Norwegian documentary Fighter about a mixed martial arts fighter who breaks his back is launching at two festivals this weekend – one for films, and one for series.
Fighter will have its world premiere as an 82-minute feature on March 21 in the Nordic:Dox competition at CPH:DOX. Three days later it is playing as a 3x42-minute series in the Special Screenings strand of Series Mania in Lille.
“The advantage is to be able to reach a wider audience,” says Mari Bakke Riise, who has written and directed the film with Sunniva Sundby, and produced it with Silje Evensmo Jacobsen for Norway’s A5 Film. “As for sales, it is beneficial because where the broadcasters can’t fit the film into their slot, it might be easier to fit in a series.”
TrustNordisk is handling nternational sales on both versions of Fighter, having boarded the project in October last year. It has secured distribution in Benelux with September Film Distribution, with further territory deals in the works; while TV2 has broadcast rights to both versions in Norway. The project was developed and backed by the Norwegian Film Institute.
Fighter tells the story of Geir ‘GK’ Kare, a Norwegian mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter with a seemingly great career ahead of him – until he breaks his back when jumping headfirst into shallow water. Told to expect life in a wheelchair, GK explores alternative treatments and throws himself back into life.
GK contacted the filmmakers himself shortly after his accident in May 2021. “I decided from the hospital bed that I wanted to make a film about this,” he explains, “I knew this would be a tough process and I wanted to document it, inspire, give hope to others because I needed that myself.”
Even in his terrible circumstance, Riise and Sundby said GK made for a great collaborator. “He had even asked his friends and family to start filming him while he was in the hospital right after the accident,” says Sundby.
Riise and Jacobsen had previously delved into the sports world in 2013 series Morgendagens idrettshelter (translation: Tomorrow’s Sports Heroes), which gave GK “a good gut feeling about them from the start.”
“I don’t have the knowledge myself about making a film so I let it be up to them,” he says.
The project was initially conceived as a film. “After several years of work, we ended up with five hard drives containing hundreds of hours of footage in different qualities,” says Sundby, which opened up the parallel series avenue. “Everything from private mobile recordings, VHS, surveillance cameras, to various film recordings made by different photographers who have been part of the project.”
The only snag in the process came recently, when the film version was complete. “GK preferred to see it for the very first time together with an audience at the premiere,” says Riise. “That says a lot about him – open and honest, with a desire to share, yet not overly concerned with controlling the narrative about himself and his story.”
The filmmakers managed to persuade him to view it in private first. “Which we’re grateful for,” says Riise. “This is still a difficult thing for GK that set in motion many life-changing processes. His entire identity was tied to a performing body, and when he lost that, he had to go through many different phases to find new ways to be himself.”
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