A former CEO at Nordisk Film & TV Fond, Kemppinen officially joined Aurora Studios as CEO August 2nd. He is attending this week’s New Nordic Films market in Haugesund on-site.

What are your priorities at Haugesund?
Petri Kemppinen: It is first of all to shake hands with people - it will be so wonderful to meet people irl.

Then our priority is to find partners - sales, distributors, festivals - for our first in-house production The Mushroom Trip. We have Nordic rights for that film, as well as for two other projects, all three in the works in progress: The Wait , produced by Aku Louhimies’s Backmann & Hoderoff, and Aleksi Salmenperä’s The Bubble, produced by Rabbit Films.

At the co-production market, we’re handling Nordic distribution on two projects in development: Four Little Adults by Selma Vilhunen, produced by Tuffi Films, and Missile by Miia Tervo, produced by Komeetta.

This gives you a clear view of the pedigree of talents we’re working with-including several female directors.

What convinced you to join Aurora Studios as CEO, from your consultancy job?
PK: It was the opportunity for me to contribute to two key areas:

  • Firstly Aurora’s expansion of its footprint on the Finnish market via strategic acquisitions, which started with the distribution label Cinemanse, high-profile production house Helsinki filmi, followed now with a minority stake in Anima Vitae (see story CLICK HERE).
  • Secondly, Aurora’s establishment of the Finnish Impact Film Fund, which signalled a serious commitment from the group to invest in talents and high-quality audiovisual content from development stage.

Furthermore, together with the management team at Aurora Studios - head of creative Roosa Toivonen, CFO Joni Ihantola, head of distribution Hanna Lajunen, Aleksi Bardy, CEO at Helsinki Filmi, we are all shareholders, alongside family offices of investors Ari Tolppanen, Ari Lahti and Otava Publishing Group.

    Aurora Studios is a welcome private investor at a booming time for content creators. Do you see yourself as direct competitors now in Finland to Nordisk Film and SF Studios?
    PK:     Yes we are in a very strong position and important competitors to both groups on the Finnish market. We’ve managed in a short period to convince some of the local key players to collaborate with us. We do feel that we can offer better conditions for partnership than Nordisk Film and SF Studios, with a stronger focus on development, financing through our Finnish Impact Film Fund and marketing at an early stage.

    How much have you spent so far through the Finnish Impact Film Fund?
    PK: In the first eight months, we have used perhaps close to €2m out of our €5.5 million private equity scheme. We’ve invested in eight projects so far. The plan is to raise a second Fund in 2022. It will depend on the situation with Covid-19, if distribution can finally go back to normal.

    Could you expand on Aurora Studios’ editorial strategy in film and TV?
    PK: Our production banner Helsinki-filmi is keeping of course its well-established editorial profile. They are working on the next Pamela Tola film after Ladies of Steel, with the working title 40Teen. It’s about friendship blurring into co-dependency, women approaching 40, working in the gaming industry.

    The latest addition investment in Anima Vitae, will allow us to secure top animation content for the local and international market. They have several upcoming projects, such as Fleak which picked-up the Eurimages Co-production Development Award at Cartoon Movie. We feel animation is a sector with great potential, as we can also develop projects that are synergetic with publishing house Otava’s children & youth book slate.

    At the same time, Aurora’s in-house productions will focus on innovative, high quality mainstream and arthouse projects-as long as there is a clear audience. Our goal is also to improve the audience outreach early on. We’ve noticed that creators are keen to benefit from our integrated structure and marketing expertise. Our first in-house production, the comedy The Mushroom Trip by JP Siili, is being pitched at New Nordic Films.

    On the TV side, so far we’ve invested in the much anticipated Mobile 1.0 [Rabbit Films/C More-MTV], the family series Vesta Linnéa [Långfilm Productions/Yle] based on Tove Appelgren’s best-selling novel and have a lot of projects in development.

    What is your strategy to nurture new talent?
    PK: We have actually invested in two ‘Nordic Talents’ winners from 2016: we’re distributing Kaisa El Ramly’s directorial debut Getaways & Dreams [earlier know as Scenes from a Dying Town] for which Kaisa won the top Pitch Award. Also on our distribution slate is Mika Gustafson’s feature Sisters [Special Mention co-winner]. The Swedish project in development is being co-produced by Tuffi Films in Finland.

    We have on-going talks with several new writers and directors and might even set up a proper talent development scheme in the future.

    Will you also champion diversity?
    PK: It is at our core. Our line-up is quite balanced in terms of gender, and we are also paying attention to ethnic origins.

    How do you view your collaboration with local and global streamers?
    PK:     We have been focusing on this seriously and are in negotiations, notably with the main local players - Yle, C More, Elisa, and Viaplay as well as with global streamers.

    Regarding feature film, we want to find windowing venues that match our needs and within TV series, we hope there will be manageable financing models. A lot depends on each project’s financial requirements.

    Are you hopeful that you will finally be able to launch your distribution slate and open up the revenue stream?
    PK:     It is hugely complicated as restrictions have hardened. We’ve had to postpone the release of the Swedish horror film The Other Side by three weeks. Our priority is to get the films out to the audience as soon as possible. We have three films lined up for 2021 - the pick up The Other Side, Bordertown: The Mural Murders [Fisher King], handled jointly with Yle and Netflix, and Aku Louhimies’ The Wait. Another 10 titles are lined up for 2022-23.