Actualités

Mohammad Rasoulof says guards in Iran asked him for selfies and to watch his films with him, when he was tied to a bed in a prison hospital.

Speaking at Goteborg Film Festival after the Swedish premiere of his Oscar-nominated The Seed Of The Sacred Fig, Rasoulof related a story from his time in Iranian prison. The director received one-year sentences in both 2019 and 2020 for what Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Court described as “propaganda against the system”.

During his imprisonment Rasoulof required an operation, which is only allowed for Iranian prisoners if family members find a hospital willing to carry out the procedure.

The Göteborg Film Festival’s Nordic Film Market announced its production award winners during a ceremony this evening and Holy Spider actor Zar Amir Ebrahimi was among the top honorees.

Ebrahimi won the Tint Post-Production Award, valued at 400,000 Sek, for her solo directorial debut Honor of Persia. The film is produced by Mohammad Farokhmanesh, Ebrahimi, Jacob Jarek, brave new work, Alambic Production and Profile Pictures. The film’s synopsis reads: An old explicit tape is leaked, and Ava Rad, a beloved star of Iranian TV and cinema adored by the religious Guardians of the Islamic Revolution and Iran’s cultural elite, begins a descent into hell. A story of betrayal, a tragicomic portrait of a truly schizophrenic country, between religious totalitarianism and the extravagance of a youth under pressure.

Other top winners were Finnish filmmaker Miia Tervo, who won the Film Finances Scandinavia Award for You Crazy Thing. The...

LevelK has boarded Paula Korva’s “Sudden Outbursts of Emotion,” a sex-positive comedy about the complexities of modern love and midlife crises, which took home the top prize this week at the Finnish Film Affair, an annual industry event running parallel to the Helsinki Intl. Film Festival.

Korva’s feature debut follows Jane, a travel agent who sells people on adventure but is happily settled in her own life with her partner, Mikki. Thinking their relationship is strong, Jane is shocked when Mikki suddenly proposes they open it up. To save their love, Jane agrees to attend a sex party of the creative class called the Isle of Lust.

The experiment takes a surprising turn when Jane falls in love with the polyamorous Valma. For a moment, everything seems fine, but then new people and new emotions enter the picture. Exploring the diversity of love and the difficult yet liberating...

Paula Korva’s “Sudden Outbursts of Emotion,” a sex-positive comedy about the complexities of modern love and midlife crises, took home the top prize Thursday at the Finnish Film Affair, an annual industry event running parallel to the Helsinki Intl. Film Festival.

The film was one of five fiction feature works in progress and seven works in development that were pitched to an audience of industry guests in Helsinki during the Nordic event’s showcase of local and regional projects. Korva’s feature-length directorial debut, the film is produced by Marko Talli of Helsinki-based Yellow Film & TV.

“Sudden Outbursts of Emotion” follows Jane, a travel agent who sells people on adventure but is happily settled in her own life with her partner, Mikki. Thinking their relationship is strong, Jane is shocked when Mikki suddenly proposes they open it up. To save their love, Jane agrees to attend a sex...

Exclusive: Vertical Entertainment has acquired North American rights to the comedy Supercool, starring Jake Short (This Is the Year), Miles J. Harvey (The Babysitter) and Damon Wayans Jr., with plans to release it in theaters and on digital and VOD on February 11.

The film from director Teppo Airaksinen (Juice) centers on Neil Tobbler (Short), who has gone through most of his life feeling invisible and fantasizing about his long-time crush, Summer (Madison Davenport). When Neil and his best friend Gilbert (Harvey) find out that Summer is throwing a birthday party, Gilbert pressures Neil to ask her for an invitation. The plan fails, and Neil embarrasses himself in front of the girl of his dreams.

Desperate and humiliated, Neil wishes upon the universe to be someone else—a supercool version of himself—the next day waking up and realizing that the universe has granted him his wish.