CineMart unveils 2024 selection
12 December 2023
The lineup for the 2024 edition of our co-production market CineMart is here! 16 feature film projects and 4 immersive projects will be presented at CineMart's 41st edition, running Sunday 28 to Wednesday 31 January. Additionally, potential co-production, sales and distribution partners can assess 6 Darkroom works-in-progress of which 4 are features and 2 immersive.
“From shape-changing cherubs to the daughter of James Joyce, to a tale of three moody geraniums.”
As ever, all corners of the globe are represented in the selection, from China to Tunisia, Singapore to Ireland, Angola to the Netherlands, and the subjects are suitably diverse – from shape-changing cherubs to the daughter of James Joyce, to a tale of three moody geraniums.
Six chain-smoking know-it-alls embark on a tragi-comedic polar expedition in 1918 Greenland for Another Journey without Women, directed by Illum Jacobi (The Trouble with Nature, IFFR 2020). The film features Greenlandic actor Hans-Henrik Suersaq Poulsen in the lead role, alongside David Dencik and Claes Bang (The Square, 2017) as the famed explorer Knud Rasmussen.
Lucia is directed by Irish filmmaker Aisling Walsh whose Maudie (2016), starring Sally Hawkins and Ethan Hawke, world-premiered in Telluride. The new project concerns the talented but eponymous, troubled daughter of author James Joyce.
In the hushed corridors and backrooms of Les Diplomates, two diplomatic counterparts from Austria and Switzerland secretly negotiate the contours of history as the Eastern Bloc disintegrates – fueled by a petty personal grudge. The project is directed by Swiss filmmaker Andreas Fontana, whose eerie thriller Azor (2021) picked up a handful of international awards. The snowcovered mountain roads of Switzerland play host to a queer spin on the car chase genre in Bad Gays, directed by Swiss filmmaker Loïc Hobi.
Across the border in Italy, Mara returns from Argentina to explore the mountains of her origin in Eduardo Crespo’s La gruta del viento. In fellow Argentinian filmmaker Natalia Meta’s The Spirit of Law, a congresswoman at the peak of her career faces an accusation by a chamber employee.
Two runaway souls escaping a dark past meet in the chaos of Singapore in Other People’s Dreams, directed by Singaporean filmmaker Daniel Hui, whose slow-burning psychodrama Small Hours of the Night has its world premiere at IFFR 2024.
Selection continues below
The animated Cherub, by Polish feature debutant Barbara Rupik, tells of shape-shifting angelic beings who descend from the sky to a small, forgotten village to claim the soul of a dying girl. Another animated feature, Cloud of the Unknown by Yuan Gao, asks: “what if our dreams were the key to our real self and the door to a better world?” The project received Hubert Bals Fund (HBF) development support in 2019.
Also HBF-backed is A Distant House Smokes on the Horizon, the first fiction feature by Tiger Award-winning Chinese filmmaker Shengze Zhu (Present.Perfect, 2019), where on a sweltering summer day, three troubled teenagers set out on a reckless plan to escape the confines of their small town.
Angolan filmmaker Fradique (Air Conditioner, IFFR 2020) brings his latest project Hold Time for Me, set in a country where trees talk and cars become boats in the desert. The Finnish Skarpnabba, directed by feature debutant Sawandi Groskind, tells of a truck driver and his teenage daughter who witness the death of a child in 1960 only for the once-deceased child to reappear decades later in Helsinki.
The Sunflowers of the Moon is directed by Tunisian filmmaker ismaël, whose stylised, dark thriller Black Medusa (co-directed with Youssef Chebbi) was in the Tiger Competition in 2021. Another returning Tiger filmmaker is Alejandro Telémaco Tarraf (Piedra Sola) who brings Alumbre, on a wounded man’s confrontation with pain and belonging. La Nuit is the feature debut of two-time Tiger Short Competition-winner Beatrice Gibson. In the film, after an abortion, a woman wanders the streets, embarking on a series of quiet encounters under a neon glow.
The Possessed is directed by Dutch-based Bosnian filmmaker Ena Sendijarević, whose Sweet Dreams is this year’s Dutch submission for the Oscars. In her new project, eccentric director Diana shoots a film about the effects of a witch hunt on the modern female psyche on an isolated island, but nothing goes as planned. The project has been jointly selected in collaboration with Les Arcs Film Festival (16–23 December), where it will be presented at the Industry Village in the framework of their Dutch focus.
