Any Day Now writer/director Hamy Ramezan is among the panellists invited on Wednesday August 25th to debate Nordic diversity issues at Haugesund’s New Nordic Films.

The seminar Status Quo-Diversity is co-hosted by Nordisk Film & TV Fond, as part of its Audiovisual Collaboration 2021 industry meet-up initiative.

Distinguished panellists invited to share their views are the following:

  • Hamy Ramezan, Finnish/Iranian writer/director. His directorial debut Any Day Now which world premiered at Berlin’s Generation KPlus section, is screening this week at New Nordic Films’ market in Haugesund. The film is inspired by Ramezan’s own experience as a refugee, who fled persecution in Iran with his family and arrived in Finland in 1990, after spending time in a Yugoslavian refugee camp.
  • Elisa Fernanda Pirir, producer at Mer Film, Norway, in charge of non-European co-productions and head of TV
  • Silje Riise Næss, film commissioner at the Danish Film Institute and former film commissioner at the Norwegian Film Institute
  • Helen Ahlsson, Film Commissioner New Talents and International Coproductions at the Swedish Film Institute
  • Anne Lajla Utsi, managing director at the International Sámi Film Institute who will discuss her experience as Sámi expert/consultant on Disney’s Frozen 2, and the institute’s global indigenous co-work.

The Fund’s CEO Liselott Forsman will be serving as moderator.

Commenting on Wednesday’s panel, Forsman said: “How can Nordic films correlate better with the structures of their audiences? This question is rightfully debated from many angles such as ethnicity, gender, age, disability, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status. A diverse community of storytellers benefits all forms of representation, and in Haugesund, we will focus on how to enable stories with cultural and ethnical diversity.”

“I look very much forward to the dialogue between Nordic filmmakers and decision-makers, all devoted to the cause. We will compare commissioning strategies and successful creative roads and discuss what pan-Nordic steps could be taken next.”

The panel Status Quo-Diversity is held under Nordisk Film & TV Fond’s Audiovisual Collaboration 2021. For more information CLICK HERE.

The bridge-building initiative between industry representatives and decision-makers is co-organised by the Fund and the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture, under its Presidency of the Nordic Council of Ministers.

After Haugesund, the next Audiovisual Collaboration 2021 will be:

  • a Town Hall session at Nordisk Panorama in Malmö, September 19 (17.30-19.00),
  • to be followed at Helsinki’s industry meeting Finnish Film Affair (September 22-24), by a session on sustainability (details to follow).

The annual industry event New Nordic Films unfolds in Haugesund August 24-27, parallel to this week’s Norwegian International Film Festival.