Director Corneliu Porumboiu obtains funding from the Prada Foundation for his upcoming film
Director Corneliu Porumboiu Photo: Dominik Bindl / Getty images / Profimedia
New films by renowned filmmakers, including Apichatpong Weerasethakul, the director of the film “Tropical Malady”, Corneliu Porumboiu from Romania and Tatiana Huezo from Mexico, are among the first 14 feature films selected to benefit from the funding provided by the Prada Foundation's Film Fund, reports Variety magazine, picked up by Agerpres, on Friday.
The Film Fund of the Prada Foundation, whose principal directors are currently attending the Berlinale, was officially launched last year in Venice, with a total fund of 1.5 million euros to support independent cinema around the world, without restrictions on theme, genre, language or any other types of conditions.
The projects that were selected by the Prada Foundation – from an impressive number of over 1,200 proposals – come from 26 countries on 5 continents. Of the 14 feature films selected, four are in development, nine in production and one in post-production. They are directed by six women and eight men and include two debut feature films.
Director Corneliu Porumboiu announced his first film after a 6-year hiatus, “an adventure” different from what he has done before
“The quality and experimentation of the selected projects demonstrate the dynamic nature and variety that characterizes contemporary independent cinema,” said Miuccia Prada, owner of the Italian luxury group Prada and director of the Prada Foundation, the cultural institution she founded with her husband, Patrizio Bertelli, in a statement in 1993.
“Through the Film Fund, we aim to promote the work of authors, especially those who most need concrete support to translate their vision into reality. Going forward, the Prada Foundation intends to continue promoting the idea of a free, demanding and visionary cinema, by building a stronger dialogue with those who conceive, develop and produce films”, she added.
The Prada Foundation Film Fund offers three types of support: development, production and post-production. The maximum amount of funding that a project can receive is 250,000 euros for production.
The fund is managed by Paolo Moretti, a former director of the Quinzaine des Cineastes section at Cannes, in collaboration with film programmer Rebecca De Pas.
The film to be directed by Corneliu Porumboiu is entitled “The Costume”, it is a France-Germany-Romania co-production and is in the production phase.
