At the close of CONNEXT, the Antwerp-based showcase of new Flemish audiovisual content, the Pitch and Work-in-Progress awards were given for the best presentations of Flemish films and series in development/pre-production and (post)production.
Feature-length film awards
The Perfect Pitch Award went to Fantastique, directed by Marjolijn Prins and produced by Serendiity Films. Fantastique is about a 13-year-old girl in a circus group in Conakry, Guinea, who wants to become a star acrobat. This coming-of-age documentary, which has magical realist elements, is aimed at family audiences.
The fiction feature project Young Hearts won the Work in Progress Award.
Both awards consist of a post-production budget at Flow, an Antwerp post-production facility, to be used in the creation of marketing tools; a digital advertising budget with Screen International; and 30 hours of strategic marketing coaching by Kathleen McInnis, to be used over the next 12 months.
Series awards
The Work in Progress Award went to She They Us – Towards an Equal Future by Zaïde Bil, Heleen Declercq and Sam Peeters and produced by Cassette for timescapes. The five-episode documentary series follows seven people from the Low Countries fighting discrimination at the intersection of gender, sexuality, colour, age, class and religion. Berlin-based sales company First Hand Films is handling international sales for this title. The first two episodes of which will have their world premiere at Film Fest Gent next week.
The second season of the fiction Roomies won the Series Pitch Award.
The prize for both series winners is a poster space at the main lobby of C21 Content London, later this year. The total value of the four awards at CONNEXT 2023 comes to approximately 80,000 euros.
CONNEXT is Flanders Image’s annual pitch and presentation platform. The on-site component of the event in Antwerp, attended by about 150 international industry professionals from the film and TV world, came to an end on October 10.
The online CONNEXT platform, which is available 24/7 and for which over 1,000 professionals have received an invitation, is open for business until 23 October.
A new feature of CONNEXT this year was that, for several months, the teams behind the selected titles received intensive guidance in the preparation of their presentations. Starting in mid-June, producer, curator and strategic publicist Kathleen McInnis was on board to coach the teams through strategic advice and one-to-one guidance, and to help think about their projects.CONNEXT is organised by Flanders Image, the international promotion agency of the Flanders Audiovisual Fund (VAF), in collaboration with Screen Flanders, Screen Brussels, Flow Postproduction and the City of Antwerp.
