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In a groundbreaking cinematic project, Danish filmmaker Mads Hedegaard has created a unique film that transports viewers to prehistoric Scandinavia by developing completely original languages for his new movie “Stranger.”

The film, which premiered at Sweden’s Goteborg Film Festival, tells the story of Aathi, a young woman from the first farming community in southern Scandinavia. Unlike typical prehistoric narratives focused on conflict, Hedegaard’s approach explores the deeper human experiences of early societies.

“When we think about the Stone Age, we think about warriors,” Hedegaard explained. “But her story is more human. It’s not just about fighting, but about society and passing things on.”

To ensure authenticity, Hedegaard collaborated with a linguistics expert specializing in ancient languages. The production team developed complete dictionaries and grammatical rules, blending Siberian tribal languages with ancient Mayan and Turkish influences. This approach allows the film to avoid modern language pitfalls and create a more immersive experience.

Danish director Mads Hedegaard had to invent new languages for the Stone Age epic “Stranger.”

“I have a background in documentaries [‘Cannon Arm and the Arcade Quest’], so it had to feel real to the audience. I was like: ‘We’re not going to buy it if the actors talk in Danish or English,’” he explained to Variety before the film’s world-premiere at Sweden’s Goteborg, where it is the festival’s closing film.

“There was a guy I knew; he has a PhD in Proto-Indo-European languages. But even those are 2,000 years older than those in our story. We asked him: ‘Can you come up with new ones?’ Tobias [Søborg] took an old Siberian tribal language and merged it with ancient Mayan. Then he did the same thing again, this time using dialects from the area around Turkey. We had a dictionary and a set of grammatical rules. Poor actors. They had to learn so much more than just their lines,...

Scandinavia’s heavyweight sales outfit TrustNordisk has picked up international rights to the “The Last Resort” by Maria Sødahl. The Norwegian writer-director’s previous drama “Hope,” starring Stellan Skarsgård and Andrea Bræin Hovig, earned her an Oscar shortlist berth in 2021.

In her first Danish pic, co-penned with Eske Troelstrup (“Shadow of Victory”) and Therese Hasman, top actors Danica Curcic” and Esben Smed” star as a couple, holidaying in an exclusive resort on a Spanish Island with their daughters. When a stranger suddenly approaches them and asks for help, they agree to assist him, but as he asks for more, they start fearing for their own safety.

“My previous films are shamelessly autobiographical,” Sødahl said. “The Last Resort” opens for a larger story with a more complex universe. A story where our Scandinavian protagonists start out as diplomatic humanists, until xenophobia leads them to act in full paranoia, primal and violence.

The Göteborg Film Festival, Sweden’s leading film fest, has unveiled its 2025 lineup, which features several award season contenders, including Brady Corbet’s Golden Globe winner The Brutalist, Magnus von Horn’s The Girl with the Needle, and Luca Guadagnino’s Queer.

The Brutalist picked up three Golden Globes this Sunday, including for best picture, drama, best director for Corbet and best actor, drama for star Brody. In the historical epic, Brody plays László Tóth, a Jewish architect who arrives in America from Budapest after surviving World War II. The film co-stars Felicity Jones as László’s wife and Guy Pearce as billionaire Harrison Lee Van Buren Sr.

Daniel Craig scored a best actor, drama nomination at the Globes for his starring role in Queer as William Lee, based on William S. Burroughs’ alter ego, following his journey through Mexico and South America with Drew Starkey as Gene. The Girl with the Needle,...

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Teacup is a sci-fi mystery horror thriller drama series created by Ian McCulloch. Based on the 1988 book Stinger by author Robert R. McCammon, the Peacock series is set on an isolated ranch in rural Georgia and it follows the Chenoweth family and their neighbors who are trapped in an invisible barrier while they fight against a mysterious threat that wants to kill them. Teacup stars Yvonne Strahovski, Scott Speedman, Chaske Spencer, Kathy Baker, Boris McGiver, Diany Rodriguez, Caleb Dolden, Émilie Bierre, Bill Heck, and Rob Morgan. So, if you loved the thrilling mystery, sci-fi horror elements, and compelling characters in Teacup here are some similar shows you should check out next.

The Mist (Rent on Prime Video) Credit – Netflix

The Mist is a sci-fi horror thriller drama series created by Christian Torpe. Based on the 1980 horror novel of...

Studiocanal’s Scandi powerhouse Sam Productions, co-founded by star writers Adam Price, Søren Sveistrup and producer Meta Louise Føldager Sørensen, is gearing up for an expansive slate of event series most-likely to shake the Kingdom of Denmark and take global viewers by storm.

“We’re working on our biggest slate ever,” said Sørensen, credited for more than 60 films and series, including the Oscar-nominated “A Royal Affair,” “The Wife,” starring Glenn Close, and Lars von Trier’s Cannes winner “Melancholia.”

