Baltic Pitching Forum’s Alumni at New Producers Room 2023

2023.05.05

With the wish of offering more space to young short film producers, the Cannes Court Métrage’s SFC | Rendez-vous Industry, launched a new initiative in 2022 – NEW PRODUCERS ROOM.

Believing that short films projects greatly benefit from co-production and knowing all the difficulty that shorts can find to be produced, the NEW PRODUCERS ROOM aims to make these producers more acquainted with co-production opportunities through dedicated online sessions, on-site Matchmaking events and presentation of short film projects.

Centered around co-production in the short film field, the event gathers 10 up-and-coming producers already active in the industry.

This year the Baltic region at NEW PRODUCERS ROOM will be represented by two Baltic Pitching Forum’s alumni of 2022 – producers NEVENA SEMOVA (Estonia) and AKVILĖ ŽILIONYTĖ (Lithuania).

About producers

Nevena Semova is an international producer, who has produced four short films, a hybrid VR performance and a TV documentary in the two years she spent in the Baltics.  Her 2022 dance film “Hunger” won best student film at the EDIFF (UK) and is currently streaming on Amazon, while her latest film “Unfamiliars” is set to premiere at the Oscar-qualifying festival In The Palace 2023. In 2022, Nevena joined forces with screenwriters/directors Ragne Mandri and Sushant Bhat and editor Tul Paloma Rodriguez in the production company Fat Cat Film. The production company’s short film project “El Baño” (dir. Ragne Mandri, Sushant Bhat) was presented at Baltic Pitching Forum 2022 and won the Baltic Producer’s Media Award, as well as participation rights to Euroconnection at Clermont Ferrand International Short Film Festival 2023. The project has also been selected to participate in the Co-Production Forum, as part of the Brussels Short Film Festival 2023.

Akvilė Žilionytė is a graduate of “EsoDoc 2020 – European social documentaries” and EURODOC2014, and she holds a MA in film directing and BA in Lithuanian philology. She has been working in the field of culture for 10 years, in the last five years she has implemented more than forty contemporary art projects, exhibitions, as well as produced 4 short films, that traveled to more than 60 international film festivals and won 6 awards. In 2017 she established ARTIŠOKAI – Vilnius based production company producing both documentaries and fiction. A. Žilionytė participated at the Baltic Pitching Forum 2022 with the project “SPA” (dir. Ieva Šakalytė). 

More information about NEW PRODUCERS ROOM: bit.ly/3AZeZC8.