Håkan Hammarén has a packed New Nordic Films schedule with The Indian Road at the Co-Pro Market, My Brother Ted at the WiP and Love Proof as closing film at the festival.

The three films and projects launched at this week’s Haugesund Norwegian Film Festival and adjoining New Nordic Films market, reflect Fundament Film’s eclectic slate.

“I produce out of gut feeling and passion,” says the company’s co-managing director, Hammarén, credited for the long-running Swedish hit 30 Degrees in February.

The Indian Road to be pitched Wednesday at New Nordic Films’ Nordic Co-Production Market, is being developed by 30 Degrees in February’s co-director Emiliano Goessens, raised between Uruguay and Sweden. In it, the young Swedish researcher Linnéa sets off to Uruguay, to work on her medical paper on a possible cure against chronic depression. Together with her sister and one of the afflicted youths, she goes on an expedition in Uruguay’s wilderness, determined as well to find the truth behind the ‘Indian Road’, whereby several youngsters where caught in a state of psychosis after eating mushrooms.

It is first and foremost an entertaining film, targeting the Hunger Games audience, i.e. youngsters hungry for big thrills,” said the producer.

So far the €2.4m project has received development support from the Swedish Film Institute, Lindholm Science Park and Creative Europe. “We have also received funding from a foundation that finances Karolinska Institute’s research into psilocybin and mental illness, as the film revolves around mental illness,” added Hammarén.

The producer who went location scouting in Uruguay with Goessens, hopes to tap into the Uruguay Audiovisual Programme’s 25% tax break.

In Haugesund, Hammarén will be looking for co-producers, distributors and co-financing from broadcasters and streaming services.

Fundament’s other project My Brother Ted, to be pitched at the works in progress, is a docu-biopic about Ted Gärdestad, the iconic Swedish pop idol and actor who rose to fame in the 1970s, before committing suicide in 1997. It’s a love letter from his brother Kenneth, who wrote the lyrics to Ted’s songs, and himself passed away in 2018.

“We have gained access to previously unseen private photos and videos from Ted and Kenneth’s lives,” Hammarén told nordicfilmandtvnews.com. “It was in front of our camera that Kenneth sat down and did the last long interview about his brother and himself before he died.”

The producer says My Brother Ted will be an artistic documentary, where the directors don’t shy away from telling the dark story about Ted Gärdestad.“

“Ted was one of the hottest artists in the 70s and the record label Polar Music was able to launch ABBA partly thanks to the money they made with him. Ted was supposed to do a world tour with ABBA, but then started to have mental issues. Unfortunately, he was never diagnosed with schizophrenia. Today, he would have been treated for this illness,” noted the producer.

The expected premiere is set for 2023.

Fundament’s third production in Haugesund is the psycho thriller Love Proof by Richard Hobert. The film is set to close the Norwegian Film festival, in the presence of its main actors Rolf Lassgård, Livia Millhagen and Hedda Rehnberg. The story centres on a couple on the brink of divorce, suddenly drawn into an emotional swirl, when a young woman arrives at their summer house, with a jealousy-driven agenda.

The film is due to open in Sweden October 14. REinvent handles world sales.