Second edition of Frontières to run July 25-28

Montreal’s Fantasia International Film Festival has announced that its Frontières International Co-Production Market is to return for its second edition from July 25-28.

Frontières is the first co-production market to join North America and Europe in an environment focused on genre film. Its inaugural edition in 2012 attracted over 250 attendees from the international film industry and featured 14 projects in its line-up, as well as 10 in its Off-Frontières line-up, from the likes of Quebec and Canada, the US, the UK, France and Australia.

As a result of its first edition, five projects found a co-producer, two found a sales agent and one project is currently in production. They include RKSS’ Turbo Kid (with EMA Films coming in as Canadian producer), Robert Morgan & Sam Walker’s The Withering signing with Raven Banner for both co-production and international sales and TCB Film coming on board Fabrice Blin’s Sève as Canadian producer.

Stephanie Trepanier [pictured], market director, commented: “It’s always hard to build expectations with the first edition of an event, but we were very pleased with the results of the first edition of Frontières. Accreditations were at full capacity, the organisation went very smoothly and we received a lot of very positive comments.”

She continued: “Many participants have told us how satisfied they were with the new encounters they made during the Industry Rendez-Vous, many of them now leading to professional partnerships as well as friendships, which are just as important for us. The genre film world is a big family and Fantasia has always been one of the places on the circuit where we can meet in a most convivial way.”

Fantasia aims to select 12 projects for Frontières’ second edition, with the only criteria being that they must be market premieres with a completed script as well as being applicable to an international co-production environment, ideally with a Canadian production element. Its Off-Frontières selection will allow projects in a wider range of development stages and production environments.

Trepanier told Screen that while the focus of the projects involved won’t change, this year will see Fantasia expand the reach of Frontières.

“We are looking at including the same territories as last year and feature as many projects, but we want to increase our accreditations rate, especially with producers, financiers and international sales agents looking to attach themselves on new projects,” explained Trepanier. “We are changing the location of the event to a more modern and spacious space to accommodate an increase in participation.”

Deadline for Frontières submission is March 26. For more information, visit Fantasia’s website.

The 17^th edition of Fantasia runs July 18-Aug 6.