As if celebrating a bustling 30^th edition wasn’t enough, the Stockholm International Film Festival is kicking off its Stockholm Industry Days market programme today, with three days chock full of activity ahead. A total of 400 participants, of 20 nationalities, are in attendance.

As in previous years, huge emphasis is being put on the works in progress/works in development segment, with the latest and most interesting projects in various states of completion. Twenty projects are being presented this year, mainly from the Nordic region.

Sweden dominates the programme with ten purely national productions. Among them are Knackningar (lit. “Knockings”), a thriller by Frida Kempff, director of the Cannes-awarded short Bathing Micky; My Dear Mother by Sami cinema veteran Paul-Anders Simma, a documentary situated in the Russian Sami area; and pantylover(dot)com, a dark comedy-thriller involving used underwear by debut feature director Niclas Larsson.

Among the most interesting international co-productions are Anna Böhlmark’s Swedish-Indian Big Social Nomad, an account of the relationship between humans and elephants in contemporary India; and actor–director Alexandra Dahlström’s (Fucking Åmål) new short, Lust for Life, a true Nordic co-production involving Iceland, Norway, Finland, Denmark and Sweden. Significant buzz also surrounds the only German production present, Second Thoughts [+leggi anche:
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scheda film] by previous Roy Andersson collaborator Zora Rux. This feature debut, billed as being in the genre of the “new weird wave”, may soon be picked for a major festival competition, say those in the know.

As is Stockholm industry tradition, five new Swedish films have been picked for the STHLM Debut support initiative, open to feature-debut directors and producers in the Stockholm region. This year’s quintet comprises Neil Wigardt’s Blomster, a hallucinatory film featuring “the hyper-connected generation”; Maria Eriksson-Hecht’s grim social-realist study Kevlar Soul; Yana Martsynkevych’s Sasha, a tale of Sweden’s East European diaspora; Salad Hilowle’s Tongues Untied, dealing with Afro-Swedish protagonists; and finally, Sub, a story of both teen and climate anxiety and being able to breathe underwater, courtesy of Peter Modestij, last seen at Berlin with his award-winning short 6A.

Master classes and panels also help to flesh out the schedule, with participation by the likes of directors Céline Sciamma, Xavier Dolan, Kantemir Balagov and Sergei Loznitsa. Promising panel-talk headlines include “What Netflix Wants” and “Production Incentives for Film and Television”, of which Sweden has none so far. With an increasing number of Swedish productions currently outsourcing their activities to Hungary, the Baltics and other territories offering such opportunities, a growing number of voices are currently calling for a radical change in government policy in the country.

The Stockholm Industry Days runs from 12-14 November, while the festival itself unspools until 17 November.