Toplining Sam’s TV projects is “By the Grace of God,” Denmark’s own version of “The Crown” based on the life of Queen Margrethe II from her birth in 1940 until her abdication earlier this year. Filming of the blockbuster series, ordered by Danish commercial pubcaster TV2, is due to start in August 2025. Sara Namer serves as producer.

Based on an original idea by Sveistrup, the biggest-ever fiction drama about the Danish ruling monarchs,...

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The Devil’s Hour is a British supernatural thriller drama series created by Tom Moran. The Prime Video series follows Lucy, a social worker who mysteriously wakes up every night at exactly 3:33 am in the middle of the so-called devil’s hour and after having some terrifying visions she soon finds herself connected to a series of brutal murders in the area. The Devil’s Hour stars Jessica Raine, Peter Capaldi, Nikesh Patel, Alex Ferns, Meera Syal, Barbara Marten, Phil Dunster, Benjamin Chivers, and Brandon Bendell. So, if you loved the thrilling mystery, complex story, and compelling characters in The Devil’s Hour here are some similar shows you should check out next.

Shining Girls (Apple TV+) Credit – Apple TV+

Shining Girls is a psychological thriller drama series created by Silka Luisa. Based on the 2013 novel The Shining Girls by author Lauren Beukes,...

When we say that Netflix has something for everyone, we do mean that because the horror sub-genre of serial killers has always been popular among audiences but making a good show on this topic is pretty hard. That’s why we had to scour through Netflix’s huge library of content to find the best of the best. So, here are the 10 best serial killer shows on Netflix you should watch right now.

Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story Credit – Netflix

Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story is the first season of the anthology series about real-life serial killers titled Monster. Created by Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan, the Netflix series revolves around one of the most dangerous serial killers ever. While Dahmer is a big part of the story, we see the series mostly through the eyes of the victims. Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story stars Evan Peters,...

Netflix has unveiled a suite of Nordic features and series, partnering on projects with the likes of Working Title, Jo Nesbø, Milad Alami, Dome Karukoski and Sf Studios.

Little Siberia, a Finnish film from Finnish-American director Dome Karukoski, whose credits include Goteborg premiere Tom Of Finland and Jrr Tolkein origin story Tolkein, directs an adaptation of Antti Tuomainen’s novel of the same name. The everyday life of the small village of Hurmevaara is shaken when a meteorite falls through the roof of a car one night.

Cast includes Eero Ritala, Malla Malmivaara, Tommi Korpela and Martti Suosal, with Ina Sohlberg,...

Another day, another Netflix content slate in Europe.

Following content showcases in Germany and London last week, the streamer has unveiled its slate in the Nordics. Among the key TV announcements are a Norwegian series based on author Joe Nesbø’s police detective Harry Hole and Netflix’s first Nordic period drama.

A number of films were also unveiled at a Next on Netflix event today in Stockholm, Sweden, and you can read about them here.

On the TV front, Harry Hole (working title) comes from Exit and So Long, Marianne creator Oystein Karlsen, and is based on Nesbø’s novel The Devil’s Star, about the titular detective. Working Title is producing ahead of a 2026 debut and Nesbø is writing the script.

Synopsis reads: “A heat wave hits a holiday-quiet Oslo. In an apartment by the cemetery, small black lumps begin to drip through the floor. At the same time,...

Screen is profiling every submission for best international feature at the 96th Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2024 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

The 96th Academy Awards is set to take place on March 10, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (over 40 minutes) produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50%) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between December 1, 2022, and October 31, 2023. The deadline...

Screen is profiling every submission for best international feature at the 96th Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2024 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

The 96th Academy Awards is set to take place on March 10, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (over 40 minutes) produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50%) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between December 1, 2022, and October 31, 2023. The deadline...

Screen is profiling every submission for best international feature at the 96th Academy Awards.

Entries for the 2024 Oscar for best international feature are underway, and Screen is profiling each one on this page.

The 96th Academy Awards is set to take place on March 10, 2024 at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

An international feature film is defined as a feature-length motion picture (over 40 minutes) produced outside the US with a predominantly (more than 50%) non-English dialogue track and can include animated and documentary features.

Submitted films must have been released theatrically in their respective countries between December 1, 2022, and October 31, 2023. The deadline...

Dark Winds is a crime thriller series created by Graham Roland. The AMC series is based on a Leaphorn & Chee novel series written by Tony Hillerman. Dark Winds is set in the 1970s Southwest and it follows the story of two Navajo police officers Joe Leaphorn (Zahn McClarnon) and Jim Chee (Kiowa Gordon) as they go up against their dark past and evil forces to maintain peace in their community. Dark Winds recently aired its second season and while you wait for Season 3 to come out here are some similar shows you could check out.

