Venice Market Kicks Off With Buzzy Indie Projects, Looks at Indigenous Cinema for First Time
variety.comNick Vivarelli International Correspondent The enduring strength of family bonds amid ecological mayhem and fears wreaked on humanity by ongoing wars are the standout themes among more than 60 projects being unveiled at the Venice Production Bridge gap-financing market which kicks off Aug.
29. As examples of this trend, Pascal Diot, who heads the VPB, as the Lido’s indie film market is known, cited Polish director and anthropologist Aga Woszczyńska’s “Blackwater,” which involves two brothers and their partners who become trapped by an ecological catastrophe on a Baltic sea island; and Yegor Troyanovsky’s doc “Cuba & Alaska,” which follows military paramedics from Cuba and Alaska as they risk their lives in war-torn eastern Ukraine.
All projects showcased at the Venice Gap Financing Market must have at least 70% of their funding in place. Even before the market started, buzz has been building on several VPB titles, including “Blackwater” and Afghan filmmaker Shahrbanoo Sadat’s “No Good Men,” a romantic comedy set inside a Kabul newsroom during the democratic era, before the Taliban returned to power in 2021.
Diot said this year’s attendance level, which amounts to roughly 3,000 accredited attendees, is on a par with the 2023 VPB edition’s surging numbers.
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