2024_ME_pitching-sessions_Eva Svenstedt Ward, Amra Bakšić Čamo

ScriptLab is led by Eva Svenstedt Ward and Amra Bakšić Čamo 

Projects written by Estonian Smoke Sauna Sisterhood filmmaker Anna Hints and Mounia Akl, the Lebanese director of Costa Brava Lebanon, are among the 16 selected by Italy’s TorinoFilmLab (TFL) for the 2025 edition of ScriptLab, the programme that supports fiction features through early stages of development.

Smoke Sauna Sisterhood won best European documentary at the 2023 European Film Awards while Costa Brava Lebanon premiered in Venice in 2021 and went on to win the audience award at the BFI London Film Festival. 

Feature projects by US writer/director Micah Magee, whose first fiction feature Petting Zoo premiered in Berlin Panorama in 2015, and US filmmaker Matthew Puccini, whose shorts Dirty and Lavender have screened at festivals including Sundance and SXSW, are also in the selection. 

Scroll down for the full list of participants

ScriptLab is headed up by Swedish screenwriter and script consultant Eva Svenstedt Ward and Serbian producer Amra Bakšić Čamo, with mentorship coming from Anna Ciennik (France), Nadja Dumouchel (France), Miguel Lopez Beraza (Spain) and Selina Ukwuoma (UK).

Four aspiring story editors will work alongside the screenwriters through the development process.

The programme features five sessions taking place in Belgrade, Berlin and Turin between April and November 2025. It finishes with the TFL Meeting Event, a co-production market in which participants can present their projects to international producers, sales agents and industry professionals, in Turin in November.

The teams are also in the running for various prizes including the €20,000 Eurimages co-production development award.

“What unites [the projects] is a drive to push cinematic form and communicate urgent, deeply personal and socially resonant stories,” said Ward and Čamo in a joint statement. “This is a cinema in motion – reflective, daring and committed to change.”

This year’s cohort is made up of 13 women, seven men and two non-binary participants from 20 countries, chosen from a record-breaking 675 applicants.

The projects comprise seven debut features and nine second features.

ScriptLab 2025 projects and participants

Projects

Black Hairy Beast 
Writer/director Anna Hints (Estonia), co-writer/co-director Tushar Prakash (India)

Chosen City 
Writer/director Maria Belen Poncio (Argentina)

Goldfish 
Writer/director Aditya Ahman (Indonesia)

Grasshopper 
Writer/director Micah Magee (US-Denmark)

He Is Cat
Writer/director Anette Sidor (Sweden)

Hearth
Writer/director Matthew Puccini (US)

History Of Illness
Writer/director David Gaso (Croatia)

Hold Me (If You Want)
Writer/director Mounia Akl (Lebanon)

Hold Still
Writer/director Shalini Adani (Chile-UK-India)

Ismaelillo
Writer/director Tommaso Santambrogio (Italy)

Radical Hope
Writer/director Steffi Niederzoll (Germany), co-writer Sina Ataejan Dena (Iran-Germany)

Summer Echo
Writer/director Miwako Van Weyenberg (Belgium)

Walk Slow
Writer/director Yvonne Zhang (UK)

Wolf Days 
Writer/director Emilija Gasic (Serbia)

Words That Burn
Writer/director Alois Sandner Diaz (Spain)

Wrecking Ball 
Writer/director Clara Stern (Austria)

Story editor trainees

Cora Frischling (Germany)

Shaza Moharam (Egypt)

Nandita Solomon (Malaysia)

Chiara Dainese (Italy)

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