BRATISLAVA: Slovak producer Mira Fornay is in the vanguard of a new generation of fearless female Slovak director/producers tackling gritty subjects with unsentimental honesty that male colleagues might envy.

SOFIA: Best know as the director of The World Is Big And Salvation Lurks Around The Corner (shortlisted in the Academy awards for Best Foreign Language Film), since 1999 Stefan Komandarev represents Bulgaria as a European Film Promotion 2012 Producer on the Move.

BUDAPEST: "I feel lucky because my job is my hobby too", says Judit Stalter, Hungary's European Film Promotion 2012 Producer on the Move.

"If I don't work, I'm always watching films, reading scripts or just talking films with my friends who are mainly filmmakers," she says. "This is an obsession that requires 24 hours a day."

LJUBLJANA: Ales Pavlin of the production company Perfo (www.perfo.si) represents Slovenia as a 2012 European Film Promotion Producer on the Move.

PRAGUE: Ondřej Zima, European Film Promotion's Czech 2012 Producer on the Move, reckons his biggest success to date is the Czech-Slovak coproduction Love, a box office hit with audiences in Slovakia. "It has been seen by 116,000 people in Slovak cinemas, making it the third most successful Slovak film in the past 20 years," he told FNE.

VIENNA: European Film Promotion 2012 Producer on the Move Constanze Schumann comes to Cannes as a part of one of Austria's leading production companies, Allegro Film (www.allegrofilm.at), which she joined in 2011.

TBILISI: Georgia's European Film Promotion 2012 Producer on the Move Vladimer Katcharava says film production "is adrenalin, it's like being in a war," because "things might change in a minute. You don't have the time for mistakes."

He doesn't have a military background though, but graduated in 2001 in Film Management from the Georgian State University of Theatre and Film (www.tafu.edu.ge).

BUCHAREST: European Film Promotion 2012 Producer on the Move Monica Lazurean-Gorgan emerged as a force in the Romanian film industry in 2007 when she founded 4Proof Film (www.4prooffilm.ro) and was associate producer for Adrian Sitaru's Hooked which premiered in Venice in 2008.

HELSINKI: For Liisa Penttila, whose introduction to production was coproducing Lars von Trier's Dogville in 2001, it is "absolutely essential" to work with good professionals in order to grow.

ZAGREB: For Sinisa Juricic, a European Film Promotion 2012 Producer on the Move, the most difficult task of a film producer is "to keep everyone happy."

Hungarian Producer on the Move Attila Csaky's production experience dates back to 1989, when he served as a production assistant on Before the Bat's Flight is Done directed by Peter Timar, building his credentials as a location manager and crew member, before taking up a position as production manager and overseeing such films as the Hapsburg historical epic The Bridgeman (2002), the Bulgarian-Dutch-Hungarian coproduction Pismo do Amerika (2001) directed by Iglika Triffonova, and Marta Meszaros' Polish-Hungarian coproduction A magzat (1994).

Latvian 34-year old Linda Krukle, European Film Promotion Producer on the Move, produced the first Latvian-Hong Kong coproduction Amaya aka Hong Kong Confidential with a cast of famous actors from Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Hong Kong, and the U.K. She'll be coming to Cannes with her comedy road movie (in development) Tempura, a contemporary story and multicultural film project that crosses national borders and cultures.

Chouchkov Brothers (www.ch-bros.com), producer of the feature debut Tilt, is the second company that European Film Promotion Producer on the Move Borislav Chouchkov (35) and director Viktor Chouchkov Jr (40) developed and own together. The Bulgarian brothers first made their name recording original scores through their company SIF309 (www.sif309.com) established in 1992, working on over 500 projects including César winner and Oscar nominee Les Choristes, Golden Globe nominee Nomad and European Film Award winner and Oscar nominee Hotel Rwanda. The achievements were aided by the active participation of their father, renowned Bulgarian pianist and composer Professor Victor Chouchkov, Bulgaria's "musician of the year" in 2000.

Almost every production from Radim Procházka has received both critical acclaim and prestigious film awards, including The Greatest Czechs by director Robert Sedláček, nominated for seven awards at the 2010 Czech Lions (www.ceskylev.cz). Now Procházka, one of the most promising filmmmakers in the Czech Republic, heads to Cannes as a European Film Promotion Producer on the Move.

European Film Promotion's (EFP) Polish Producer on the Move Łukasz Dzięcioł is one of the youngest and most successful film professionals in Poland. Thanks to his experience in the American film industry, he develops projects that modernize the Polish film market.

Hungarian "Producer on the Move" Tamás Liszka is breaking new ground in the field of animation in Hungary, and earning high praise along the way.