Swedish-Georgian feature ‘And Then We Danced’ to premiere at Cannes Directors’ Fortnight
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Swedish-Georgian co-production And Then We Danced will have its world premiere at this year’s Directors’ Fortnight festival in Cannes next month.
The feature, directed by Swedish filmmaker Levan Akin and featuring a cast of Georgian actors, was unveiled as one of 24 works picked for the event that runs in parallel with the Cannes Film Festival since 1969.
In the 51st edition of Directors’ Fortnight, which aims to “aid filmmakers and contribute to their discovery”, Akin’s story of a dancer on the brink of adulthood falling unwillingly in love with his greatest rival will come to the big screen in Cannes.
Produced by Mathilde Dedye and involving screenplay by Akin, And Then We Danced is one of 11 works promoted internationally by the Swedish Film Institute’s International Department.
Principal production for the 96-minute-long film began in October, with its international debut at the Cannes festival announced earlier today.
Akin was born in Stockholm to parents who emigrated from Georgia to Sweden in the 1970s. His debut feature Certain People (2011) was nominated for the Best Film Award of the Stockholm Film Festival, with Yohanna Idha receiving the Best Actress Award for her part in the film.
The film had its international premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival, where it received critical acclaim, before Akin also directed The Circle (2015), which debuted at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Filmmaker Levan Akin has cast a selection of Georgian actors in his latest film. Photo: frenchquarter.se.
The Swedish creative has also directed TV series for Sweden's public broadcasting television including Real Humans (2012) and Second Avenue (2008).
The Directors’ Fortnight festival was founded in 1969 as an independent event running in parallel with the Cannes festival, following the cancellation of the latter in 1968 due to countrywide strikes in France.
Launched by the French Directors Guild, this year’s cinema event will run at three locations in Cannes — Le Theatre Croisette, Cinema Les Arcades and Olympia — between May 15-25.
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Several Georgian films will be presented during the upcoming festival in Sarajevo, the capital city of Bosnia and Herzegovina on 16 - 23 August. Georgian-Swedish feature ‘And Then We Danced’ directed by Levan Akin will be shown during the festival. The co-production premiered at Cannes festival earlier this spring and was received praised from the international media.
Four films from Georgia, ranging between short works to student productions, are on the big screen for an audience of over 100,000 cinephiles at the ongoing Sarajevo Film Festival — the leading cinema event of the Balkan region.
Actor Levan Gelbakhiani, cast as the principal protagonist of the newly released feature And Then We Danced by filmmaker Levan Akin, has been unveiled as the winner of the Best Actor Award at the Sarajevo Film Festival.
Swedish-based film director Levan Akin, whose feature And Then We Danced has earned critical acclaim at international festivals since its release, has collected the latest accolade in the form of the Best Film Award at the Carl International Film Festival in Sweden.
Filmmaker Levan Akin's Swedish-Georgian-French co-production And Then We Danced has been picked as Sweden's submission for the Best International Feature Film competition at the next Academy Awards.
Filmmaker Levan Akin's feature And Then We Danced has been nominated for the European University Film Award, a prize by university students throughout Europe.
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Levan Akin's award-winning feature And Then We Danced will be part of the line-up at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival next month, bringing a personal story of love to the high-profile cinema event.