Roskino welcomes 20 companies at TIFF

Russian promotional body Roskino continues its Doors travelling film market in Toronto, with films promoted including Alexey Uchitel’s crime drama Break Loose [pictured] and Yury Bykov’s The Major (both of which are selected for TIFF’s Contemporary World Cinema section), Avdotia Smirnova’s romantic comedy 2 Days, Vasily Serikov’s action thriller 22 Minutes, Vladimir Karabanov’s road movie Elephant, and Svetlana Baskova’s drama For Marx.

More than 20 companies are attending Toronto under the Roskino umbrella, including Central Partnership, Koktebel, Glavkino, Mosfilm, Len Film and Sverdlovsk Film Studios.

Roskino CEO Catherine Mtsitouridze said that the Doors deal with Gravity Ventures and Hulu, which presents Russian films on the online platform, is set to expand soon.

Doors will also include industry screenings at the Message to Man International Film Festival later this month in St Petersburg, which will invite global buyers.

“The Russian domestic market’s growth because of blockbusters is good for investors that can help smaller production companies too,” Mtsitouridze tells Screen.

Also of note for global buyers is Roskino’s ability to help with P&A funding for international releases of Russian films. For example, Alexander Sokurov’s Faust was released in Italy by Archibald, which got $20,000 (Euros 15,000) for P&A support. The promotional body has up to $78,700 (Euros 60,000) per year to help with P&A costs for foreign distributors.