Paris-based Apc (About Premium Content) has acquired world sales rights on the six-part Finnish thriller “A Good Family,” currently filming in Estonia before moving back to Finland.
The high-end drama about love, marriage and parenthood is based on Finnish author and screenwriter Petri Karra’s 2019 novel “The Dark Light” (“Musta Valo”). The creative team takes in creator/producer Minna Virtanen, creator/writer Antti Pesonen and helmer Pete Riski, behind the crime show “Bullets,” which won the MIPDrama Buyers’ Coup de Coeur award in 2018 and launched on Walter Presents in the U.K. in January.
Virtanen said she started collaborating with Karra on the TV show concept even before his novel was published. Then Pesonen’s screenplay was polished by script editors Matti Laine (“The Paradise”) and Charlotte Lesche.
Seasoned actor Maria Sid and actor/singer Samuli Edelmann are toplining the TV show as police officer Anna and her husband Henrick,...
The high-end drama about love, marriage and parenthood is based on Finnish author and screenwriter Petri Karra’s 2019 novel “The Dark Light” (“Musta Valo”). The creative team takes in creator/producer Minna Virtanen, creator/writer Antti Pesonen and helmer Pete Riski, behind the crime show “Bullets,” which won the MIPDrama Buyers’ Coup de Coeur award in 2018 and launched on Walter Presents in the U.K. in January.
Virtanen said she started collaborating with Karra on the TV show concept even before his novel was published. Then Pesonen’s screenplay was polished by script editors Matti Laine (“The Paradise”) and Charlotte Lesche.
Seasoned actor Maria Sid and actor/singer Samuli Edelmann are toplining the TV show as police officer Anna and her husband Henrick,...
- 10/4/2021
- by Annika Pham
- Variety Film + TV
“Bullets,” a Finnish, German and Belgian co-production from creator-producer Minna Virtanen and Antti Pesonen, held its market premiere screening on Monday at Berlin’s Drama Series Days, the TV component of the European Film Market.
In the series, ex-terrorist Madina Taburova, presumed to be dead, emerges in Helsinki looking for political asylum. Intelligence agent Mari Saari adapts a false identity and attempts to befriend Madina, as a means of keeping tabs on the once-dangerous woman. Krista Kosonen (“Blade Runner 2049”) and Sibel Kekilli (“Game of Thrones”) play the two main characters.
Virtanen and Pesonen spent five years co-writing and developing “Bullets.” The series is produced by Finland’s Vertigo Production, and co-produced by Germany’s Nadcon Film and Belgium’s Lunanime/ Lumière, and thanks to support from the Finnish tax incentive system, the show’s entire €5 million ($5.65 million) was in place before shooting began. TV show newcomer Pete Riski directed the series’ 10 episodes.
In the series, ex-terrorist Madina Taburova, presumed to be dead, emerges in Helsinki looking for political asylum. Intelligence agent Mari Saari adapts a false identity and attempts to befriend Madina, as a means of keeping tabs on the once-dangerous woman. Krista Kosonen (“Blade Runner 2049”) and Sibel Kekilli (“Game of Thrones”) play the two main characters.
Virtanen and Pesonen spent five years co-writing and developing “Bullets.” The series is produced by Finland’s Vertigo Production, and co-produced by Germany’s Nadcon Film and Belgium’s Lunanime/ Lumière, and thanks to support from the Finnish tax incentive system, the show’s entire €5 million ($5.65 million) was in place before shooting began. TV show newcomer Pete Riski directed the series’ 10 episodes.
- 2/13/2019
- by Jamie Lang
- Variety Film + TV
Finland’s Vertigo is moving beyond Nordic Noir with an ambitious, six-part TV series about Europe’s migrant crisis which they’ll be presenting at Series Mania.
Based on the book by best-selling Finnish novelist Jari Tervo, “Layla” is the story of a 15-year-old Kurdish girl who travels the perilous migrant route from Turkey to northern Europe, where she hopes to be reunited with her older sister.
Vertigo’s Minna Virtanen and Sagafilm Nordic’s Kjartan Thor Thordarson will be looking for financing when they present the series at the Co-Pro Pitching Session in Lille. “Layla” will be directed by the Kurdish-born, Swedish helmer Karzan Kader.
Virtanen says she was immediately drawn to the acclaimed book, and bought the rights with an eye toward developing it into a feature film. “But as a concept, it didn’t work really well,” she says.
Following the eponymous heroine as she flees an...
Based on the book by best-selling Finnish novelist Jari Tervo, “Layla” is the story of a 15-year-old Kurdish girl who travels the perilous migrant route from Turkey to northern Europe, where she hopes to be reunited with her older sister.
Vertigo’s Minna Virtanen and Sagafilm Nordic’s Kjartan Thor Thordarson will be looking for financing when they present the series at the Co-Pro Pitching Session in Lille. “Layla” will be directed by the Kurdish-born, Swedish helmer Karzan Kader.
Virtanen says she was immediately drawn to the acclaimed book, and bought the rights with an eye toward developing it into a feature film. “But as a concept, it didn’t work really well,” she says.
Following the eponymous heroine as she flees an...
