stimulating.

Back to Tahrir Square– The threat picture was chaotic. When we have previously worked under totalitarian regimes, the opponent has been more clearly defined, says director Petr Lom and producer Torstein Grude. In the documentary Back to the Square they follow several characters in Egypt who have suffered injustice at the hands of the current post-revolutionary military regime. By KJETIl lISMOEN

© Piraya Film

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PHONE: +47 22 47 45 00 - POST@NORWEGIANFILM.COM - WWW.NORWEGIANFILM.COM

LOOK TO NORWAY - A LOCATION WITH A DIFFERENCE

Being a producer is not a simple profession to begin with. Making films about and from totalitarian states does not make it simpler. This type of film projects requires very good insight into human nature and an ability to judge situations, Grude says.

– Petr has several times worked in dangerous areas. He is a tall guy, 2 meters and 10. So it is not much use for him trying to hide. When he enters dangerous areas nobody thinks he is there with a hidden agenda, and that can actually have a disarming effect.

– Directors on such projects have to share their protagonists’ fears and at the same time deliver cinematic content on a high level. They cannot become so afraid that they freeze up, but they cannot be fearless either, without contact with the realities around them and their team. They make up a special league of sensitive tough guys.

Back to the SquareA year after the euphoria of Tahrir Square and Mubarak’s fall, Egypt’s revolution remains incomplete: many continue to suffer from government-inflicted cru-elty. More than 12 000 protesters have been arrested by the army and secret police, sentenced by summary military tribunals, and often tortured. The film follows several people who have suffered injustice at the hands of the current post-revolutionary military regime. It shows how the systematic use of vio-lence and fear by Mubarak’s regime continues after he has been ousted from power.

Genre: Documentary, 80’Director: Petr lomscreenplay: Torstein Grude, Petr lomProduced by: Torstein Grude for Piraya Filmlanguage: ArabicProduction year: 2012international sales: Kudos Family Distribution AS

Torstein Grude Torstein Grude (b. 1971) holds a degree in media theory and film history from the University of Bergen (1994), and studied at the london International Film School, graduating in 1997. He has directed several documentary films, and works as a director, cinematographer and producer at Piraya Film AS, a com-pany that he also founded. In addition to his own efforts as a director and producer, Grude has also worked in various technical capacities on over 100 other productions.

Petr LomPetr lom (b. 1968) hails from Prague, Czechoslovakia, but grew up in Canada, and received his Ph.D. in Political Philosophy from Harvard University in 1997. He gave up his academic career in 2004 to pursue a full-time career as a documentary filmmaker, making his debut with Bride Kidnapping in Kyrgyzstan the same year. He has since written, directed and produced several documen-tary films and television series, and runs his own documentary production company lom Films.

Grude and lom with Mark at Rotterdam International Film Festival 2012

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– The Troll Hunter, Happy, Happy, Turn Me On, Goddammit, Oslo, August 31st and Headhunters were all programmed at important film festivals, like Sundance, Tribeca, Cannes and Toronto, receiving a very good response, says Stine Helgeland, Director of the Department of Promotion and International Relations at the Norwegian Film Institute.

– All of these films have a very well defined concept, a limited universe and a clear story. Happy, Happy and Turn Me On, Goddammit also have powerful female stories with refreshing and original angles on how girls and women ofte n are portrayed on film. Their basis is a small, and typically Norwegian country-side universe, but they come across as universal stories – and stories that are very well told.

Happy, Happy won The Grand Jury Prize at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, and according to Helgeland Happy, Happy suits this major US arena for indie films very well.

– The film has an «independent» style, something I think is caused by the Maipo Minimal Concept, which means limits on the number of locations and actors. Perhaps the winter land-scape also appeals to this festival, which takes place in the middle of winter in the Utah mountains. Happy, Happy seems very exotic internationally, with its typical Norwegianness and episodes of absurd humour. Director Anne Sewitsky thought it was almost as if her film had arrived at home when it was screened at Sundance.

Filmkameratene presented The Troll Hunter as a secret ”work-in-progress” event during Fantastic Fest in Austin.

– This was a quite a risk to take, since the film was not slated for a Norwegian premiere until a few months later and it had not been showed to an audience before. Fantastic Fest is not among the largest festivals, but it attracts a big and very enthusiastic genre audience who are highly active on film blogs and other internet forums. The audience loved what they saw and told the whole world about it. Fantastic Fest positioned The Troll Hunter in an excellent way and this probably contributed to Sundance also becoming aware of it.

As the first Norwegian film ever, Jannicke Systad Jacobsen’s feature film Turn Me On Goddammit was selected for the Tribeca Film Festival, where it won Best Screenplay.

– Tribeca is a relatively new festival and they look for new voices and stories. I guess it was the quirky story of horny Alma that appealed to them. In this film as well, a very local and typi-cal Norwegian environment is emphasised.

