Once again, five renowned and highly experienced experts from the international film industry will discuss which projects have the potential to play a significant role in the international film scene in the coming years. The members of the 2024 jury include:
Heino Deckert founded Ma.ja.de. Filmproduktions GmbH in 1991. Since 2003, he has also been managing director of his own world distribution company for documentary films, Deckert Distribution. Heino Deckert has produced over 130 films to date with filmmakers like Sergei Loznitsa, Victor Kossakovsky, Ai Weiwei, Thomas Heise and Feras Fayyad. He is a member of the German and European Film Academy and a member of Ampas.
Priscila Miranda, movie producer and CEO of the independent movie distributor Fenix, studied Philosophy at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) and French language at Blaise Pascal University in Clermont Ferrand. Following her passion for Cinema, in 2011 she founded the movie distributor Tucuman, a company specialized in the distribution of foreign films in Brazil. In 2016, she founded Fenix Filmes. Both distributors are today a reference in the international market. She has also been part of curatorships and film festival selection committees. Currently she is part of the curatorial team of BIFF – Brasilia International Film Festival. As film producer, she carried out from film exhibitions to short films at the beginning of her career. She is the producer of the feature films “Ivan, O TerriVel” by Mario Abbade (2020, Best Documentary / Sitges Film Festival) and “Arte da Memória” by Rodrigo Areias.
Born in 1997, Sophie Stejskal has been working at the Austrian film distributor Filmladen since 2020. Specializing in the project management of Austrian films, she has increasingly focused on acquiring international arthouse films. Sophie Stejskal is a regular presence at film festivals around the world, with a particular emphasis on European festivals, where she is dedicated to discovering emerging talents.
Urte Fink joined ZDF/ARTE in 2024 as a commissioning editor for international co-productions and acquisitions. Before this role, she worked as a line producer on several notable films, including “7 Days” by Ali Samadi Ahadi (2024, Toronto Film Festival), “Quiet Life” by Alexandros Avranas (2024, Venice International Film Festival – Orrizonti), “Holy Spider” by Ali Abbasi (2022, Cannes International Film Festival – Competition) or “Home” by Franka Potente (2020, International Film Festival Rome) and served as head of production at Detailfilm and Zentropa Hamburg, after gaining extensive experience in France, including with Coproduction Office through the Atelier Ludwigsburg-Paris program. Urte holds a degree in Production from the film university Potsdam Babelsberg.
Paul Ridd was appointed CEO and Festival Director of Edinburgh International Film Festival at the end of 2023. His first edition in this position recently took place in August 2024. Prior to this he was Head of Acquisitions for UK distributor Picturehouse Entertainment and worked as an International Consultant for Karlovy Vary International Film Festival and a Programme Advisor for The BFI London Film Festival.
Up to 30 European co-productions will compete on the EWIP stage in Cologne and enter the race for the numerous awards and support. The total funding amount is 50,000 euros, which is awarded by the joint partners of EWIP: K13 Studios, MMC Film & TV Studios, LAVAlabs Moving Images, Gruvi, Usheru, Way Film, mm filmpresse and TorinoFilmLab for post-production, marketing and festival PR.
EWIP is significantly supported by the Film- und Medienstiftung NRW, one of the leading film funding institutions in Europe, the Creative Europe MEDIA programme of the European Union as well as the City of Cologne. It is thanks to the support of the Film- und Medienstiftung NRW that the EWIP was able to be launched and establish itself in the European film industry over the past seven years. The industry event also takes place in co-operation with the Film Festival Cologne as well as KölnBusiness and the International Film Distribution Summit – IFDS.
At EWIP buyers, industry delegates and journalists will have the opportunity to get an overview of the latest and most exciting film projects in their late production phases. The 30 carefully selected European co-productions will present their current state of development, show first scenes and pitch their plans in order to win the best partners for further production processes and distribution within the framework of the EWIP platform. Since its first edition EWIP is held ahead of the Film Festival Cologne.
