10-10-2019

GRANTS: Latvia Announces National Identity Film Production Grants

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    RIGA: The National Film Centre of Latvia (NKC) will distribute up to 1.5 M EUR for the production of three films dealing with historical subjects and national identity.

    The grants were awarded to two fiction films and one documentary. The production company Mistrus Media received funding for the production of director Viesturs Kairiš's fiction film January / Janvāris, about the events in Latvia in the early 1991 during the complicated time of confrontations between the newly established Latvian state and the Soviet Union. The first financial instalment is 220,000 EUR, with total funding of up to 600,000 EUR.

    Jura Podnieka studija will produce the film Iron Song / Dziesma par dzelzs aizskaru, which will be directed by Hungary’s Agnes Kocsis. The film will be based on the real life love story of Latvian composer Imants Kalniņš and American writer Kelly Cherry in the 1960s. The amount of the grant awarded in 2019 is 220,000 EUR, and the total grant is 840,000 EUR.

    Director Stanislav Tokalov will direct the documentary Iestrēgušiec for Ego Media. The film will focus on three generations of the director’s family, who represent the Russian speaking population in Latvia. The total grant for the project is 60,000 EUR.

    The films are planned to be released in 2021.  

    In total 11 projects were submitted for the competition, including eight fiction films, two documentaries and one full-length animation.

    Click HERE for the grants chart.