Oslo, August 31st received its world premiere in the presti-gious section «Un Certain Regard» in Cannes. Joachim Trier attracted attention in Cannes with his debut Reprise, and he was received well also this time.

– Oslo, August 31st tells a timeless «young man searching for

the meaning of life» story, and is also a sensitive celebration of Oslo. Based on a familiar novel and film, it fits very well into the classical, intellectual French way of film storytell-ing. Joachim Trier is a hugely talented young director, and he showed with his debut Reprise that he could capture the zeitgeist and say some-thing important about a gen-eration and our age.

Headhunters received its international premiere at Piazza Grande during the Locarno Film Festival, and was later screened at the Toronto International Film Festival.

– The plan was to get the film to Toronto, and the Locarno screening came almost as a bonus. But already in Berlin and Cannes, almost a year before the Toronto screening, Headhunters was presold to several large distributors, including Magnolia in the US. The Scandinavian crime wave has conquered the world. Headhunters is mastering this genre to perfection. The film is efficient, suspenseful and appeals to a wide audience. In addi-tion to that, it is based on a novel by Jo Nesbø, a Norwegian star of world literature, Stine Helgeland says.

2011 – an outstandig year for Norwegian cinemaTicket sales for Norwegian films in theatrical release reached 2,855,000 in 2011, the highest since 1975. The marked share was a record high of 24.5% for Norwegian films in movie theatres in Norway.

2011 was also the year when the international film industry joined André Øvredal’s troll hunt in the Norwegian mountains. 45 international film festi-vals have screened The Troll Hunter and so far it has been sold to more than 50 countries. Headhunters tops the Nordic sales figures with more than 65 countries, while Happy, Happy and The Troll Hunter follow closely with sales to more than 50 countries.

2011 was a very good year for Norwegian cinema. Impressive ticket sales for Norwegian movie theatres, heavy participation at international festivals, and extensive sales of foreign rights, says Stine Helgeland at The Norwegian Film Institute.

2011: Norwegian films succeed abroad

By MORTEN STEINGRIMSEN

Stine Helgeland © NFI

Headhunters © Nordisk Filmdistribusjon

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The great majority of Norwegian cinemas and almost all of the smaller ones, are run and/or financed by local government. Only 20 out of nearly 200 Norwegian movie theatres turned a profit before the digitalisation. When it became inevitable that cinemas would turn digital, it was a risk that many of Norway’s cinema theatres would not be able to afford the digital equip-ment.

This is why Film & Kino and some of the largest Norwegian cinemas together with the independent distributors, in 2005 began to plan a switch to digital projection. Negotiations with Hollywood started in 2007, and in 2010 the financing was in place. During the fall of 2010 and spring of 2011, Norway became the first country in the world where all analogue projectors were substituted with digital systems.

– Today there is 184 movie theatres in Norway compared to 199 in 2007, and some closed down during the digitalisation. But there are plans for about 30 new theatres, so we will soon be back to the level of 2007, Stensland says.

a Virtual Print FeeThe transition to digital cinema in Norway is the result of a unique co-operation that involves the cinemas, Film & Kino and both Hollywood and independent Norwegian distributors. Through a Virtual Print Fee (VPF) the distributors will cover 40% of the costs of the digitalisation. The deal was negotiated between Film & Kino and the Hollywood studios, and later offe-red to the independent distributors. The final negotiations tur-ned out to be more difficult than expected, largely because the VPF meant a change to the distributor’s business model.

When films were screened on 35mm, the distributors wanted to get every single print screened as many times as possible. Almost all costs were connected to the making of the prints. In some cases, the VPF will soon exceed the distributor’s expected revenue. Therefore the distributor might want to withdraw films that cinemas still would want to show.

b Limiting the withdrawalTwo elements of the VPF deal intend to limit such withdrawals. Only the first 90 screenings will have the VPF, and the cinemas have access to financial support from Film & Kino for the scree-ning of «quality films». These two elements have been the core of the conflict.

A VPF for every screening would have created problems for the smallest cinemas. Even though the Norwegian VPF is low compared to the rest of Europe, few films would have earned more than the VPF at the smallest theatres, which would limit the availability for these cinemas. Small independent distribu-tors fear the large blockbusters that will often reach more than

90 screenings already during the opening weekend. Therefore the independent distributors expect they will have to have to pay the largest part of the distributors’ VPF, even though Hollywood represents a majority of the screenings.

The financial support for «quality films» is complicated and has seen some changes. The support has to be applied for for each title, and is given per screening, up to 90. After that it is cancelled. The consequence has been that films have been withdrawn after 90 screenings, even though audiences still want to see the film. This happened to Joachim Trier’s acclai-med Oslo, August 31st (2011).

c Increased film availabilityThe independent distributors’ struggle against the agreement could also be an expression of anxiety about the future. There is a surplus of films to choose from when cinemas are deciding what to show, and audiences must get used to the fact that films will run for a shorter period of time. Even if ticket sales are increasing, the profits will be spread out among many more films. This is not a problem for the cinemas, but distributors have to share the earnings with more producers. The increase at the smaller cinemas suggests they have used the new oppor-tunities well, and that audiences value the access to more and newer films, and thereby accept shorter screening periods.

