With hopes of a more peaceful world, concrete measures and a greener industry in 2023

“In 2023 the Fund focuses especially on pan-Nordic talent development, a strengthened Nordic distribution and pan-Nordic, concrete efforts to achieve a greener industry in our region.

Last year started in an optimistic mood with our world re-opening after the long Covid pandemic. Then Russia attacked Ukraine and Europe darkened. In times of crises, the importance of Nordic collaboration became more evident than ever, also on a top political level.

In early March, I had a zoom talk with my former Input TV colleague, the Kharkiv born Canadian documentary producer, Alex Shprintsen, who has covered Ukraine and Russia for more than 30 years. He sees that not only greed, but also the weak international (pre-war) covering of Russia had its part in how Western political leaders treated Putin and Russia for 20+ years as a normal, 'quasi-democratic' country. Indirectly this also enabled Russia’s censored media. More than ever, the world needs well-financed and thus well-researched and produced content to fight global disinformation. Link to video.

Ten months later, the war goes on and Alex keeps us updated through links you can find below his interview. A question for us all is still: what can we do on a concrete level to help? In the Fund’s last 2022 newsletter, Ukrainian producer Julia Sinkevych offered some advice: Link to article.

Last year our industry faced new business challenges. For years there’s been speculations on when the so-called drama series bubble will explode, and in 2022 some air did go out of it. The situation was especially tough in Denmark due to over optimistic rights demands and the production stop that followed. In November, Ampere Analyses predicted, at the drama series event C21 in London, that 2023 will be the weakest year for content spending in more than a decade.

Compared to last year’s record numbers of drama series projects we did notice a slight decrease in series and documentary applications at the Fund, while films were back in numbers and with a great variety of styles and content. We could overall see a welcomed rise in stories analysing our societies’ economic and political power structures.

Nordic fictions were strongly represented at international events. Among the many celebrated are two Swedish tiles: the documentary The Most Beautiful Boy in the World that won the Prix Europa and Triangle of Sadness that won EFA and Palme d’Or awards. Iceland was strong at Nordic stages as Blackport received the Nordisk Film & TV Fond Prize in Gothenburg, and Lamb the Nordic Council Film Prize in Helsinki.

It was a joy to return to real life meetings and festivals in 2022. The Fund could finally launch its new initiative Nordic Script in collaboration with partners from Oslo Seriedagene, Göteborg Film Festival and the City of Helsinki. In May 12 participants from all Nordic countries were selected for this new screenwriting lab and networking arena, and in September the first lab was held in Oslo.

The very positive feedback especially mentioned the great work of the three mentors. After the very first day, one could sense a deep Nordic collective learning and networking mood in the room.

In 2022-2023 Nordic Script focuses on drama series writing. The next module takes place early February in Gothenburg during TV Drama Vision, and the final one in Helsinki early June, followed by the grand finale, the Nordic Script industry day June 8^th. Info will be published here in March for the next round summoning writers of feature films and mini-series!

The Fund’s bridge building Nordic Talents event was happily back in Copenhagen for the first time since the start of the pandemic. Upcoming talents from Finland and Norway were awarded on stage and valuable real-life networking between young and experienced professionals took once again place in the Danish autumn sun.

Since 2020, the Fund has introduced theme years. Last year ’s theme 20-something paid special attention to new generations of film and series makers. During the whole year, we used every opportunity to discuss Nordic content and industry issues with upcoming filmmakers.

Among things they saw lacking in the Nordic industry were alternatives to realism, laconic tones, and grey colours. Brave new concepts are needed as well as authenticity in both realistic and fantasy storytelling. Voices were also raised for genuine diversity instead of a cosmetic one that ticks boxes. When asked about non-domestic Nordic favourites and truly diverse productions, Norwegian titles were often referred to.

Optimism was also expressed as some fresh more colourful projects and a wider variety of stories were noticed. As an example, was mentioned new Sámi narratives that finally seem to happen here and now, and not only in the past. This creative tendency links well with what we see happening in the coming year on basis of our applications.

Experts from 20-something interviews have been presented at industry meetings and festivals. These videos are available at the Fund’s homepage’s new Industry Insight section: https://nordiskfilmogtvfond.com/industry-insights.

This section is part of the renewal of the Fund’s home page that started in 2022 and continues in 2023. The aim is to offer clear and easy access to more Nordic industry data than before.

For some years the Fund has launched discussions on sustainability at Nordic events and through Nordic over views.

In 2023 the Fund’s theme year Nordic Green looks concretely at the industry’s pan-Nordic needs and how to achieve them. The first concrete step will be taken in strong collaboration with Nordic Film Commissions at a joint summit during the Berlinale.

The elephant in the green room is travelling motivated by financing. On what green and economic grounds can domestic productions be attracted to film at home? On what grounds can we offer green locations to other countries? Do we need a common standard and/or a pan-Nordic green industry expert/organisation?

The summit will look for answers together with Nordic film institutes/funds, broadcasters, media companies, and producer organisations. If we financiers set new demands, we also need to help enable them.

When doing our everyday job - top-up financing audiovisual productions, we always consider both the overall quality and the Nordic (and international) distribution.

In late 2022 we started to analyse the effects of our distribution and dubbing support. We aim to renew our application system at the end of 2023 to make the support more predictable and more effective. Our discussions with distributors and other experts continue all spring. Feel free to contact us if you want to be part of this planning process.

The Fund will keep working on multiple levels for a stronger Nordic industry in 2023. Strength includes sustainability and aims to promote great content that in the end also can promote a more peaceful world.

We are very excited about the new Nordic content that is on its way and look forward to collaborating with you in 2023!”