- 4/18/2018
- by Christopher Vourlias
- Variety Film + TV
Cannes — “Bullets,” a women-driven political thriller which adds a new cutting edge to Nordic crime suspense, won the first Buyers’ Coup de Coeur, facing off with tough competition from other often high-end dramas from ambitious producers across Europe.
Created by “Border Town’s” co-screenwriter Antii Pesonen and Vertigo Production’s Minna Virtanen, and written by Pesonen Matti Laine (“Bordertown”) and Kirsi Vikman (“Mother of Mine”), “Bullets” drew heat when it hit October’s Mipcom with Nadcon, headed by Peter Nadermann (“The Bridge,” “The Killing”) and Belgium’s Lunanime/Lumière on board as co-producers, plus Sky Vision handling international sales.
A 15-minute sneak peek of select scenes at the MipDrama Buyers Summit did not disappoint. What the excerpts did more than anything else was to establish the shifting perspectives of “Bullets,” its two arresting main characters, the context, Helsinki, and a welling sense of tragedy.
The 15-minute excepts began with a...
Created by “Border Town’s” co-screenwriter Antii Pesonen and Vertigo Production’s Minna Virtanen, and written by Pesonen Matti Laine (“Bordertown”) and Kirsi Vikman (“Mother of Mine”), “Bullets” drew heat when it hit October’s Mipcom with Nadcon, headed by Peter Nadermann (“The Bridge,” “The Killing”) and Belgium’s Lunanime/Lumière on board as co-producers, plus Sky Vision handling international sales.
A 15-minute sneak peek of select scenes at the MipDrama Buyers Summit did not disappoint. What the excerpts did more than anything else was to establish the shifting perspectives of “Bullets,” its two arresting main characters, the context, Helsinki, and a welling sense of tragedy.
The 15-minute excepts began with a...
- 4/10/2018
- by John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
Once I Was A Dragonfly was selected from 10 works in progress presented to the festival’s jury.
Producer-director Elli Toivoniemi’s feature documentary debut Once I Was A Dragonfly received the Best Pitch Award at this year’s Finnish Film Affair (Sept 22-24) in Helsinki.
The new $3,400 (€3,000) award, which was sponsored by the Finnish Film Foundation for use in the film’s international marketing, was decided by a three-person jury made up of Fortissimo Films’ Berenice Fugard, Robert Burke of TenOne Entertainment and La-based critic Barbara Gasser.
Announcing the winner on Wednesday evening, Gasser said that it had been a “tough decision” to make the final choice from the 10 works in progress, but Toivoniemi’s film boasted “stunning visuals” and was “a story we could also relate to”.
The $224,000 (€200,000) Tuffi Films production centres on 24-year-old Miikka Friman’s lifelong fascination with dragonflies from the tender age of six and the decisions he must take as the obligations...
Producer-director Elli Toivoniemi’s feature documentary debut Once I Was A Dragonfly received the Best Pitch Award at this year’s Finnish Film Affair (Sept 22-24) in Helsinki.
The new $3,400 (€3,000) award, which was sponsored by the Finnish Film Foundation for use in the film’s international marketing, was decided by a three-person jury made up of Fortissimo Films’ Berenice Fugard, Robert Burke of TenOne Entertainment and La-based critic Barbara Gasser.
Announcing the winner on Wednesday evening, Gasser said that it had been a “tough decision” to make the final choice from the 10 works in progress, but Toivoniemi’s film boasted “stunning visuals” and was “a story we could also relate to”.
The $224,000 (€200,000) Tuffi Films production centres on 24-year-old Miikka Friman’s lifelong fascination with dragonflies from the tender age of six and the decisions he must take as the obligations...
- 9/24/2015
- by screen.berlin@googlemail.com (Martin Blaney)
- ScreenDaily
Exclusive: Keanu Reeves has been approached to star in Antti J. Jokinen’s thriller The Criminal about organised crime in Finland and Russia.
Pitching the project at the first edition of the Northern Seas Film Forum (Nsff) in St Petersburg at the weekend, producer Markus Selin of Solar Films Inc. Oy and director Jokinen said that they are speaking to the Matrix star about headlining the crime thriller which is set to shoot next year.
The Criminal is based on interviews conducted with Russian and Finnish felons over the past four years and has the Organised Crime Unit of the Finnish Police now serving as an advisor on the screenplay.
Selin revealed that Ireland’s Subotica Films is already onboard as a co-producer and he is now looking for a Russian company to join the production.
The $16m (€12m) production would shoot in Helsinki, Dublin and St Petersburg in Russian and Finnish with the English actors speaking...
Pitching the project at the first edition of the Northern Seas Film Forum (Nsff) in St Petersburg at the weekend, producer Markus Selin of Solar Films Inc. Oy and director Jokinen said that they are speaking to the Matrix star about headlining the crime thriller which is set to shoot next year.
The Criminal is based on interviews conducted with Russian and Finnish felons over the past four years and has the Organised Crime Unit of the Finnish Police now serving as an advisor on the screenplay.
Selin revealed that Ireland’s Subotica Films is already onboard as a co-producer and he is now looking for a Russian company to join the production.
The $16m (€12m) production would shoot in Helsinki, Dublin and St Petersburg in Russian and Finnish with the English actors speaking...
- 9/16/2013
- by screen.berlin@googlemail.com (Martin Blaney)
- ScreenDaily
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