In June 2012, one year after every Norwegian cinema went digital, the VPF deal will be evaluated. Disagreements will pro-bably remain between independent distributors and Film & Kino, but big changes are not expected. More likely, the industry will draw a breath of relief over a successful transition. Now that Hollywood is reluctant to make further VPF deals, it seems that Norway’s initiative came in the nick of time.

The switch to digital cinema in Norway could have meant the end for many small movie theatres, but they experience a strong attendance increase, says Jørgen Stensland from Film & Kino. by mArius ØFsTi

Digital Cinema: Year One

Digital cinemas: increased businessThe smaller Norwegian cinemas have seen a growth a growth of 50% compa-red to 2010. The growth is just under 6%, but the turnover increased with 9%. The increased is caused by the fact that 3D movies have seen a substantial growth after the digitalisation. In 2010 12% of all screenings were in 3D, and 25% in 2011. The total number of screenings is increased by 10%.

423 movie theatres out of 460 joined the agreement. Most of the theatres not digitalised, did not meet Film & Kino’s stipulation of at least one screening a week. The digitalisation seems to expand the number of cinemas, and it is still possible to join the financial support system for digital equipment.

Film & Kinois a member organisation for Norwegian municipalities and an industry orga-nisation for the cinema and video industries. The organisation, established in 1917, administers the Norwegian Cinema and Film Foundation and runs the Mobile Cinema and S-Kino. www.kino.no/english

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Lasse Greve Alsos, who has produced Magic Silver 2 together with Jørgen Storm Rosenberg, explains that there is scientific research on how 3D affects audiences, for example an experi-ment performed at the University of Helsinki.

– They had two different audiences. One audience saw a shot of a sleeping child in 2D, the other in 3D. The 3D audience felt much closer to the person on the screen.When Alsos and Rosenberg decided to do Magic Silver 2 in 3D, like many they were inspired by great 3D successes like Avatar. But it was Street Dance that convinced them that it was possible to make the film.

– Street Dance was made in London, on something that loo-ked more like a Nordic budget. We realised then that it would be possible to this in Norway. We contacted the people working on the film and started researching what it would take. Magic Silver 2 was the right film for us to do 3D on. You are drawn into the fairytale-like universe, allowing us to achieve the magic atmo-sphere we want.

a 3D AFFECTS EVERY LINK IN THE CHAINDuring the screenwriting process you have to think possibilities in a new way, Alsos says.– You have to find the type of scenes suitable for 3D. The cutting rhythm will also be different. A 3D movie emphasises mise-en-scène and favours longer takes, where you can really be at rest and take in the space.

– Where to put the convergence point between the two camera lenses is important in 3D. This decides where you set the depth. Do you want the depth inwards, into the screen, or out-wards? There are various methodologies to shooting in 3D. Since this was a pioneering project, we decided to go for the method where we can see the result at once. We decided on the depth while shooting, and the only thing we can do in post-production is to adjust it a little back and forth, compared to the screen plane. We could sit on the set and see the result, knowing that this is basically what we will get. We chose this method since we wanted to know at once that what we have on tape now, we really have.

It is also more difficult to cheat and get away with cost-cutting effects.

– The first Magic Silver movie was shot in the studio and we built a cave out of plaster that was painted to look like stone. This won’t work in 3D. In this film we decided to go on location in some cobalt mines. We had to enter through a 150-meter passage, 40 meters underground. We even made a custom-built elevator to transport several tons of equipment. Logistically, it was more challenging for us, but what we gain visually is really fantastic.

– Texture is also important in props and costumes. If you go

to Norsk Film’s props warehouse, a lot of the things there are imitations in plastic. This works fine in 2D, but in 3D it will reveal itself as plastic. You have to get things that look more real.

You also need a larger crew on a 3D movie.– In addition to the usual crew, we got assistance from a team

from England – for example a stereographer, who takes care of the 3D part. He brings along a stereograph assistant, who in principle functions as a second unit cinematographer. While the second unit cinematographer is adjusting the focus, the stereo-grapher is adjusting the convergence point. In addition there is an even greater need for a DIT, and even greater need for video assist and 3D playback. Because the stereographer constantly has to check the footage. You also have a digilab on set, with three people who are checking that the 3D is working and that the cameras are in synch.The shooting team came from Vision 3 in London and the post-production team from Post Republic in Berlin. Both teams have experience from big Hollywood productions. The Vision 3 team came straight from Pirates of the Caribbean 4.Alsos tells us that they have received very positive feedback from these international operators, and that they often show scenes from the film to others, as examples of good use of 3D.– I think this is so because our approach was quite humble. We felt that this was a situation where they brought the compe-tence to us. I think they felt that they had a greater impact on the result and what had to happen to make it the best possible 3D. On many other productions you can see that they shoot it almost like a 2D film, with a worse 3D as a result. Here they hel-ped laying the groundwork from the start.

b THE FUTURE OF 3DAlsos thinks it is unfortunate that so many recent 3D films are bad. He is especially critical towards post-converted 3D.

