Panorama

Iran, 1980. After an Iraqi missile strike, the oil metropolis of Abadan descends into chaos. Fourteen-year-old Omid, who works as a food delivery boy, is searching for his missing brother – and for an escape route out of the besieged city.

Production: Les films d'ici (FR), Katuh Studio (DE), Bac Cinema (FR), Lunanime (BE), TrickStudio Lutterbeck (DE), Special Touch Studios (FR), Rêves d’Eau Productions (FR), Amopix (FR), Les fées Speciales (FR)

Screenings:
Feb 16 | 19:00 | CinemaxX 5 *Press
Feb 16 | 19:00 | CinemaxX 6 *Press
Feb 16 | 21:00 | Zoo Palast 1 *World Premiere
Feb 16 | 21:30 | Zoo Palast 2
Feb 17 | 13:00 | International
Feb 18 | 21:30 | Cineplex Titania
Feb 19 | 15:30 | Filmtheater am Friedrichshain
Feb 24 | 18:30 | Zoo Palast 1

Juraj Krasnohorský on Slovak contribution to the film:

It’s a big French-Belgian-German-Luxembourgish co-production in which we haven’t participated as co-producers, but thanks to a great idea and excellent work of a small team from Blue Faces studio located in Bratislava, we made almost 30 minutes of animation in the film. [...] The French producer Sébastien Onomo I met via the CEE Animation network was looking for a lot of 3D animators because they needed to finish a film that had been in the works for years. Unfortunately, Slovakia is not a country where you could find masses of the kind of animators he was looking for, but I reached out to Blue Faces and we suggested the use of motion capture technology which the studio is well-versed in. This technology works by actors wearing special suits with motion capture sensors. We paired the drawn models of the film’s characters with live actors which saved us a ton of time in animation. Until then, every move was animated by hand, which is very time-consuming. The director Sepideh Farsi found this technique to be super convenient to her, as she had more experience with fiction films. Thanks to us, she could direct live actors whose movement was translated into animation. It was a game-changing moment for the film and since then, the French producer has been strongly promoting us, because, as they say, we "saved their ass". The good reputation we built with The Siren earned us a place in two big co-productions we are developing, and what we are bringing to the table is the specific know-how we have precisely from making The Siren. I would like to emphasise that for us, the 33% cash rebate in Slovakia is a very important instrument when it comes to such extensive co-productions. This financing system is well-known to European producers and it is what makes us competitive on the European level. I feel that even though our market is small, we can play a key part even in big and costly European films thanks to good ideas. This has vividly put us on the map of European animated film in the last years and I dare say that our brand will rise in the upcoming years.

Juraj Krasnohorský (1980) was born in Bratislava where he works for Artichoke as film producer and for the international education programme for producers, CEE Animation Workshop, as head of studies. He studied physics, mathematics, and film in Geneva, Bilbao, and Paris, and has been directing and producing films in Slovakia since 2008. He is an EAVE programme graduate, a Slovak Association of Animated Film Producers member, and a CEE Animation board member. He is also a pedagogical contributor to European and Asian workshops for creative producers.