Italy’s TorinoFilmLab (TFL) has selected 10 projects for the 2024 edition of its FeatureLab training programme, for first or second film projects at an advanced development stage.
The 2024 edition comprises nine fiction features and one documentary feature. Seven of the projects are debut features, with three second films.
In total, FeatureLab will host 21 participants, of whom 14 are women and seven are men. They come from 11 countries - Azerbaijan, Belarus, Brazil, France, Germany, Greece, India, Italy, South Korea, Switzerland, Ukraine.
Scroll down for full list of projects
Among the 10 projects is Versorgen by Swiss writer and director Nora Longatti whose latest short film Chute won the Pardino d’Oro at the Locarno Film Festival in 2021.
Cold Ashes Can Cause Forest Fire is the first feature film by India’s Ashmita Guha Neogi whose 2020 diploma film CatDog won the top prizes at Cinefondation at Cannes and NEST at San Sebastían, while her short film Silan (2023) premiered at San Sebastían.
A Day In The Life Of Jo: Chapter Phaedra is by Greece’s Jacqueline Lentzou, who previously took part in TFL ScriptLab programme 2017 to develop her debut film Moon, 66 Questions which played in Berlinale Encounters in 2021.
Another TFL alumnus taking part in FeatureLab is Jarell Mahinay Serencio who participated at ScriptLab 2022 with the same project The Boy And The Fight Of The Spiders.
The training programme runs from June until November 2024, with a one week-long residential module in Opatjia (Croatia), with the support of Croatian Audiovisual Centre, followed by the online module (in September) and leading up to the final session in November in Turin.
The teams will be guided by head of studies Violeta Bava and curator Vincenzo Bugno. FeatureLab 2024 is organised by TorinoFilmLab - National Museum of Cinema and co-funded by Creative Europe’s Media programme, in partnership with Croatian Audiovisual Centre.
TorinoFilmLab FeatureLab 2024 projects
Synopses provided by TFL
A Day In The Life Of Jo: Chapter Phaedra (Gr)
Dir-scr: Jacqueline Lentzou
Prod: Annabelle Aronis for Avion Films
Jo, a 15-year-old tomboy, has a nightmare made of fog and aurora light: her dog is lost, her voice cannot be heard, and her surroundings seem completely unfamiliar. Has the tone of the day been set yet?
Antonivka (Ukr)
Dir-scr: Kateryna Gornostai
Prod: Viktoriia Khomenko for Moon Man
The future: postwar Ukraine. A young couple, Aurora and Darko, move to the house of her grandfather who survived village occupation alone and is recovering from a mild stroke. New life begins, but death is still present.
Cold Ashes Can Cause Forest Fires (India-Fr)
Dir-scr: Ashmita Guha Neogi
Prod: Avantika Singh Desbouvries for Salt for Sugar Films
The sudden departure of her mother opens up a deep chasm between a 13-year-old girl and her father who manages a hotel in a small mountain town in the Himalayas.
Hard Sub (Azer-Ger)
Dir-scr: Novruz Hikmet
Prod: Julian Gerchow for plotlessfilm
Anticipating war, Amir’s ex-wife is taking their daughter to Europe. Now he is forced to a quick decision: should he stay, go back to his motherland, or become an immigrant all over again.
La Notte Brucia (It)
Dir-scr: Angelica Gallo
Prod: Andrea Gori for Lumen Films
Massimo and his friends live in the suburbs of Rome. They have a dangerous hobby: stealing from rich young people in discos – but one night something goes wrong.
The Boy And The Fight Of The Spiders (Phil-Fr)
Dir-scr: Jarell Mahinay Serencio
Co-writer: Homer B. Novicio
Prod: Claire Lajoumard for Acrobates Films
In Southern Philippines, a carefree, spider-obsessed young boy loses his older brother and father in a mine’s collapse. Forced to look for their bodies in the rubble, he digs up a web of lies woven together by the powers-that-be.
Sea, Star, Woman (S.Kor-UK-Fr)
Dir-scr: Jeunghae Yim
Prod: Helen Olive for 5 à 7 Films
All I have of my mother are photos with holes cut out of them where her face had been. After thirty years of amnesia, my wandering gaze will take us on a journey across three continents and my complex family’s relationships…searching for traces of my mother.
Spadčyna - Legacy (Belarus-Ger)
Dir-scr: Aliaksei Paluyan
Prod: Paulina Toenne for Tamtam Film
Minsk 2020: “25 years of Lukashenka is enough” echoes through the streets and paints the walls of Belarus. A father, mother, son and daughter find themselves at opposite ends of a systemic power struggle that dates back to the Soviet era.
Versorgen (Switz)
Dir-scr: Nora Longatti
Prod: Chanta Schiner for Seeland Filmproduktion
Versorgen immerses us into the choreographed realm of care work through everyday encounters between human bodies, architectures and machines.
Yellow Chrysanthemum (Braz)
Dir-scr: André Hayato Saito
Prod: Mayra Faour Auad for MyMama Entertainment
Amidst the festivities of the 1998 World Cup, Erika, a Japanese-Brazilian teenager living on the border between two worlds, faces the prejudices linked to her identity and struggles with unresolved grief over her best friend’s disappearance when she was seven.
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