– This destroys the market for 3D, because regular audiences are not aware of the difference. They have attended a badly post-converted film and go ”Is this what 3D films are like? This was not so cool.” I hope this will end.

He is still positive as to the future of the 3D format.– Personally I think 3D is such an interesting new storytelling

element that I hope there will still be an opportunity in the market for it, to the advantage of both filmmakers and audien-ces. But not every movie is suitable for 3D.

Alsos also thinks there are quite good opportunities for 3D movies in the Norwegian film industry.

– The costs will go down as more equipment become standar-dised. The threshold for making a 3D film becomes lower. We also have a great advantage in the Norwegian way of distributing films digitally. It is not in every country that you are able to show your film in 3D everywhere.

– 3D is a new storytelling element and that means new possibilities, says Lasse Greve Alsos, who is one of the producers of Norway’s first 3D movie, Magic Silver 2.

Pioneers in 3D

By ANDERS FAGERHOlT

© Storm Rosenberg AS

20

The films Two Lives and Mercy are co-productions that concern both Germany and Norway equally much, says the Norwegian co-producers. Both films are part of a rising trend of German and Norwegian co-productions.

Co-productions in the best sense

by TOmmy GjErAlD

The German-Norwegian co-production Two Lives (Zwei Leben) is a hybrid of two genres – family drama and spy thriller. The story is about Stasi’s exploitation of Norwegian Lebensborn children after the war, camouflaged as a family secret. Directed by Georg Maas from Germany, the main character is played by Juliane Köhler from Germany, and the also cast include Norwegian actors Liv Ullmann and Sven Nordin.

– Two Lives is inspired by historical references to events that actually happened. It is set in both countries, but primarily in Norway, producer Axel Helgeland says.

Mercy (Gnade) which is in the competition programme at the Berlinale, was shot in the world’s northernmost city, Hammerfest, and in Hamburg. The German auteur Matthias Glasner has taken on a Scandinavian story written by the successful Danish screenplay writer, Kim Fupz Aakeson, and the film is produced by Kristine Knudsen.

Mercy portrays a big theme where the inner conflicts are expressed in the violent landscape, Knudsen explains.

– Hammerfest is an international small city, to which many for-eigners have moved to work in the gas industry – including Germans.

The central parts are played by a mix of German and Norwegian star actors.

– Mercy is the first ever feature film to be made in the area, but the enthusiasm from local resources was completely incre-dible. Locals joined the film as interns, actors and extras, and we had to improvise and be open to changes, not least because of the changing weather, she adds.

The fact that Norway and Germany enjoy a very productive co-operation does not surprise Axel Helgeland.

– Germans are fond of Scandinavian cinema. Every year three or four Norwegian productions have theatrical release in Germany. There are several interesting financial support sys-tems for film production in Germany, and the producers are easy going to work with. They are very professional with a high level of precision, Helgeland says.

The co-operation is seeing a positive development. Much of the reason for this is that Norway has joined The European Convention on Cinematographic Co-Production.

– Positive things have developed regarding Germany as a co-operative partner. It has been an active two-way co-opera-tion. The previous film I co-produced with German partners ran into trouble because Norway was not connected to The European Convention on Cinematographic Co-Production. It is a great advantage that we are now a part of the agreement, with a 10% German share being enough to get a project approved as a German production, Helgeland says.

He has a clear strategy for how to achieve increased co-operation between the two countries.

– We have to continue building and qualify relations, on an official and a personal level. It is important, it gives an increased focus and professional attention for future projects, Helgeland concludes.

Mercy (Gnade)A German family are moving to the world’s northernmost city, Hammerfest, in an attempt to start a new life. But a terrible accident turns their lives upside down and forces the question: What role does innocence play for the family’s happiness?

Genre: DramaDirector: Matthias Glasnerscreenplay: Kim Fupz AakesonProduced by: Kristine Knudsen, Matthias Glasner, Andreas Born for Knudsen & Streuber Medienmaufaktur GmbH, Schwarzweiss Filmproduktion GmbH, Ophir Film GmbH AS Norwegian Co-Producer: Aage Aaberge for NeofilmProduction year: 2012Country: Germany, Norwayinternational sales: Beta Cinema

Two Lives (Zwei Leben)Europe 1990. The Berlin wall has just crumbled. Katrine, raised in East Germany, now living in Norway since more than 20 years, is a “war child”. A lawyer asks her and her mother to be witnesses in a trial against the Norwegian state on behalf of the war children, but she resists. Her loved ones are forced to take a stand: What carries more weight, the life they have lived together, or the lie it is based on?

