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Christiana Wertz • BLS Film Fund & Commission

“Films supported by BLS are successful at festivals and at the box office”

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- After Venice and Toronto, three projects supported by BLS Film Fund & Commission are in the running in various sections of the Rome International Film Festival

Christiana Wertz • BLS Film Fund & Commission

Born in 1978 in Cologne, Christiana Wertz has been heading the Film Fund & Commission of the Business Location Südtirol – Alto Adige since 2010. Her activities include directing the production funds, as well as the local development and promotional funds.

Cineuropa: Are you happy with the second edition of the Script Lab Racconti?
Christiana Wertz: Very. At the beginning of October, professional screenwriters took part in RACCONTI #2 and set the bases for seven television series in Alto Adige, which were developed in recent months by tutors and experts for a panel of television producers at the FictionFest in Rome. Producers interested in producing one of these proposals can present a funding offer for pre-production to our Film Fund & Commission. Two of the projects developed during the Script Lab have already received options from two German production houses, one of which is currently looking for an Italian co-producer.

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After pitching, we presented a new edition of RACCONTI #3, once more aimed at professional screenwriters from Italy, Germany and Austria, who presented an idea for television series with strong ties to Alto Adige.

The fund supporting audiovisual and cinema productions has been active since 2010. It is one of the biggest of its kind in Italy and has been attracting a number of projects.
We have the luck of being able to manage - on behalf of the autonomous province of Bolzano - an annual fund of €5 million for the support of cinema and television projects going through phases of production and pre-production. Various projects we have supported are still going through preparation phases, but for those already made, the verdict is certainly a good one. It is especially satisfying to see this in the smaller projects we supported, which are getting a lot of attention at festivals. For instance Piccola Patria [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
was selected in the Horizons section at the last Venice Film Festival. That film was partially financed by our FC. We have three projects supported by BLS taking part in the upcoming International Rome Film Festival: Tir [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Alberto Fasulo
film profile
]
by Alberto Fasulo, in competition in the official section of the festival, documentary Dal profondo, by Valentina Pedicini in the Prospettive Doc Italia section and If I Close My Eyes I’m Not Here [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
by Vittorio Moroni in the autonomous Alice in the City section. Then there are those films taking part in festivals across the ocean, like Marvin Kren’s The Station at the Toronto Film Festival.  

At the same time, it is beautiful seeing other projects becoming successful at the box office. I am for instance talking about The Best Offer [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Giuseppe Tornatore, which was partially filmed in Alto Adige and was supported by our fund or Il Principe abusivo [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
by Alessandro Siani which was filmed in Merano: both among 2013’s most watched films. Thanks to FC’s work, the local economy is benefitting too. Infrastructures needed to welcome production teams are on the increase and more and more local professionals are becoming involved at home. Producing in a professional way in Alto Adige is becoming easier and for us that means reaching an important objective one step at a time. Various local production companies motivated by recent local cinema developments are starting to successfully produce. As for the future, we are waiting to see whether we can bring to a conclusion some of our internal projects which were fully conceived and made at home.

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(Translated from Italian)

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