A total of 36 emerging producers with 2-5 years of experience from 14 different countries have been selected for Locarno Pro's international networking initiative Match Me! From August 9 to 11, Match Me! will organize individual meetings and tailor-made networking activities with potential creative and business partners, with the aim of strengthening relationships in the industry, finding potential co-producers and consolidating the producers’ international visibility.
Among this year's participants are Cristian Mojica from Mentes Fritas Film Production (Dominican Republic), whose latest project Bionico’s Bachata (2024) won the Audience Award at SXSW; Volia Chajkouskaya (Estonia), founder of the Northern Lights Film Festival and a producer at the award-winning production company Allfilm; Lineta Lasiauskaitė (Lithuania), producer of Eglė Razumaitė’s short Ootid (2024), which premiered in competition in Cannes; Felix Schreiber (Germany), who currently works at Sommerhaus Filmproduktion, which produced several hit titles including Burhan Qurbani’s Berlin Alexanderplatz (2020); and Umberto Angrisani (Italy), producer at Manetti Bros.’ production outlet Mompracem.
From Latvia Match Me! programme will be representred by Zane Bukša (White Picture) and Nikola Ozola (Trickster Pictures).
The full list of participants can be found here.
Ayumi Filippone, Match Maker at Match Me!, comments: “We received an amazing 183 submissions this year and are extremely happy to welcome these 36 promising emerging players from the international production landscape into our network, ready to be discovered during Locarno Pro.”
Locarno Pro runs from August 8 to 13, 2024, during the 77th Locarno Film Festival.
Match Me! is organized in partnership with several film institutes across the globe: Cinecittà (Italy), Cinema Chile, Cinema do Brasil, Dominican Republic Film Commission (DGCINE), Estonian Film Institute, German Films, Finnish Film Foundation, Lithuanian Film Centre, National Film Centre of Latvia, Polish Film Institute, ICA Portugal, ICAA Spain, Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA), and Unifrance.
Participants of previous editions include Thomas Hakim (petit chaos, France), the main producer of Payal Kapadia's Cannes 2024 hit All We Imagine As Light; Tatiana Leite (Bubbles Project, Brazil), producer of Pardo d’Oro winner Rule 34 (Regra 34, 2022) directed by Júlia Murat; Pedro Duarte (Primeira Idade, Portugal), who produced the award-winning title The Metamorphosis of Birds (A Metamorfose dos Pássaros, 2020) by Catarina Vasconcelos; Paola Wink (Tokyo Filmes - Vulcana Cinema, Brazil), producer of Davi Pretto's Rifle (2014); Berlinale Talents alumni Tan Si En (Momo Film Co, Singapore) and Alessandro Amato (dispàrte, Italy); Giovanni Pompili (Kino Produzioni, Italy), who went on to co-produce Carla Simón’s Berlinale winner Alcarràs (2022); and Marta Gmosińska (Lava Films, Poland), who was part of Match Me! 2018 with Never Gonna Snow Again (Śniegu już nigdy nie będzie, 2020) by Małgorzata Szumowska and Michal Englert, Poland's 2021 Oscar entry.