Genre: DramaDirector: Georg Maasscreenplay: Georg Maas, Cristoph Tölle, Ståle Stein BergProduced by: Zinnober Film- und FernsehProduktionNorwegian Co-Producer: Axel Helgeland for Helgeland Film Country: Germany, Norway, Denmark

Kristine Knudsen Axel Helgeland©Tom Trambow

21

After nearly 30 years and almost as many films, all of them regarded as box office successes, producer John M. Jacobsen is a living legend in Scandinavian cinema.

Filmkameratene is arguably the most successful production company in Norwegian film history. What is your formula for success? – If there is any formula, it is always to make the film you would like to see, not the one you think others would like to see. We have a good team at Filmkameratene, and most of the time we are in agreement when we come across a project with poten-tial. We did the deal on The Troll Hunter (2010) during our first meeting with André Øvredal. We just looked at each other and …wow! We must try to make this film!

I guess it goes that fast very rarely?– In most cases it actually goes that fast – but usually in the other direction, unfortunately. That does not necessarily mean that the project is no good, but that we are already doing something similar. Or we know that others do. Or we cannot see any challenge in the project. And without a challenge there is no fun in it.

What production of yours has been the most challenging?– Body Troopers (1996), without a doubt. Something like that had never been made in Norway before, maybe not in the entire Europe. The CGI technique was in its infancy, neither had we any experience in blending model shots and live action. There was a lot of trying and failing. It sold 350,000 tickets in its Norwegian theatrical release and is still selling on DVD. Spelling bought the world rights, today it is handled by Paramount. In Germany alone it was released in 200 prints.

Can one say that Filmkameratene is based on making hits?– Of course we want to make successful films, and we have

almost always done that. The only film we weren’t sure whether there was a wide audience for, was Only Clouds Move the Stars (1998). But the screenplay was so good that there was nothing else to do but give the green light. In the future I don’t think it will be possible to survive as a film producer without a high hit factor. The movie theatres will not keep films on long enough for them to «find their audience», as it is called. Not that I think that audiences would be interested in finding them. Today audiences know what they want to see long before the curtain is raised for the first screening.

The Troll Hunter has become a formidable success, also abroad?– For about six months it was Norwegian cinema’s greatest film export success of all times, possibly with the exception of Pinchcliffe Grand Prix (1975) which we don’t have verifiable figures on. Without knowing the numbers for Headhunters (2011) in detail I have a feeling that Friland and Yellowbird now have beaten us. That’s great. Two Norwegian successes like that happening within the same year is fantastic. We must also not forget Happy, Happy (2010). And we sold Max Manus (2008) to more than 40 countries. This is a sign that foreigners finally are discovering Norwegian cinema. Hopefully this is the start of a trend, for success has a tendency to breed success.

Is The Troll Hunter a greater success than Pathfinder?– A really difficult question. Pathfinder (1987) was a mega-success in a Norwegian context, but reports from abroad were often inaccurate. We actually don’t know how great that success was, even though we know that it was screened all around the world. But even if we adjust for inflation and the dollar exchange rate, we have received more money from export markets for The Troll Hunter than for Pathfinder.

You closed a deal on The Troll Hunter in the first meeting – are you able to foresee a success?– It doesn’t work that way. What I can foresee is whether I would like to see that film myself, if it turns out as expected. Then the hope is that I am in tune with the market. The Troll Hunter was a very interesting challenge and we realised of course that it was something we could sell in theory, but we didn’t know if Øvredal would deliver a finished product that lived up to its potential. It was a process where Filmkameratene as a production company also had something to contribute.

Do you have any unrealised dream projects?– One film we would have liked to make is an adaption of Erik Fosnes Hansen’s novel Psalm at Journey’s End, and we actually thought we would make it. But alas, a gentleman named James Cameron decided to make his version of Titanic and then we could just forget about ours. My dream project has always been Hamsun’s Victoria. I already started working on it in 1974. And now we will finally make that film. It is important not to lose faith.

– To enter an unknown

landscape and deal with

new challenges, that is the

fun part, says Norway’s

most prominent producer

John M. Jacobsen, who will

finally see his dream

project become reality.

The Troll Hunterby sØlvE sKAGEN

© Scanpix

22

Erik Løchen is Scandinavian cinema’s forgotten modernist. In December Norwegian critics chose Løchen’s The Hunt as the best ever Norwegian film, with a film by his grandchild Joachim Trier in third place.

