Scandinavian filmmakers Olga Krussenberg and Balder Ljunggren have received the Swedish Film Institute’s Wild Card prize, of SEK 800,000 (£57,337) shared equally between them.
Wild Card supports recently graduated directors with development funding for their debut feature film.
Krussenberg is selected with her project Late Blue Winter, in which a man is forced to settle on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard after being denied a European visa. Krussenberg has previously directed short documentaries Slowly I Move in Your Direction and Isblink, and graduated from the Royal Institute of Arts and Biskops Arno.
HDK-Valand graduate Ljunggren is selected for Worldbuilding, about a construction worker, still in love with his ex-wife, who begins to see strange figures and unexplained patterns in the world. Ljunggren’s previous work includes short films That’s Amore and Rift, the latter of which competed at Gothenburg Film Festival this year.
The jury praised Krussenberg for “a visually stunning, charming and wistful story about one man’s struggle to find belonging in a place where the future has never been more uncertain”; while crediting Ljunggren for “a world as mysterious as life itself. It is brave. It is beautiful. It is striking.”
The filmmakers were presented with their prizes at Stockholm Film Festival’s Industry Days.
Previous winners include Lisa Forslund, Andre Vaara and Angelica Ruffier in 2023; and Tess Quatri, Vangelis Kollias and Simone Norberg in 2022.
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