New features by Lukas Dhont, Felix van Groeningen, and Teodora Ana Mihai will be among the projects to be showcased at Flanders Film Days 2025, a relaunch of Flanders Image’s feature showcase, previously known as Connext.
Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF) is again supporting the event which will take place in Ghent from October 7-8, 2025, in close collaboration with Film Fest Gent, which opens on October 8.
Feature-length fiction, animated and documentary films at various stages of production will be pitched and shown to international industry and festival executive.. It will also be presenting work from young and emerging filmmakers. In a change from Connext, it will not include series.
In addition to the projects by Dhont, van Groeningen and Mihai films, of each little is confirmed, further projects include Cinéfondation resident Meltse Van Coillie’s Arctic-set feature debut Torpor, and Raf Wathion’s Black Wolf, the first animated feature project produced by Eurydice Gysel and Koen Mortier’s production company Czar.
There will also be excerpts from films in post-production including Anke Blondé’s Dust, scripted by Girl and Close co-writer Angelo Tijssens, Kristof Bilsen’s documentary The Apologist, first pitched at IDFA Forum, and the hybrid feature, The Decapitation of Ousmane Sembene by the Commission for Classification of Cinematography (CCC), by Berlinale Talents alumnus, Benjamin Deboosere.
The full programme will be unveiled in the summer.
The final edition of Connext in 2023 gave a major boost to films such as Leonardo van Dijl’s feature debut Julie Keeps Quiet, premiered last year at Cannes Critics’ Week, Anthony Schatteman’s Young Hearts, which was selected for the Berlinale 2024, Soft Leaves by Miwako van Weyenberg, which had its world premiere at International Film Festival Rotterdam, and Jen Debauche’s The Anchor, which received two awards at DocLisboa.
Additionally, Johan Grimonprez’s Oscar-nominated Soundtrack To A Coup d’Etat was presented as a work in progress in Connext in 2022.
Lukas Dhont’s debut feature Girl, won the works-in-progress award at Connext in 2017 and he participated several times in the event subsequently.
“Lukas has personally experienced how events like this can give a film’s visibility a powerful jumpstart. That’s why we’re genuinely proud to be part of Flanders Film Days with Cato Kusters’ debut, Julian, and Lukas’ latest project,” said Dhont’s producer and brother, Michiel Dhont, founder of their joint production outfit The Reunion.
Flanders Film Days is an initiative of Flanders Image, the international promotion department of the Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF), in collaboration with Film Fest Gent. Flanders Film Days is supported by Screen Flanders, Screen Brussels, Yalo Hotel Gent and Gent Congres.
“The conjunction of Flanders Film Days and Film Fest Gent offers international festival programmers and sales agents a unique opportunity to delve into both Flemish productions in development and those premiering at the festival,” suggests Marijke Vandebuerie, managing director, Film Fest Gent. ”It also provides the chance to network with many local and international guests and register for a wide range of engaging sessions and meetings for the international film industry.
Film projects announced so far:
Project pitches
- Alors on danse by Pieter Van Hees (prod. De Wereldvrede)
- Black Wolf by Raf Wathion (prod. Czar Film & TV)
- Torpor by Meltse Van Coillie (prod. Menuetto)
Works in progress
- New film by Lukas Dhont (prod. The Reunion)
- New film by Felix van Groeningen (prod. Menuetto)
- The Apologist by Kristof Bilsen (prod. Limerick Films)
- The Assignment by Patrice Toye (prod. Menuetto)
- The Decapitation of Ousmane Sembene by the Commission for Classification of Cinematography (CCC) by Benjamin Deboosere (prod. Untitled Production)
- DUST by Anke Blondé (prod. A Private View)
- Heysel 85 by Teodora Ana Mihai (prod. Menuetto)
- Jonah Was Here by Nathalie Teirlinck (prod. De Wereldvrede)
- Sorry by Frederike Migom (prod. De Mensen)
- Team Spirit NXT G3N by Jan Verheyen & Anne-Marie Brandstötter (prod. A Team Productions)
Finished titles
- Behind the Bars of Time by Stijn Geenen (prod. Lompvis)
- Foley Man by Frank Van Passel (prod. Lompvis)
- Four Brothers by Pieter-Jan De Pue (prod. Savage Film)
- Julian by Cato Kusters (prod. The Reunion)
- Moths by Indra Siera (prod. Eyeworks Film & TV Drama)
- Paris, Paris by Isabelle Tollenaere (prod. Menuetto)
- Sunday Ninth by Kat Steppe (prod. Panenka)
No comments yet