The film magasine Rushprint assigned 30-odd film critics, film scholars and cura-tors the task of assembling their own list of the ten best ever Norwegian films released theatrically. Erik Løchen’s groundbreaking The Hunt turned out to be the clear choice. The Hunt was a small film revolution when it was released in 1959. The following year it was selected for the main competition in Cannes, where it attracted attention and recieved an award for its sound. But in Norway Løchen’s break with traditio-nal storytelling got a lukewarm reception. Variety critic Jay Weissberg points out in his piece on the film in Rushprint, that it is exactly this approach that is the film’s raison d’être. Løchen plays with time and space, wraps the mountains of Norway in elegant jazz music and shows us the pos-sibilities of cinema:

”The Hunt is a film that’s brimming with insight and character, beautifully modulated for maximum psychological

nuance. Perhaps it was too subtle – dare one say too Norwegian? – in the sense of understatement, of controlled emotions, but surely one doesn’t need a therapist’s degree or a PhD in the Norwegian charac-ter to appreciate the depth of feeling, not to mention the playfulness, that Løchen brings to his debut. I have no hesitation in saying it’s one of the best films I’ve seen recently, from any period. The Hunt has a fresh inventiveness that’s intimately tied to the story, and notwithstanding our foreknowledge of the conclusion, the ending is still deeply disturbing. In addi-tion, Løchen’s stunning use of landscape, highlighting the solitary nature of the

characters and their deep, almost crush-ing sense of exposure - to each other, to themselves, to their environment - lends a certain magnificence to the intimate love triangle.

The film needs to be seen, and Joachim Trier’s justified championing of his grandfather’s work will hopefully increase Løchen’s exposure worldwide. For me, the discovery of Erik Løchen reinforces the sense, which should be in every cineaste’s head, of how limited our exposure is to the galaxy of filmdirectors barely explored outside their own coun-tries. We all have a lot of catching up to do.”

The Hunt: Best film of all times

The Norwegian student production Tuba Atlantic is among the Academy Awards nominees for Best Short Film. The film is one of five shorts that could receive an Oscar statuette at the world’s most cele-brated film awards at the ceremony 26 February 2012 ...

Tuba Atlantic by Hallvar Witzø, is a graduation film from the Norwegian Film School. The film has already received an Academy Award: it was voted the best Foreign Student Film at the 38th Annual Student Academy Awards in Hollywood in June 2011.

– To me as a director, we have reached much further than our wildest dreams with this film. Both winning the student Academy Award, recieveing a prize at Clermont-Ferrand in France, and now being nominated for an Academy Award for Best Short. I have to pinch my arm to believe it. I am incredibly proud of what

the whole team have achieved. Regardless of who the statuette goes to, I am humble about the experience I have had with this film. All this started out as some childish drawings in my notebook,

says director Hallvar Witzø. Tuba Atlantic is the first Norwegian

student film to receive an Academy Awards nomination, and the first Norwegian live action short film to be nominated. In 2007 Norwegian director Torilll Kove’s short animation film, The Danish Poet (Den danske dikteren), was nominated and won the trophy.

Tuba AtlanticEverybody is going to die one day. Oskar (70) is going to die in 6 days. He is now ready to forgive his brother for a disagreement years ago. Will he reach his brother, who he believes live on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, before it is too late?

Genre: DramaDirector: Hallvar Witzøscreenplay: linn-Jeanethe KyedProdcution year: 2010Produced by Gudrun Austli for The Norwegian Film School

Nominated: Academy Award for best short

Hallvar Witzø © Paradox Film

23

New Nordic Films is a major annual mar-ket for Nordic cinema, and is organised during the Norwegian International Film Festival in Haugesund. It includes film screenings, seminars, scripts-pitching, a Nordic co-production forum and pre-sentations of works in progress

By PIA EKElAND- At New Nordic Films we present the films that we believe have the best poten-tial outside the Nordic countries. We aim to demonstrate the wide range of Nordic cinema, with artistically ambitious works and more commercial genre movies, says Manager Gyda Myklebust.

Apart from screenings, the event also focuses on co-productions between the Nordic Countries and other countries. The Nordic Co-Production Forum was established in 2006 to assist producers who are looking to make co-productions, finding nordic partners and working on the financing.

- Our main focus geografically this year will be on co-productions with France and the Benelux countries. We will also be presenting their national cinemas: their financial support systems, their volume of annual film production.

a A growing interestMore details in this year’s programme will be ready as we reach Cannes, but in 2012 the event will also draw atten-tion to European co-productions with Norwegians as minority co-producers. - Co-productions remains a vital part of the film industry. In Haugesund the Scandinavian film industry is well repre-sented, and the world’s largest film festivals, international producers and distributors will be back. There is a gro-wing demand from abroad, but we keep

the size of the market and the number of participants on the same level as last year, this works well for business. We prefer focusing on a few projects with the right mix of participants, instead of expanding in numbers.

- A “location-tour” for the internatio-nal producers by boat and helicopter into the Norwegian west coast has proved to be a true hit among participants, and it will be organized again this year.

- New Nordic Films provides you with a broad selection of film screenings and the opportunity of socialising with other film professionals, but we also like to present to our guests the beautiful coun-tryside around Haugesund. Hopefully they will be aware of the unique location opportunities that this area can offer international co-productions, Myklebust says.