The Chestnut Man (Netflix) Credit – Netflix

Synopsis: The Chestnut Man is set in a quiet suburb of Copenhagen, where the police make a terrible discovery one blustery October morning. A young woman is found brutally murdered in a playground and one of her hands is missing. Next to her lies a small man made of chestnuts.

Georgian filmmaker Elene Naveriani clinched the Best Feature Award in the main international competition of the 29th Sarajevo Film Festival with her latest pic Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry. The award comes with a €16,000 cash prize.

The film also picked up the Best Actress award for Ekaterine Chavleishvili, which comes with a €2,500 cash prize. Overall, eleven films battled it out in the main competition, and Mia Wasikowska’s jury—including MoMA Film Head Josh Siegel, actor Zlatko Burić, actress Danica Ćurčić, and director Juraj Lerotić, spread the love quite widely.

The Ukrainian pic La Palisiada won the Best Director Award for Philip Sotnychenko, while Jovan Ginić won the Best Actor prize for the Serbian film Lost Country. In the festival’s documentary section, the top prize went to Bottlemen by Slovenian director Nemanja Vojinović.

Check out the full list of winners below:

Honorary Heart of Sarajevo

Mark Cousins, director and screenwriter

Lynne Ramsay,...

Elene Naveriani’s “Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry” won the top prize, the Heart of Sarajevo Award for best feature film, Friday at the Sarajevo Film Festival. The Georgian film, in which a stoically independent woman in her late 40s experiences a gentle existential awakening during an affair with a local deliveryman, also won the best actress prize for Ekaterine Chavleishvili’s performance.

The award for best director went to Ukraine’s Philip Sotnychenko for “La Palisiada,” and the best actor prize was picked up by Serbia’s Jovan Ginić — who won the Louis Roederer Foundation Rising Star Award at Cannes — for “Lost Country.” Serbian director Nemanja Vojinović’s “Bottlemen” took the documentary film award.

The awards were given by a jury headed by actor Mia Wasikowska (“Club Zero”), which included Danish-Croatian actor Zlatko Burić (“Triangle of Sadness”), Serbian-Danish actor Danica Ćurčić (“The Chestnut Man”), Museum of Modern Art Department of Film...

The Sarajevo Film Festival has unveiled its official selection for this year’s edition, with Elene Naveriani’s Cannes Directors’ Fortnight title Blackbird Blackbird Blackberry among the titles playing in Competition.

A total of 49 films will compete for the Heart of Sarajevo awards. The Festival’s four competition sections – feature, documentary, short, and student film – will feature 22 world, two international, 22 regional, and three national premieres.

Additional titles featured in the main competition program include Animal by Greek filmmaker Sofia Exarchou, Tigru by Andrei Tănase, and the Turkish series Rumi from producers Ahmet Okur, Kerim Ayyildiz, and director Can Ulkaj playing as a special screening.

The festival said Creative Director Izeta Građević saw 935 films submitted for consideration, including 200 feature fiction films, 235 documentaries, 500 shorts, and student titles.

The Sarajevo Film Festival competition programme is open for films and filmmakers from Albania, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Greece, Georgia, Hungary, Kosovo*, North Macedonia,...

Mia Wasikowska To Head Sarajevo Jury

Actress and director Mia Wasikowska (Bergman Island) will head the Competition jury at this year’s Sarajevo Film Festival. Wasikowska will be joined by actor Zlatko Burić, actress Danica Ćurčić, director and actor Juraj Lerotić, and Josh Siegel, curator of MoMA’s Department of Film. “I’m thrilled to serve as Jury president for the 29th Sarajevo Film Festival alongside such wonderful members of the international arts community,” Wasikowska said. “It seems a particularly poignant time to reflect on the origins of the festival, and to celebrate the importance of coming together to promote a diverse range of cultures, perspectives, and experiences through art.”

Two-Time Oscar Winner Pietro Scalia Set For Locarno Honor

American editor and two-time Oscar winner Pietro Scalia will be feted with Locarno’s Vision Award Ticinomoda. The award will be handed over in a ceremony on August 3 in the festival’s famed Piazza Grande,...

Wasikowska will be joined by jurors including ‘Triangle of Sadness’ star Zlatko Buric.

Australian actress and filmmaker Mia Wasikowska will lead the competition jury for the 29th Sarajevo Film Festival, which runs from August 11 to 18 this summer.

Wasikowska will be joined on the jury by Croatian actor Zlatko Buric, who starred in Ruben Ostlund’s 2022 Palme d’Or winner Triangle Of Sadness; and Serbian actress Danica Curcic, who recently appeared in Lars von Trier’s The Kingdom Exodus.

Completing the five-strong jury are Croatian actor and filmmaker Juraj Lerotic, whose debut feature Safe Place won best actor and the Heart...

