Sweden's Way Out West fest sees record attendance, offers world premiere of Snabba Cash 3

Directed by Jens Jonsson, Snabba Cash: Life Deluxe was produced by Tre Vanner and is released locally by Nordisk Film on August 30.

Way Out West screened around 30 films in total including Scandinavian premieres of films such as Per Fly’s Waltz For Monica, a biopic of legendary Swedish singer Monica Zetterlund, Wong Kar Wai’s The Grandmaster, Stephen Soderbergh’s Behind The Candelabra and music documentaries such as Shane Meadows’ Made Of Stone and Reincarnated: Snoop Lion.

The festival also held Swedish premieres of Before Midnight, The East, The Broken Circle Breakdown and Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer.

Screenings were held at five theatres around Gothenburg as well as at a new cinema tent in the festival site in the city’s Slottsskogen park.

The event attracted a range of local industry figures, including representatives from the Swedish Film Institute, Nordisk Film and the regional fund Film I Vast.

Film-makers in attendance included Snabba Cash: Life Deluxe director Jens Jonsson, Ruben Ostlund (Play), Josef Fares (Jalla! Jalla!) and Goran Olsson (The Black Power Mixtape).

Producers at the festival included Fredrik Wikstrom Nicastro (Snabba Cash) and Lena Rehnberg (Waltz For Monica).

Way Out West, which also included music performers such as Kendrick Lamar, Alicia Keys, Public Enemy, Cat Power and The Knife, was attended by a record 27,700 ticket holders.

Founded as a music festival, Way Out West introduced its film section under head of film programming Svante Tidholm in 2011 and it has gained popularity with distributors as a place to launch local films.

“I think we’ve proven that we can do big premieres,” Tidholm told ScreenDaily. “It’s a festival for very active cultural consumers and that’s also why I think a lot of film distributors and film-makers want to screen their films here because they know that this is a place where people start to talk about things.”

Ola Broquist, CEO of festival organiser Luger, said: “We want Way Out West to be a versatile festival, encompassing all creative fields. When Svante came to us with the idea of creating a film festival-within-a festival we immediately jumped at the opportunity.

“The film section has grown steadily and it’s quickly become a force to be reckoned with for the Scandinavian market. Way Out West has become a place where talent and executives in film, music and the arts come together, and where they meet their audience”.