New Nordic Films: 15-18 August 2012

For news in English: www.filmfestivalen.noContact: Gyda Myklebust gyda@kino.no

– According to the feedback, there is a big demand for support like the Norwegian South Film Fund provides. We support features and documentary films, but we would like to se some of the major Norwegian producers taking part in the co-productions, says Lasse Skagen.

By PIA EKElANDSørfond will make it easier for Norwegian and international co-producers to take part in international co-production, and grants production support as top finan-cing, meaning a substantial part of the financing must be confirmed before first payment. Maximum support for one pro-duction is EUR 1.3 million.

-This is the only fund of this sort in the Nordic countries. We arranged a pitching session this autumn, and we have had a great response from abroad. There is for example many international price win-ners among our aplicants

About EUR 5 million will be granted for foreign support in 2012. In a

co-operation between the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and The Norwegian Ministry of Culture, The Norwegian Filmininstitute (NFI) and the Films from the South Festival (FFS) will jointly be in charge of the administration of the fund.

-A Norwegian co-producer is required, and the application should be sent by the Norwegian co-producer. A short form agreement between the producer and the Norwegian co-producer is also required at the point of sending the application. But please contact us if you need further information, says Skagen.

a Inspire co-productionsThe main objective of the new fond is to inspire the increase of filmproduction in countries where production is limi-ted for political or economical reasons. Producers and directors from countries in Asia, Africa, Latin-America and the Middle East are eligible for grants. Strong artistic performance and cultural inte-

grity are top priorities. A basic Sørfond feature is to encourage productions dea-ling with freedom of expression to apply for grants.

The deadline for application to the fund is February 15, 2012.

Sørfond guidelines and the webform for application is avaliable at: www.sorfond.com

New Nordic Films: Focus on Co-Productions

Sørfond: New opportunities for international co-productions

Gyda Myklebust © Helge Hansen

24

After huge international success with, respectively, The Troll Hunter and The Last Norwegian Troll, André Øvredal and Pjotr Sapegin have started new projects: Sapegin with his first short feature film in 3D, and Øvredal with a science fiction short. By TOMMy GJERAlDPjotr Sapegin has never before directed a live-action film, but this spring he will start his first – an ambitious genre film project to be shot in 3D.

– This time the project is not an ani-mation but a short live-action film. It is something I have been thinking about for quite a long time – a project that, in a way, has lived in a dark corner of my soul. It is a historical action drama, a sword-fight-ing film set in the Viking age. The story is about an old warrior and his daughter, Sapegin reveals.

– It will be shot in 3D, and it will be in 5K resolution – the same format that is being used for The Hobbit by Peter Jackson, which is due for Christmas. We have decided to use non-professional

actors, but have brought in experts on sword-fighting and martial arts veterans for the action scenes.

It is too early to say when it will be finished, but Sapegin promises us a dif-ferent experience.

– We are not in a hurry to be finished. We start shooting in April – we are wait-ing for spring. This is in many ways an experimental project. I can guarantee that this will be something completely different, he says.

André Øvredal’s short film project is an adaptation of a science fiction short story from his youth.

– My next film The Tunnel is based on an American science fiction story I read at school. It is called The Tunnel Ahead by Alice Glaser, written in 1961. This was a story that my entire generation – at least everyone I have talked to – had as manda-tory reading at school. And they remem-ber it with horror and was a very powerful experience to a great many in my youth, he says.

The story is set in a future dystopian world, which gives great latitude for a creative design process.

– The film is set in a future world that is heavily overpopulated. We follow a family who is stuck in an enormous car queue on their way home from the beach. They must pass through a tunnel which is closing at various times, but no one knows when. Everyone caught in the tunnel is killed – the whole thing is a project to control the population growth. The story is a chamber piece inside the car, but a lot is happening outside at the

same time. We have commissioned stu-dents from Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) and teachers to design the futuristic cars, while Gimpville and Storyline deliver all special effects. The project is based on a screenplay competition, organised by Storyline in 2010, which I won. We are having big fun designing cars, the city and the traffic system, and – well every-thing, Øvredal says.

The film was intended to be shot in 3D, but Øvredal still promise that it will be stuffed with special effects.

– The idea was to shoot in 3D, but we could not raise the money and wanted to get started. The completion date is not official yet, but if we get selected for the Norwegian Short Film Festival in Grimstad this summer, we will try to be finished in time for that. But there are special effects in every single shot – twice as many as in the entire The Troll Hunter – so quite a lot of work remains to be done.

Sci-Fi and 3D from Øvredal and Sapegin

Pjotr sapegin André Øvredal

Levi’s HorseFourteen-year-old Jonas is a lonely and aliena-ted young boy living in a small village in Northern Norway. He feels a certain bond with levi, a men-tally disabled man, and his little horse. When Jonas wants to be accepted amongst his peers he is facing a moral dilemma: He must choose either to defend, or to throw a stone at, the weakest one.

