Agora, Thessaloniki International Film Festival’s Industry section, is now accepting submissions for its programs, i.e. the Agora Film Market, the Crossroads Co-production Forum and the Agora Works in Progress.

For the first time during the 57th TIFF, the new Lab Project Award for unconventional projects bestowed by EURIMAGES – European Cinema Support Fund will be presented to a film project that participates in the TIFF’s Agora Work in Progress section. The award amounts up to €50,000.

Countries that are eligible to submit in the Agora are: Albania, Algeria, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Egypt, France, FYROM, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Malta, Montenegro, Morocco, Palestine, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Syria, Tunisia and Turkey.

 

The Agora Film Market promotes the majority of the feature films participating in the TIFF official sections, as well as additional titles from countries that the Agora focuses on which may be not included in the official selection – thus offering an opportunity so as more films can find their way to other international film festivals, sales agents and distributors. Furthermore, the Agora Film Market includes the previous films of Crossroads participants and a selection of Greek films produced within the past two years. Agora Film Market’s goal is to bring together filmmakers and industry professionals for future collaborations.

Agora is supported by the European Program Creative Europe.

 

As headed by producer Marie Pierre Macia, the CROSSROADS team’s goal is to support the producers of feature-length fiction film projects that originate from and/or deal with the Mediterranean, Central and South-eastern Europe regions. Qualifying features should be produced or co-produced by a country in this area or contain story elements from the aforementioned regions.

Projects should have a producer attached and could be in all stages of pre-production. Our main focus in the selection procedure will be on projects that present a high possibility of being realized, combining this quality with artistic elements. CROSSROADS introduces producers and directors to a variety of industry professionals from all over the world. The program is varied and provides the opportunity to meet - formally and informally - with distributors, broadcasters, sales agents and consultants.

The constant goal of the project is to scout for new talent in the aforementioned countries and to provide producers with opportunities to make their work known in a wider market. Through the actions of the Forum, the selected producers are aided in their efforts to promote their projects outside their countries and to network with potential partners. 

CROSSROADS awards include the main co-production award with Two Thirty Five Inc. offering post-production services (image & sound) and the CNC Development Award of 10.000 euros. The producer of the winning project will also be granted a free accreditation for the Producers’ Network, Cannes Film Festival 2017 session. Sofia Meetings of the Sofia International Film Festival will also be selecting a project to be presented during their session in March 2017. Also, the MFI Script 2 Film Workshops will be awarding a scholarship to one of the projects, whereas Initiative Film (France) will be offering its script development services to one Greek project and Cinemed (Montpelier Mediterranean Film Festival) will select a project to be presented during its session.

Crossroads is supported by: Two Thirty Five, CNC, Producers’ Network, Sofia Meetings, MFI Script 2 Film Workshops, Initiative Films, Ateliers du cinéma européen ACE and Cinemed.

 

The Agora Works in Progress hosts sessions reserved only for the invited industry professionals in Thessaloniki. They will be presented to our invited sales agents, distributors, producers and festival programmers. In this way, the professionals have access to films from the countries of the Balkan, Mediterranean and Central European regions, just before completion.

Apart from the new EURIMAGES’ Lab Project Award mentioned above, the post-production house Graal will be offering, for the sixth consecutive year, a co-production award in post-production services to a film project that participates in the Works in Progress section.

The Lab Project Award is sponsored by EURIMAGES.

The Agora Works in Progress is sponsored by Graal. S.A.