guiding the industry – efp’s manual to european world sales companies

LYNX MAN by Juha Suonpää, Finland (Rise and Shine World Sales)

Three new documentaries from Estonia, Finland and Spain represented by German world sales company Rise and Shine are receiving EFP’s (European Film Promotion’s) Film Sales Support (FSS) to spur their promotion and sales at this year’s Hot Docs Film Festival taking place from 27 April to 7 May.

Lynx Man, boldly shot by Finnish director Juha Suonpää takes us to the dazzling wilderness of Finland where a Finnish pensioner has devoted himself to saving the Eurasian lynx from extinction to the point of identifying himself and communicating with this wild cat. In La Singla by Paloma Zapata (Spain), we take part in the discovery of forgotten flamenco dancer Antonia Singla who was born deaf in the 1940s but was able to revolutionize flamenco in the most amazing way although she could not hear the music. Russia and its people, their extremely contrasting and often absurd political views and hopes are portrayed in The Last Relic by Estonian director Marianna Kaat, confronting us with the spirit of this country.

Thanks to SWISS FILMS, The Hearing by Swiss director Lisa Gerig will also be endowed with an FSS grant for a dedicated promotion campaign at the festival. Four asylum seekers, protagonists of The Hearing re-enact their own real-life conversations with the government officials who will assess their case in the most personal and sometimes disturbing way. The Hearing is part of EFP’s annual programme, THE CHANGING FACE OF EUROPE at Hot Docs.

FSS is a financial incentive to advance promotion campaigns of European world sales companies for their European films. It is supported by Creative Europe MEDIA of the European Union, by the Nordisk Film & TV Fond and member institutes, German Films and ICAA (Spain).