EFM Frontières Focus Unveils High-Caliber Ranging Five-Title Lineup

Khan Muftich“With Blessings on Your Way”, “Touch Me” by Riognac Ní Griohair and “Oriental Snatch” from the co-writer of “A Hundred Beavers” Ryland Brickson Cole Tews were chosen for Berlin Film FestivalThe first EFM Frontiéres Focus, a five-film genre showcase, begins with horror and fantasy films taking up a larger share of international sales.

The section, unveiled Thursday, also features Vanessa Magic's “Nadine Pick up the Phone” and Ryan Glover's “Split Rock,” also from Canada.

The five projects were selected from “about” 100 submissions, which was a very touching response, he said. Borders Executive Director Annick Manert.

Announced in August EFM Limits aims to highlight the “depth, range and artistry of genre cinema,” the Berlin Festival and Frontières said at the presentation.

Of course, Focus highlights the range of possibilities in the current genre. Folk horror but set in Bosnia, for example, Blessings on Your Path provides a potentially powerful, moving and grounded metaphor for the haunting post-war collective trauma in Bosnia.

Touch Me marks the long-awaited feature debut of Irishwoman Riognac Ní Griogair, who drew widespread praise for directing her 20-minute Don't Go Where I Can't Find You, a sensitive ghost story filled with heartbreak that premiered at SXSW in 2022.

The hilarious and outrageous American-Brazilian production Eastern Catch is the latest from the unstoppable Ryland Brickson Cole Toews, co-writer and star of 2023's Hundreds of Beavers. He will provide “all the answers” to the real-life 1971 DB Cooper case, the only documented unsolved hijacking case. However, Oriental Snatch has more to offer. The concept poster features an armored alligator wearing a Nazi armband.

“Each title has a completely different personality and offers different stories,” Manert said, calling “Nadine, Pick Up Your Phone” a “dreamy, light comedy drama about trauma and a woman who meets someone in shared dreams who can help her, which is something I haven't seen before” and “Split Rock” as “perhaps a more straightforward sci-fi horror.”

“With today's tools, someone can shoot a movie on their iPhone, have artificial intelligence and create special effects. There are no limits to the imagination anymore,” Manert added.

“Genre cinema is experiencing a significant surge in creativity and visibility, attracting leading creative voices, top talent and big budgets, and EFM Frontières Focus will firmly place it in the spotlight,” said Tanja Meissner, director of Berlinale Pro, in August, announcing the new market focus.

Of course, the directors of all five publications have authority. Blessings Your Way marks the feature film debut of Muftik, an acclaimed concept artist (Bioshock 2) and animation director (Kiss Me First). LOL's silent black-and-white film “Hundreds of Beavers” grossed $1.4 million worldwide.

“Split Rock” is Glover's second feature film after “The Strings,” which was acquired by Shudder. “Nadine, Pick Up Your Phone” was selected for Telefilm Canada's Talent to Watch and won the Canadian Film Festival's You-CAN-Pitch competition. After Don't Go Where I Can't Find You, Riognac Ní Griogair is considered one of the young directors to come out of Ireland.

Directors can be touchingly original. “In a world saturated with technology, tactile, hands-on approaches to filmmaking have become a guiding force for me, inviting audiences into the strange, emotional and often absurd terrain of our existence,” says Magic, writer and director of Nadine, Pick Up Your Phone.

If there is one trend, many of the titles are a mixture of genres, such as Split Rock, an eco/supernatural/body horror thriller.

“Split Rock” is in post-production. The remaining four games are moving ahead with funding. In this sense, the EFM Frontières Focus is intended to complement the Frontières Platform at the Cannes Marché du Film Festival and Fantasia's Frontières Market in Montreal in July, Manert said.

“In Cannes the focus is on proof of concept or publication, and in Montreal it's on films that are very early in development or very, very early in production. We have so many films in post-production that there's enough for two events,” she added.

A closer look at the five EFM Frontières Focus editions:

“Nadine, pick up the phone” (Vanessa Magic, Canada)

Nadine, a heartbroken, lethargic 40-year-old, answers a strange help-wanted ad to share her lucid dreams. She meets a mysterious young man whose connection to her dream world reveals long-forgotten family secrets. “A film about the power of dreams and the need for human connection in overcoming grief” that blurs the line between fantasy and reality, says writer-director Magic, a potentially moving work from Toronto-based Bonnie Doe's House Panther Films.

“Eastern Rush”. (Chris Tex, Ryland Brickson Cole Tews)

“The outrageous true story of the mysterious air pirate “DB Cooper” and his infamous 1971 airplane robbery. Where did he come from? Where did he go? What really happened on that fateful day? All questions will be answered and a few more raised in this sexy, action, adventure, mystery, horror and romance! The only sure way to find out the real story of DB Cooper is to watch East Catch where the truth is Scarier than fiction. Also, DB Cooper will direct the film,” Cole Tews teased Brickson. Diversity. Directed by Chris Tex (The Wind Princess).

“Split Rock” (Ryan Glover, Canada)

In the badlands of Saskatchewan, while excavating an unusual boulder of highly magnetic rock, geologist Lauren's body undergoes a terrifying transformation as her mind is destroyed by an ancient force of destruction. Combining the environmental and obsessive sub-genres, shot on location with widescreen anamorphic lenses, “with tactile 16mm cinematography and hands-on special effects created for the film, it's something unique and truly moving,” Glover said. Produced by Toronto-based Low-End, Observer Effect and US, Mexico and Canada based Prowler Pictures.

“Touch me” (Raina Ní Gregor, Ireland)

Marianne, an exquisite florist, suffers from a fear of skin-to-skin contact until the murders of a serial killer ignite her darkest desires. “I want to explore women's relationships with their bodies and with the cruel, male-dominated world we live in,” says Ní Griogair, whose film Don't Go Where I Can't Find You is at SXSW 2022. Produced by Claire McCabe (Blue Road – The Edna O'Brien Story) for Pipedream Productions and Fantastic Films (You Are Not My Mother).

“Blessings on your journey”(Kan Muftić, UK, Bosnia and Herzegovina)

Deep in the Bosnian mountains, a reclusive war survivor named Tariq is believed to have awakened evil supernatural powers and been banished to the forest. Overrun by hornets, he returns transformed, an otherworldly presence that haunts his wife and blurs the line between reality and hidden trauma. Leading producer of the London studio Snafu Pictures (“Bad Dinosaurs”). The story “is born out of personal experience in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Many of us, the cast and crew, live quietly with PTSD, pretending that everything is fine,” said Kan Muftic. Diversity.