Georgian film selected for Berlin festival co-production spot
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A new feature film by Georgian director has been selected for seeking international co-production at the leading European festival next month.
Hostages by director Rezo Gigineishvili will be among 19 other film projects in production from Europe, Latin America and Asia featured in the Co-Production Market of the 2016 Berlinale Film Festival.
The 20 films were selected for the Co-Production Market from an initial list of 301 submissions.
From left to right: InStyle Russia Magazine editor-in-chief Yurate Gurauskiate, filmmaker Rezo Gigineishvili with spouse Nadezhda Mikhalkova and producer Josh Wood at an event to mark the 2013 Moscow International Film Festival. Photo by InStyle Magazine.
The Co-Production Market will allow producers to seek support from international cinema financiers for their projects that already received domestic support or partial financing of at least 30%.
The international occasion will take place from February 14-16.
Produced by Tbilisi-based 20 Steps Productions, Gigineishvili' film featured a budget of €2.5 million ($2.7 million), of which 70% was already secured.
Also selected for the 2015 Sarajevo Film Festival’s co-production market in August 2015, Hostages was written by Gigineishvili and author Lasha Bugadze.
The film focuses on the true 1983 story of a group of Georgian students who attempted to hijack a civilian flight and use it leave Soviet state boundaries for seeking personal freedom in the West.
Producers of the project interviewed more than 100 witnesses of the incident that ended in casualties and a highly publicized criminal case against the young hijackers.
The story became basis for a 2001 novel by popular Georgian author Dato Turashvili and a play by director David Doiashvili staged at the Liberty Theatre the same year.
Director and producer Gigineishvili was known for his film productions in Russia over the last decade.
The full list of film productions selected for the Berlinale Co-Production Market can be viewed here.
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Two Georgian productions will feature at top international short film festival starting next month in France, with hundreds of thousands of visitors expected to attend.
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Germany-based Georgian author Nino Kharatishvili will seek to have her popular novel transformed into a film at next month’s 66th Berlinale Film Festival.
Three films being shot by Georgian filmmakers or co-produced by studios from the country have received production grants from Eurimages, a major cultural support fund of the Council of Europe.
If you are in Berlin, come catch some of the best new Georgian cinema at the Berlin International Film Festival that launched in the German capital earlier today.