04/03/2011

Kicking off today is the 3rd Ciné Nordica Festival, which will run until March 8 at the Cinéma du Panthéon in Paris. Opening with Swedish director Pernilla August’s Beyond [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (unveiled in Venice Critics’ Week – see interview), the Paris event is now France’s only fest for fans of Scandinavian cinema as the Rouen Nordic Film Festival has unfortunately closed its doors after 23 editions.

Among the other Swedish films in the line-up is Daniel Espinosa’s Easy Money [+see also:
trailer
film profile], adapted from Jens Lapidus’s same-named best-seller. The film was a big hit in Swedish theatres and will be released in France on March 30 by MK2 Diffusion.

Norwegian production will be represented by Andre Ovredal’s mockumentary The Troll Hunter [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Andre Øvredal
film profile], selected at Sundance in the Park City at Midnight section (to be released in France on July 20 by UPI); and Sara Johnsen’s Upperdog [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (crowned Best Norwegian Film of the Year at last August’s Amanda Awards – see interview with producer Asle Vatn).

The Danish section will give Parisian movie-goers a chance to discover Henrik Ruben Genz’s Terribly Happy [+see also:
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film profile] (top prize-winner at Karlovy Vary in 2008 and Danish entry for the 2009 Best Foreign Language Film Oscar) and dive back into Thomas Vinterberg’s Submarino [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Thomas Vinterberg
film profile] (released in France last September amassing a total of 21,000 admissions).

Finally, Finland will make its first appearance at Ciné Nordica with Lenka Hellstedt’s Overseas and Under Your Skin [+see also:
trailer
film profile]; Aku Louhimies’s Tears of April [+see also:
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film profile]; and Dome Karukoski’s The Home of the Dark Butterflies [+see also:
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film profile] (the director’s previous film Lapland Odyssey [+see also:
trailer
film profile] is currently showing in French theatres).

In 2010, Scandinavian films enjoyed quite a good year in French theatres, thanks in particular to the two final instalments in the Millennium trilogy: The Girl Who Played With Fire [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (273,000 admissions) and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (145,000 viewers). Other successes were the Swedish series of animated short films Laban the Little Ghost (56,000 admissions) and Danish director Nicolas Winding Refn’s Valhalla Rising (42,000 admissions).

On the other hand, the following films didn’t get past the 10,000 admissions mark: Home for Christmas [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Bent Hamer
film profile] by Norway’s Bent Hamer (to whom Ciné Nordica will pay homage with a screening of Kitchen Stories introduced by French director Bruno Podalydès); North [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Rune Denstad Langlo
film profile] by fellow Norwegian Rune Denstad Langlo; Just Another Love Story [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Denmark’s Ole Bornedal; and Falkenberg Farewell [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Sweden’s Jesper Gansladt.

Meanwhile, 2011 is looking very promising with two Scandinavian films in with a very strong chance of being selected in competition at Cannes in May: Danish director Lars von Trier’s Melancholia, whose provisional French release date has been set for August 17 through Les Films du Losange; and Finnish helmer Aki Kaurismäki’s Le Havre, which Pyramide is planning to release on November 9, 2011.

(Translated from French)