Fiction feature directorial debut of Mads Hedegaard is produced by Motor.

REinvent International Sales has boarded action drama Stranger, the fiction feature directorial debut of Mads Hedegaard which is produced by Motor.

The film is set around 4,000 BC, during the transition from Hunter Stone Age to Peasant Stone Age.

The story follows a 19-year-old girl, Aathi, whose family are the first farmers to arrive in what is now Denmark; when her family is killed by a local tribe of hunter-gatherers, she and her brother are forced to live with the tribe in the vast and eerie forest and learn new traditions in order to survive.

The film is the second from Malou Reymann following ‘A Perfectly Normal Family’.

TrustNordisk has closed four new deals on Malou Reymann’s Unruly, the winner of the prestigious Dragon Award at Goteborg earlier this year.

The film has now sold to Former Yugoslavia (Cinemania Group), Benelux (September Film), Estonia (Estinfilm) and Taiwan (Cineplex Development Co.).

It is the second film rom Reymann after Rotterdam Big Screen winner A Perfectly Normal Family.

Unruly is about the Sprogø Women’s Institution in the 1930s, when “morally feeble” girls and women were sent to the island to become more compliant. The story focuses on Maren,...

Fast-rising Danish production powerhouse Motor, led by scribe Christian Torpe and producer Jesper Morthorst, has unveiled a splashy five-pic slate, led by the Göteborg Film Festival’s closing film “Camino” by Birgitte Stærmose and Tea Lindeburg’s pic in development “The Seal Woman,” to be pitched at the Discovery strand of Göteborg’s Nordic Film Market (Feb. 2-5).

One of the hottest new Danish directors, Netflix “Equinox” series creator Lindeburg made waves on the festival circuit with her directorial debut “As in Heaven,” which scooped a double win in San Sebastian and best-Nordic statuette in Göteborg 2021, before wooing several buyers including Juno Films in the U.S.

Her anticipated sophomore feature “The Seal Woman,” based on her original screenplay, is inspired by a Faroese legend, which has it that those who drown themselves turn into seals. And once every year, they return to shore in their human shape.

The story...

Sweden’s Göteborg Film Festival announced Tuesday lineup for its 46th edition, with “Danish Girl” star Alicia Vikander and double Palme d’Or winning director Ruben Östlund among attendees.

The biggest festival in Scandinavia, Göteborg opens with the world premiere of Abbe Hassan’s “Exodus” on Jan. 27. Its closing film is “Camino” by Birgitte Stærmose.

The festival will screen 250 films during 10 days. “Exodus” will compete for the title of Best Nordic Film – and a prize sum of Sek 400 000 – alongside “Godland,” IFFR opener “Munch,” “Ellos eatnu – Let the River Flow,” “Unruly,” “Four Little Adults,” “Copenhagen Does Not Exist” and “Dogborn,” already shown in Venice.

In the Nordic Documentary Competition, the audience will get to see “Hypernoon,” “The King,” IDFA winner “Apolonia, Apolonia,” “Bong Thom” (“The Brother”), “Labor” and “Monica in the South Seas.”

“Nordic countries are opening up for discussion about their role in colonial history. It’s something that’s...

Scandinavia’s leading streamer Viaplay has ordered its Danish feature, “Camino,” a heartwarming comedy-drama directed by Birgitte Stærmose (“Industry”) with a cast led by Lars Brygmann and Danica Curcic (“The Chestnut Man”).

“Camino” portrays the complex relationship between a father and daughter who are walking a famous pilgrim route in Spain. The film is produced by Copenhagen’s Motor and will premiere exclusively on Viaplay in 2023.

Penned by Stærmose and Kim Fupz Aakeson (“Becoming Astrid’), the film tells the story of Regitze (Danica Curcic), who is in her early 30s, pregnant and no longer speaks to her father Jan (Lars Brygmann). But when they discover that Regitze’s mother’s dying wish was for them to follow the Camino de Santiago together, the two set out on a 260-kilometer journey of discovery under the burning Spanish sun.

“Many people have children, but everybody has parents. Processing and dealing with baggage...

Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

Before we highlight this week’s picks, I want to give a special shout-out to our newly-launched Twitter account for Michael Snydel’s podcast Intermission. He’s sharing daily, well-curated streaming recommendations, so be sure to give it a follow!

Beast (Baltasar Kormakur)

There’s no better form of getting over a dead parent or spouse than combatting a killer animal. At least that’s the thesis of The Shallows, Crawl, and now Beast. Arriving in the coveted late-August B-movie spot (basically the January doldrums for slightly cooler people), Beast is a lean and likably earnest, if slightly unremarkable, creature feature. The newest from director Baltasar Kormakur––who has not quite graduated to the IP blockbuster class while his contemporary Jaume Collet-Serra...

