With one feature
in the main competition at the Berlin International Film Festival, three
children's films at the Kinderfilmfest and a short film selected for
Panorama, the pace is expected to be hectic at the Danish Film Office at
the European Film Market.
Italian
for Beginners in competition
'Film of the year'
and a 'Dogme bulls eye' is how the critics voiced their welcome to
director Lone Scherfig and Zentropa's Italian for Beginners, a
bubbling paean to love, which will be shown in the main competition at the
Berlin Film Festival. This is Scherfig's third feature and again she
demonstrates her special talent for infusing everyday tales with magic and
humour. Besides receiving unanimous critical acclaim, Italian for
Beginners came in on the Top-20 chart for 2000, in spite of its
release just three weeks before the close of the year.
Kinderfilmfest
Screening in the
competition at the Kinderfilmfest are two feature films for
children:
Circleen -
Mice & Romance by Danish grand master of animation, Jannik
Hastrup. A winner at the International Film Festival for Children in
Chicago, Hastrup's film is a swinging modern fable, bringing to life the
familiar little elf girl Circleen and her pals Ingolf and Fredrik, a film
packed with exciting adventures and narrative relish as well as the
Hastrup seal of a good dose of meaning and food for thought - the kind
kids seem to appreciate.
Miracle,
a feature film debut directed by the promising young director, Natasha
Arthy, and produced by Nimbus Film is a musical adventure with a bold mix
of farce, realism and fantasy sequences. Described as a remarkable work,
one that is made of the same matter as the finest film stories for
children, this film deservedly won the Adult Jury Award at Buster, the
International Children's Film Festival in Copenhagen in December
2000.
Also screening is
the short fiction film Susanne Sillemann, by Cæcilia Holbek Trier
and produced by Crone Film Produktion. A story that bolts to the core of
some of the problems that younger children must deal with today, like the
traumas teasing creates and the fear of parents splitting up.
Panorama
Noted for her
short film If I Give You My Humbleness, Don't Take Away My Pride,
selected for Un Certain Regard in Cannes in 1999, Karin Vesterlund's short
film Helgoland has been selected to take part in Panorama, one of
the official programmes at the Berlin Film Festival. Helgoland
gives the viewer a first hand impression of the sensation of winter
bathing in the clear icy water of the Copenhagen coast.
Shooting
Star
European Film
Promotion will be holding its annual press meeting and presentation of
'Shooting Stars' which promotes young European actors. The Danish
representative is the winner of a Danish Film Academy Robert Award for
Best Supporting Actress, Ann Eleonora Jørgensen, who plays a major role in
Lone Scherfig's Italian for Beginners.
The
DFI in Berlin
The Danish
Film Institute will be represented at the European Film Market, together
with the Nordic Film Institutes and the sales companies: Trust Film,
Nordisk Film Sales, NonStop Sales, and SF Film. The office is situated at
Potsdamer Strasse 5, First Floor G12, Stand No. 190. Telephone (+49 30)
2535 8318 and will be open daily from 09:00 - 19:00 until Sunday 18
February.
For further
information about the films, screenings and activities go to www.dfi.dk/sitemod/moduler/index_english.asp?pid=3830.
See also articles:
"Danish Film on a Confidence High" by Lars Fiil-Jensen and "Circleen,
Dennis and Susanne" by Ulrich Breuning at www.dfi.dk/sitemod/moduler/index_english.asp?pid=1870.
For further
information contact the Danish Film Institute:
Vicki
Synnott, phone: +45 3374 3438 or +45 5581 2280, vickis@dfi.dkTine Mosegaard, mobile:
+45 2482 3759, tinem@dfi.dkAnne
Marie Kürstein, mobile: +45 4041 4697, kurstein@dfi.dk