CineMart 2024 Immersive selection
Three moody geraniums take control of their fate and plan their escape from the windowsill in The Great Escape (of three geraniums) by Belgian animator Joren Vandenbroucke. Fathoming, directed by Italian artist Sara Tirelli, immerses the audience within an infinite descent toward an underwater abyss, posing a poetic quest through the liquid fabric of existence.
The March by Amsterdam-based photojournalist Leo Erken and composer Frieda Gustavs is a non-linear VR opera-without-words that deals with our relations and responsibilities to war in our society. The Australian project The World Came Flooding In, directed by Isobel Knowles and Van Sowerwine (Passenger, IFFR 2020; Night Creatures, IFFR 2023), is an immersive documentary installation that reveals the devastating human impact of flooding and climate emergency.
Darkroom 2024
Making a welcome return for its second edition is the Darkroom programme of work-in-progress screenings of former CineMart and HBF-supported projects, taking place on Tuesday 30 January 2024.
IFFR Pro 2024
IFFR is set to welcome industry, press and audiences from 25 January to 4 February 2024. The IFFR Pro Days will take place Friday 26 to Wednesday 31 January, with CineMart running 28 to 31 January.
The IFFR Pro Awards, recognising projects from the CineMart and Darkroom selection, will be presented on the evening of Tuesday 30 January 2024 including the recently created Eurimages New Lab Awards, consisting of an Innovation Award for projects in development and an Outreach Award for work-in-progress projects, the ARTEKino International Prize, the Wouter Barendrecht Award, the VIPO Award, and the 4DR Studios Award.
Full project lineup
Alumbre, dir. Alejandro Telémaco Tarraf, Spain
Produced by: Zeitun Films
Another Journey without Women, dir. Illum Jacobi, Denmark
Produced by: Adomeit Film
Bad Gays, dir. Loïc Hobi, Switzerland
Produced by: Cloud Fog Haze Pictures
Cherub, dir. Barbara Rupik, Poland
Produced by: Madants
Cloud of the Unknown, dir. Yuan Gao, Hong Kong, France
Produced by: Chinese Shadows, Shasha & Co Production
Les Diplomates, dir. Andreas Fontana, Switzerland, United Kingdom
Produced by: Alina Film
A Distant House Smokes on the Horizon, dir. Shengze Zhu, China, United States
Produced by: Burn The Film
Fathoming, dir. Sara Tirelli, Italy
Produced by: dispàrte
The Great Escape (of three geraniums), dir. Joren Vandenbroucke, Belgium
Produced by: Animal Tank
La gruta del viento, dir. Eduardo Crespo, Argentina
Produced by: Pensar con las manos
Hold Time for Me, dir. Fradique, Angola, Germany, Spain
Produced by: SEERA Films, Uika Films, Migranta Films
Lucia, dir. Aisling Walsh, Ireland, Luxembourg
Produced by: EZ Films, JKML, Calach Films
The March, dir. Frieda Gustavs & Leo Erken, Netherlands, Ukraine
Produced by: NL12
La Nuit, dir. Beatrice Gibson, United Kingdom, France
Produced by: Somesuch, Norte Productions
Other People’s Dreams, dir. Daniel Hui, Singapore
Produced by: Momo Film Co, 13 Little Pictures
The Possessed, dir. Ena Sendijarević, Netherlands
Produced by: Aventura
Skarpnabba, dir. Sawandi Groskind, Finland
Produced by: Kenno Filmi Osk
The Spirit of Law, dir. Natalia Meta, Argentina
Produced by: Picnic Producciones, Rei Pictures
The Sunflowers of the Moon, dir. ismaël, Tunisia
Produced by: Utopia Films
The World Came Flooding In, dir. Isobel Knowles & Van Sowerwine, Australia
Produced by: Film Camp
Darkroom 2024 complete selection
Alternates, dir. Jonathan Hagard, France, Japan
Produced by: Floréal
Diamonds in the Sand, dir. Janus Victoria, Japan, Philippines
Produced by: Paperheart
Duchampiana, dir. Lilian Hess, France, Germany
Produced by: Tchikiboum
The Idyll, dir. Aaron Rookus, Netherlands, Belgium, Estonia
Produced by: Studio Ruba
Mongrel, dir. Wei Liang Chiang, France, Taiwan, Singapore
Produced by: E&W Films
La vie devant nous, dir. Olivier Meys, Belgium, France, Luxembourg
Produced by: Michigan Films