Croatia’s Drugi Plan and Bulgaria’s Agitprop, two of the leading production outfits in Southeast Europe, have been attached to co-produce the upcoming drama series “Sabre,” a political thriller revolving around the 2003 assassination of Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic produced by Belgrade-based This and That Productions.

Created by Goran Stanković and Vladimir Tagić, the series will star Serbian-Danish actress Danica Curcic, known to international audiences for her lead role in the Netflix psychological thriller “The Chestnut Man,” as a reporter investigating the shocking murder.

The companies announced the deal on Monday at the Sarajevo Film Festival, where This and That’s “Bad Blood” and Drugi Plan’s “The Silence” were among the top Balkan drama series vying for Heart of Sarajevo TV Awards, which were handed out at a ceremony in the Bosnian capital on Sunday night.

“Sabre” was first pitched in Sarajevo three years ago during the CineLink Drama co-financing forum,...

Click here to read the full article.

As the stunning Murina opens, a blue expanse of water fills the frame like a painterly abstraction. Two divers drift into view, otherworldly in their masks and flippers and seemingly united in their spear-fishing mission. Once they’re back in the sunlight, though, their moray-eel prey dying in a pail between them on the boat, the man and his 17-year-old daughter are not in harmony. They might even be mortal enemies.

With an exceptional quartet of lead actors and a potent immersion in the Croatian island locale — you can practically smell the salt air and sea — Murina draws the viewer straight into its emotional undertow. Director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic and her co-writer, Frank Graziano, have constructed a taut story bristling with unease, and one that looks head-on at conflict. The father-daughter power struggle between Ante (Leon Lučev) and Julija (Gracija Filipović) is right...

This review was adapted from a piece that ran on “Murina” when the film premiered in Cannes in July 2021.

The last few weeks in the United States have lent resonance to a current in international films that’s been growing over the past couple of years – stories of young women trying to find places for themselves in environments that afford them little or no agency in their own lives. The films have nothing to do with Roe v. Wade, but from the recent Cannes period drama “Corsage” (a royal woman chafing under physical and societal constraints) to the unsettling Costa Rican film “Clara Sola” (which puts a mystical spin on the awakening of female power) the movies can feel timely to viewers that see their own boundaries narrowing.

First-time Croatian director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic’s “Murina,” which won the Camera d’Or as the best first film at Cannes in 2021 and comes to U.

Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović’s debut feature, Murina, is set on a Croatian island, where the adolescent protagonist Julija (Gracija Filipovic) usually fishes underwater with her father Ante (Leon Lucev). The fact that Julija usually observes the young people who have fun near her indicates an entire world is out there, waiting to be explored. Once the wealthy Javier (Cliff Curtis) – an old acquaintance of Ante and his wife Nela (Danica Curcic) – makes his appearance as he might invest in land, the main family’s reality surfaces. Ante’s repressive actions towards the women in his life become more nasty. Javier and Nela are evidently...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

Last year at Cannes, writer-director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović won the Caméra d’Or for “Murina,” a tempestuous psychodrama set along Croatia’s shimmering Dalmatian coast. Now out in select U.S. theaters and expanding across July, the film follows 17-year-old Julija (Gracija Filipovic), whose deep-seated desire to flee her abusive father (Leon Lucev) and acquiescent mother (Danica Curcic) suddenly surges to the surface when a family friend (Cliff Curtis) comes to visit, offering her a rare chance to escape their remote-island abode.

Continue reading ‘Murina’ Director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović Talks Fearless Filmmaking & Fearing The Sea [Interview] at The Playlist.

The nation’s fourth-largest cinema chain is testing a new subscription program called MovieFlex+ that includes a curated set of small and mid-sized films each week for no extra charge.

“We can’t live off just blockbusters,” chairman and CEO Greg Marcus tells Deadline. “We cannot just live off dinner. We need breakfast and lunch too.”

The launch of the 14.99 monthly service comes as the box office renaissance for wide-release studio franchises is clear, but whether that’s trickling down to smaller films less so. At issue is the long-term health of a theatrical ecosystem with breadth and depth of product.

Marcus began testing MovieFlex+ in two markets in January along with a general subscription plan, also new, called MovieFlex for 9.99 a month that offers one free film of choice. Both programs have deals on concessions and other perks. At two Columbus theaters, Crossroads and Pickering, where both programs are available,...

Director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović’s career is off to quite a start: the filmmaker made her feature debut with “Murina,” which won the Camera d’Or upon its 2021 Cannes premiere. But while it’s a distinctly feminine film, Kusijanović’s coming-of-age drama isn’t your typical “woman film,” as Kusijanović told IndieWire. And that may be its greatest asset — and a look at what’s to come for the rising star.

