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OPEN DOORS LOCARNO “We had 213 submissions and we


could easily have added three or four more projects to the line-up but had to stick to our limit of 12,” she says. She notes that few of the upcom-


Locarno success story Burqa Boxers


‘Some 70 producers attend the event, and three to four projects on average go on to find


Sunny Days won Open Doors’ top prize in 2010 and premiered in Film-makers of the Present a year later


some sort of partner’ Martina Malacrida, Open Doors


ing feature and documentary projects touch on politics or confl ict, apart from Bekolo’s The President which looks at the potential for a pro-democracy ‘African Spring’ in his native Cameroon. “Recurring themes are the posi-


tion of women in African society, spirituality, the tension between modernity and tradition and the impact of unemployment… social issues dominate,” says Malacrida. As in previous years, the directors


and producers attached to the selected projects will attend a two- day training session on pitching, fol- lowed by two days of meetings with European producers, and two round-tables on the region’s cinema. The projects also compete for an award worth $51,000 (CHF50,000), funded by the Open Doors initiative in collaboration with the town of Bellinzona. A second award of $8,600 (¤7,000) will be offered by the Centre National du Cinéma et de l’Image Animée (CNC) and Arte will award the Premio Arte Open Doors, worth $7,400 (¤6,000). “Some 70 producers attend the


Open Doors 2011


who is an adviser on this year’s Open Doors. “This is partly due to state support


but in large part due to the FESPACO festival, which has raised the profi le of cinema in the country and also created a community of cinephiles,” adds Sawadogo, referring to Africa’s largest film festival, which takes place in Burkina Faso’s capital, Oua- gadougou, every two years. Beyond fi nancing issues, political


turmoil and armed conflict in the region are also rife. In the weeks lead- ing up to Locarno, several nations represented at Open Doors have been drawn into the burgeoning humani- tarian crisis sparked by the occupa- tion of northern Mali by Islamic extremists, which has forced thou- sands to fl ee into neighbouring coun- tries such as Burkina Faso and Niger. The fragility of the region’s cin-


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ema scene is not a problem for Open Doors. On the contrary, it makes its fi lm-makers all the more eligible for the programme, says Malacrida. “Our main partner is the Swiss


Agency for Development and Co- operation and in keeping with its work we focus on fi lm-makers from southern hemisphere countries where cinema is fragile,” she explains. Since its launch, Open Doors has


also showcased the work of directors hailing from Cuba and Argentina, the Mekong, the Maghreb, South- East Asia, the Near and Middle East, Latin America, Greater China, Cen- tral Asia and India. In spite of the challenges facing


film-makers in French-speaking Sub-Saharan Africa, Malacrida says the quality and quantity of the projects submitted this year was “surprisingly” high.


event, selected through our partner- ships with Atéliers du Cinéma Européen, the European Producers Club, Cannes Producers’ Network and European Audiovisual Entre- preneurs (EAVE),” says Malacrida. “Three to four projects on average go on to find some sort of partner through the event.” Past success stories include Chi-


nese director Li Hongqi’s Winter Vacation, which was presented at the Open Doors Greater China focus in 2009, and won Locarno’s Golden Leopard in 2010. Kazakhstan director Nar-


iman Turebayev’s Sunny Days won Open Doors’ top prize in the 2010 edition devoted to Central Asia, and went on to premiere in Locarno’s Film-makers of the Present section a year later. At last year’s


focus on


India, San Francisco-based director Alka Raghuram connected with French producers Golda Sellam of Celeste Images and Smitha Chakra- varthy of 24 Images for her docu- mentary Burqa Boxers, about female Muslim boxers in Kolkata. “Open Doors played a huge role


in helping me to find producers. Being selected was a huge validation for the project… people take you seri- ously,” says Raghuram. She is due to shoot the next instalment of the doc- umentary in November and plans to complete the work by April 2013, with the hope of premiering it in Locarno next August.


Annual fi xture Producers due in Locarno for this year’s edition include Arte France Cinema’s deputy director Rémi Burah, who says the event is an annual fi xture on his calendar. “I first started coming in 2009


and since then I co-ordinate my holi- days to make sure I can make it to Open Doors. I systematically look at all the projects,” he says. “At the 2011 edition I met the team behind Banker To The Poor,” he reveals, referring to Marco Amenta’s bio-documentary about microcredit creator Muham- mad Yunus. “We have since entered into the development of the project and are currently helping them to receive support from Doha.” Another Open Doors habitué, Thi-


erry Lenouvel of Ciné-Sud Promo- tion, says he attends the event every year to network and keep track of on- going projects. In 2011, the director met up with Open Doors participant Anup Singh, from India, to talk about another of his fi lms, Qissa: The Ghost Is A Lonely Traveller, which Lenouvel was already producing. “Even if you don’t end up picking


Open Doors’ Winter Vacation went on to win the Golden Leopard


up a project at Open Doors, it’s a great place for connecting with fi lm-makers it would other- wise be diffi cult to meet in person,” says Lenouvel. “There are so many co- productions labs and mar- kets these days you often end up following a project over several events. Open Doors is a key stop-off in this process.” 


s August 2012 Screen International 3 n


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