Levi’s Horse is in the Berlinale’s Generation Programme

Imagining Emanuel at MOMA’s Doc Forthnight 16-28th Feb

Genre: Documentary, 52’Director: Thomas A. Østbyescreenplay: Thomas A. ØstbyeProduced by: Medieoperatørene ASProduction year: 2011international sales: Deckert Distribution GmbHFestival Contact: NFI Documentaries

Imagining EmanuelHow can we know who a person is? Emanuel’s identity is unknown, and his life is put on hold. Through several different documentary genres, Imagining Emanuel attempts to form an image of a man calling himself Emanuel. At the same time, the film exposes the process of observing, and how credibility is formed in a documentary.

Genre: youth Drama, 14’Director: Torfinn Iversenscreenplay: Torfinn IversenProduced by: Mona Steffensen for Originalfilm ASProduction year: 2011Festival Contact: NFI Shorts

25

Mariken Halle and Clara Bodén have finished their feature film The World Is Waiting – a film about three Swedish actresses fresh out of acting school working as waitresses in Oslo. They start a limited company, buy a house and introduce us to a world of people who “do things they don’t want to and play roles they don’t know why they are playing”. Like the girls in the film, Halle and Bodén produced the film for their own production company, Vapen och dramatik (“Weapons and Drama”). – We took the name from something the Swedish director Kjell Sundvall once said about female directors’ lack of box office success. He thought that the women in our business should get their act together, with more weapons and drama, Halle says. The duo won the most prominent award during the 2011 Norwegian Short Film Festival in Grimstad for No Sex Just Understand, which was nominated for the Swedish Oscar, Guldbaggen. Their graduation film from The School of Film Directing in Gothenburg, Perhaps Tomorrow, was screened in the independent section at Karlovy Vary in 2010. Halle and Bodén are inspired by Cassavetes, Breien, Widerberg, Andersson, Olin and Seidl – who take both reality and fiction seriously. They employ the strategy of ignorance and the method of unpredic-tability in an attempt to capture the fictional. They want to play around and have an open mind about what cinema could be. – We worked out a method on Perhaps Tomorrow, based on the wish to be a small team, Bodén says. – This was also for econ-omic reasons. At the School of Film Directing you get 60,000 Swedish Crowns to make the graduation film. Clara and I had already met. And we had a person doing sound. Being just three people while shooting influences the way the scene can be done. We cannot have food on the set, for example. Everything has to move fast. At the same time we want to keep the actors in

character for a long period of time. Then they become more inte-resting people, so that you can watch the scene many times: «What does he think about there?»

They use ignorance to capture surprise, like when the well-known Norwegian artist Susanne Sundfør is acting in a hen party in The World Is Waiting.

– We use ignorance as a strategy, especially in the large sce-nes. But we also do it with the three main girls. For example, it is too difficult to act surprised. We often know that we have only one chance. When Susanne Sundfør started to act, there was no one who knew that she would be there. A lot is happening along the way when we are making films. But as long as we are as clear as possible towards the people involved without lying, we often get what we need. We feel that we are capturing what we think the film is about, Halle says.

– We are working in between fiction and documentary. We use a very documentary cinematography to give an impression that things are happening only once: an event and our attempt to capture it. Sometimes we have to reshoot. But we are looking for a documentary experience, Bodén says.

The World is WaitingThree girls just out of acting school work as waitresses in Oslo one summer. They use all their intelligence to get as much tips as possible. They are going to set up a limited company and buy a house. They become our guides in the film, gradually opening up a world of people who do things they don’t want to do and play roles they don’t know why they’re playing.

Written and directed by: Mariken HalleCinematography: Clara BodénProduced by: Mariken Halle and Clara Bodén for Vapen och DramatikCo-produced by: Kalle Boman og Anna for Sohlman Hinden AB

– A lot is happening along the way when we are making films. But as long as we are as clear as possible without lying, we often get what we need. In their feature film The World Is Waiting Mariken Halle and Clara Bodén use ignorance as a central strategy.

With ignorance as strategy

By JON INGE FAlDAlEN

© Vapen och Dramatik

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40th17-23 August 2012

the NorwegiAN iNterNAtioNAl Film FestivAl hAugesuNd

New NordiC Films 15–18 AugustA NordiC Film mArket

AN iNterNAtioNAl Co-produCtioN ANd Film FiNANCiNg mArket

A meetiNg plACe For Film proFessioNAls

www.FilmFestivAleN.No

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w.steinariversen.no

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film

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COMPETITIONMercy by Matthias Glasner German-Norwegian co-production

GENERATION 14pluslevi’s Horse by Torfinn Iversen

EUROPEAN FILM MARKETComing Home | Company Orheim | into the White | Jackpot | King Curling | Magic Silver 2 - The Quest for the Mystic Horn | Sons of norway

Please visit us at the european Film Market, c/o Scandinavian Office, stand no 28, Martin-Gropius-bau

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i’s H

orse

by

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nn Ive

rsen