The lushly voyeuristic “carnal” family drama centers on 17-year-old diver and eel fisherwoman Julija (Gracija Filipović) as she struggles to slip out of the dictatorial grasp of her father Ante (Leon Lucev) and stifled mother Nela (Danica Curcic). When wealthy family friend Javier (Cliff Curtis) comes to town for a business investment, Julija sees a way out — no matter the cost.

Set along Croatia’s Adriatic coast, “Murina” features cinematography by “The Lost Daughter” and “Never Rarely Sometimes Always...

Directorial debuts rarely arrive as fully formed as Murina, Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović’s riveting Cannes Camera d’Or winner that follows a coming-of-age journey of liberation and rebellion. Led by Gracija Filipović in a revelatory performance, the Croatian drama bursts with tension in every frame, following a love triangle-of-sorts set against a cruelly domineering patriarchal figure.

Ahead of this Friday’s release I spoke with the Croatian writer-director about working with legendary cinematographer Hélène Louvart, leaving things unsaid, collaborating with executive producer Martin Scorsese, the important motif of water, and much more.

The Film Stage: Murina draws from your 2017 short Into the Blue, also starring ​​Gracija Filipovic, but reframes that story. Can you talk about what you learned making that short and its connection with this feature?

Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović: I think that actually the characters, in a nutshell, are completely different because the daughter in Into the Blue is...

"He forgets about us the moment he boards the plane." Kino Lorber has revealed another new official US trailer for the worth watching Croatian film Murina, now opening in July in the US in just a few months. I highly recommend seeing this when it opens, worth it on the big screen. It initially premiered at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival playing in Director's Fortnight, winner of the Golden Camera award. A Croatian teen tries to replace her controlling father with a wealthy foreigner on a weekend trip to the Adriatic Sea, causing turmoil. She hopes it will help her escape her life at home for something more, but it doesn't go as planned. Starring Gracija Filipovic as Julija, Danica Curcic, Leon Lucev, Cliff Curtis, and Jonas Smulders. I saw this film during TIFF last year and it's fantastic. Excellent cinematography and a riveting story about this young woman fighting back against her misogynistic father.

An eel will eat its own skin to survive. So what would a teenage girl — a similarly slippery force of nature — be willing to do for her freedom?

Director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović helms the coming-of-age story and 2021 Cannes Camera d’Or winner “Murina,” which opens in select theaters July 8, as distributed stateside by Kino Lorber. Executive-produced by Martin Scorsese and featuring cinematography by “The Lost Daughter” and “Never Rarely Sometimes Always” director of photography Hélène Louvart, the lush family drama is a captivating Croatian tale of mother-daughter jealousies, outdated patriarchal powers, and adolescent angst. Watch the trailer for the film, exclusively on IndieWire, below.

“Murina,” which translates to eel, takes place along Croatia’s Adriatic coast and hones in on 17-year-old diver and eel fisherwoman Julija (Gracija Filipović) as she grapples with her suffocating father Ante (Leon Lucev) and stifled mother Nela (Danica Curcic). When wealthy family friend Javier (Cliff Curtis...

It’s no mean feat to win the coveted Camera d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, but that’s precisely what Mulina, by debutant writer/director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic, managed to do last year. At times a gripping psychological drama, set against a slice of the laid-back Adriatic lifestyle, this movie is a worthy recipient.

And yet the big irony is that the theme of this movie is ultimately about broadening horizons, something it doesn’t quite manage to do itself.

Julija (Gracija Filipovic) is a young girl who’s unhappier than your average teen. Things have gone somewhat south for her since her mother (Danica Curcic) remarried, and her ultra-strict stepfather (Leon Lucev) arived on the scene, making life on an idyllic Croatian island unbearable for both mother and daughter at times. Enter Javier (Cliff Curtis), a genial and well-travelled friend of the family, who unwittingly puts some spice back in their lives.

This confident debut is set on the rocky Adriatic coast where a spear fisher plays a dangerous game with his wife, daughter and a dodgy land deal

There is a lot about emotional tension and teen yearning and the semi-official sexiness of swimming costumes in this confident directorial debut from Croatian film-maker Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic, though I wondered about some beautifully shot visual cliches.

Julija (Gracija Filipovic) is the teenage daughter of Ante (Leon Lucev), an aggressively insecure man whom she has to help, diving underwater with him while he makes a living on the rocky Adriatic coastline spear-fishing moray eels (the “murina” of the title). She is reasonably close to her mum Nela (Danica Curcic) but otherwise unhappily proud and self-contained. Her father is jittery with excitement because his old friend Javi (Cliff Curtis) is coming to visit: a super-rich alpha male who may be interested in buying some...

