The European Genre Forum, a one-year training cycle for emerging European genre filmmakers, opens a call for submissions for 2023. EGF is a collaboration between the Imagine Fantastic Film Festival in Amsterdam, Fantastic Zagreb Film Festival, and the Black Nights Film Festival in Tallinn.
In its 9th edition, EGF will run three talent Labs from July to November 2023. The objective of the European Genre Forum is to provide comprehensive cross-sector and film life cycle training for professionals working in European genre and fantastic film – a rapidly growing pan-European industry that is still distinctively different from the general film industry.
Its unique requirements for creative and financial development, production characteristics and distribution and monetizing networks have created a dedicated infrastructure of markets, festivals and training. The EGF has a fruitful collaboration with the BIF Market (part of the Brussels Fantastic Film Festival), and projects from previous editions enjoy successful festival runs both in Europe and the US.
The training cycle consists of three workshops in the second half of the year. Together, the Labs will increase the level of the participating projects in every aspect: creatively, financially, legally and in terms of access to the market.
- The Screenwriting & Directing Lab takes place during the Fantastic Zagreb Film Festival in July in Zagreb, focusing on script development and other artistic aspects of the projects.
- The Producing Lab in October takes place during the Imagine Film Festival in Amsterdam and is aimed at business development, with coproduction and legal aspects among its topics.
- The Marketing & Packaging Lab in November is part of industry events of the Black Nights Film Festival in Tallinn and is focusing on pitching, packaging, marketing and sales. The projects will be pitching to the international audience of film professionals, and have one-to-one meetings with attending guests, including the sales agents.
The EGF training cycle is aimed at European first or second feature film directors and their teams developing a genre film project. Genre films and related genres include horror, science fiction, fantasy, anime, dark thrillers, dark comedies, mystery, adventure and martial arts as well as TV series. Documentaries with a focus on genre film or topic can also be considered.
Eight projects will be selected, and the participants are expected to attend all the three Labs.
The call for projects in now open on www.europeangenreforum.com
The Rules and Regulations for submission can also be found there.
For any question, please contact us at info@europeangenreforum.com
Timeline
Submission Deadline: Friday, 21 April 2023, Midnight CET
Announcement Selection: Friday, 5 May
Directing & Screenwriting Lab: 6-9 July, Zagreb
Producing Lab: 31 October – 3 November, Amsterdam
Marketing & Packaging Lab: 14-18 November, Tallinn