"What secrets are you hiding?" Modern Films UK has revealed an official trailer for Murina, an excellent film from Croatia marking the feature directorial debut of Croatian filmmaker Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic. This initially premiered at the 2021 Cannes Film Festival playing in the Director's Fortnight sidebar. A teenage girl decides to replace her controlling father with his wealthy foreign friend during a weekend trip to the Adriatic Sea, causing turmoil. She hopes that this will help her escape her life at home for something more, but it doesn't go as planned. I saw this film at the Toronto Film Festival last year and Loved it. It's absolutely gorgeous - not only the cinematography (including some great underwater scenes) but the story about a young woman pushing back against her traditionalist parents and figuring out her own way in this modern world. I can't recommend it enough. Starring Gracija Filipovic, Danica Curcic,...

The moray eel is a simple creature, content to scavenge where it can. It’s hunted for its flesh, considered a delicacy in parts of the Mediterranean, but the spear fishers who pursue it do well to be cautious: it has a nasty bite.

“You’re dangerous,” Javier (Cliff Curtis) says to Julija (Gracija Filipovic), and she’s much more pleased than when people tell her that she’s beautiful.

He’s an old friend of her father (Leon Luvec), though people sometimes wonder how two such different men come to know each other. Living abroad, he is a wealthy man, but he has visited from time to time over the years; now that Julija has reached a certain age she begins to suspect that it’s because he is in love with her mother (Danica Curcic). This time around, her father wants to sell him some land, so everybody...

Now in its 11th edition, the Museum of the Moving Image’s First Look festival brings together a varied, eclectic lineup of cinema from all corners of the world––including a number of films still seeking distribution, making the series perhaps one of your only chances to see these works on the big screen.

With the five-day festival kicking off Wednesday, March 16, we’ve gathered seven essential films to check out. Beginning this Friday, March 11, MoMI will also present Second Look, which looks back at selections from the past decade of the festival.

Babi Yar. Context (Sergei Loznitsa)

One of two new archival documentaries from Ukrainian filmmaker Sergei Loznitsa screening at First Look, Babi Yar. Context revisits the horrific September 1941 massacre of 33,771 Jews that took place outside Kyiv. Casting an unflinching eye in its assembly of footage, the Cannes prizewinner examines factors leading up to the atrocity as Nazis took...

Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s animated documentary won the best documentary, best editing, best score and best sound design prizes.

Flee made history at the Danish Film Academy Robert Awards, which took place on Saturday (February 5) in Copenhagen, as the first documentary to win all four awards it was nominated for, scooping the best documentary, best editing, best score and best sound design prizes.

Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s animated documentary focuses on a man, on the cusp of marriage to his boyfriend, revealing the secrets of his journey from Afghanistan to Denmark as a child refugee. Last week, the title was...

Bridgerton and Squid Game made big impressions in 2021 (and rightfully so), but be sure to catch these series, which may not have grabbed as many headlines but are just as worthy of a watch. Virgin River Here’s to second chances! On this TV equivalent of comfort food, nurse Melinda “Mel” Monroe (Alexandra Breckenridge) moves to small-town Virgin River after losing her husband. She wins over prickly new boss Doc Mullins (Tim Matheson), navigates love with bar owner and Marine vet Jack Sheridan and befriends folks whose problems are deeper and darker than she realized. A little soap, a lotta hope. Seasons 1–3 available The Chestnut Man (Tine Harden) The Chestnut Man Every moment of this Nordic noir thriller is packed with eerie intrigue as detective Naia Thulin (Danica Curcic) and her partner Mark Hess (Mikkel Boe Følsgaard) investigate the grisly murders of women whose killer left behind handmade figurines fashioned from chestnuts.

Reymann previously directed festival hit ’A Perfectly Normal Family’.

Danish director Malou Reymann, who previously directed festival hit A Perfectly Normal Family, has started the shoot for her new historical drama Ustyrlig (the literal English translation is ‘Uncontrollable’ although the film’s international title is not yet set).

TrustNordisk has boarded international sales. As with A Perfectly Normal Family, Matilda Appelin produces for Nordisk (which plans the Danish release in March 2023). The Danish Film Institute is supporting the production.

The story is about the Sprogø Women’s Institution in the 1930s, when “morally feeble” girls and women were sent to...

By now, we’re all familiar with the trope in movie and TV trailers where an eerie children’s choir cover of a popular song is used to signify ominous undercurrents. There’s a reason why so many projects have turned to songs that are simultaneously familiar and unfamiliar as a shortcut to significance. It’s ambiguous, it can be unsettling, and it’s (well it used to be) a signal that what was up around the corner was something that could break with expectations.

Over a decade into a post-“Creep” world, that tactic pops up not in the marketing materials for “The Chestnut Man,” but the Netflix show itself. Near the end of the first of the season’s six episodes, an assembled group of Danish schoolchildren sing a nursery rhyme about chestnuts, the same marker a murderer leaves at a crime scene as their de facto calling card.

One of the hottest under-the-radar titles to emerge out of the 2021 Cannes Film Festival was Dubrovnik-born filmmaker Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović’s feature debut “Murina.” The film came to the Directors’ Fortnight with the imprimatur of executive producer Martin Scorsese and came out winning the Camera d’Or, the festival’s top prize for a first feature. With those recommendations, it’s baffling to find about a young woman’s blossoming sexuality under the spell of her mother’s old flame.

“Murina” sticks to familiarly opaque arthouse beats despite a dazzling symphonic opening sequence. And what an arresting sequence that opening is: In the capable hands of cinematographer Hélène Louvart, the film fades into an underwater shot of a rippling, cyan Mediterranean surface. It’s set to a stir of strings(from composers Evgueni and Sacha Galperine) that build toward a moment that feels like a cinematic overture. We then see two people,...

We often forget that exotic locales aren’t an escape for those living here. While co-eds dock ashore for sun, sex, and fun, families merely wake up early to go spearfishing so they have dinner that night. The psychological toll of constantly looking out your window at happy faces while dealing with the futility of teenage living under a domineering father with few (if any) opportunities to leave must be daunting. So when Julija (Gracija Filipovic) exits the water to see her father’s (Leon Lucev’s Ante) rich friend from a past life (Cliff Curtis’ Javi) has arrived, she wonders about the possibilities he brings. Ante and her mother (Danica Curcic’s Nela) hope to sell him land. Julija hopes he’ll save her.

And why shouldn’t she? Julija sees the way Javi looks at her mother (and the way she looks back). She also senses the jealousy...

After the Viking conquest at July’s Cannes Festival, where Norway (“The Worst Person in the World”), Finland (“Compartment No. 6”) and Iceland (“Lamb”) collected kudos, more than 60 possible gems from the North are to be unveiled at the hybrid market New Nordic Films which will unspool over Aug. 24-27.

Scandinavia’s major film showcase, New Nordic Films runs parallel to Haugesund’s Norwegian Intl. Film Festival, which takes place Aug. 21-27.

Sony Pictures Classics’ Finnish pick-up “Compartment No. 6”, a Grand Jury Prize co-winner in Cannes, is set to kick-start the annual event and lead the pack of 24-plus finished titles. Most pics will screen online only, except those bowing in Haugesund cinemas as well, as fest official selections, such as “The Innocents,” “The Gravedigger’s Wife,” “Margrete-Queen of the North,” and “a-ha-The Movie.”

“It’s been a bit hard to finalize the market screenings, due to social distancing measures still in place in cinemas,...

The film is executive produced by Martin Scorsese.

Modern Films has acquired UK-Ireland distribution rights to Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic’s Camera d’Or-winning Murina from The Match Factory.

The distributor is planning for a theatrical release in spring 2022, followed by a rollout across Modern’s virtual cinema platform Modern On Demand.

Murina played in Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes last month and is about a family living on a seemingly idyllic Croatian island, who are fixated on the idea of selling up and reversing their past mistakes.

The cast includes Cliff Curtis, Leon Lucev, Danica Curcic and Gracija Filipovic. It is...

If Patricia Highsmith had ever written a coming-of-age story set on the rocky, clear-watered Croatian coastline, it might have looked a lot like Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović’s bright, brooding debut, “Murina,” which quietly, with a sinister Adriatic sparkle, makes the compelling case that .

As at home in the water as out of it — in fact the sea is maybe her refuge from more dangerous currents of life on land — Julija (Gracija Filipovic) is the lithe, surly teenage daughter of beautiful, unhappy, trapped Nela (Danica Curcic). The major source of tension in the family is Julija’s controlling, domineering father, Ante (Leon Lucev), the extent of whose abusiveness is hard to gauge, but who certainly expects submission and obedience of his womenfolk, and who diminishes Julija and scorns any ambitions she might have for anything but the future he has planned for her. Julija is beginning to bristle under his despotic...

The winner of the Caméra d’Or for the best debut feature at Cannes this year was the maritime Murina, a coming-of-age drama of slow-motion escape from Croatian writer-director Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic. Premiering in Directors’ Fortnight, the sun-baked film tracks teenaged Julija (Gracija Filipivoc) as she slowly but surely pushes for autonomy from her grumpy father, Ante (Leon Lucev), who runs their family like an impatient captain. A visit from a longtime friend, bekhaki’d and comfortable businessman Javier (Cliff Curtis), sets thoughts spinning for Julija and her youthful mother, Nela (Danica Curcic), as Ante frantically schemes to sell land. Kusijanovic brilliantly […]

The post “We Had to Combine Three Different Islands”: Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic on Cannes Caméra d’Or-Winner Murina first appeared on Filmmaker Magazine.