Alive and Kicking: Company Strategies Today

12/10/24 • 47 min

Industry Insights – The EFM Podcast is presented by the European Film Market of the Berlinale. Hosted by media analyst, broadcaster and experience designer Johanna Koljonen, it delves deep into the rapidly evolving film industry.

In this episode, the Berlinale Co-Production Market invites two experienced producers to share their innovative strategies as part of a film industry in flux and how they address the changes of their own roles. Didar Domehri, producer and founder of Maneki Film and Maneki Stories, and Roman Paul, producer and co-founder of Razor Film Produktion, join forces to discuss the need for both, flexibility and collaboration while maintaining one’s own outstanding focus as an independent producer.

Cooperating with other producers in the creative collectives Athena Collective and The Creatives, respectively, is giving them a chance to work with creatives across borders with a high level of solidarity, and allows them to put together each independent producer’s strengths. Developing and sustaining successful business strategies and slates in disruptive and difficult times also means that the role of the producer is changing in the lifecycle of a film, and their relationship to audiences takes on new forms. Being original and thinking differently is key when connecting with today’s audiences, so the appeal to staying curious, teaching and learning at the same time is something they agree on. Being involved with training young producers, they also deliver a tip or two on how to stay sane in the industry while maintaining the passion for the work.

Roman Paul began his film career in acquisitions for German distributors and Celluloid Dreams in Paris. In 2002, he co-founded Razor Film Produktion with Gerhard Meixner. Razor’s work has earned two Golden Globes, three Oscar nominations, and recognition at major festivals. In 2019 was named professor at the Filmakademie Ludwigsburg, and received the “Chevalier des Arts et Lettres” by the Republic of France. Razor joined "The Creatives" in 2021, a global alliance developing high-end drama series and films.

Didar Domehri, founder of Maneki Films, has produced more than 20 features including Eva Husson’s Bang Gang & Girls of the Sun in Cannes Competition, Santiago Mitre’s Paulina, Cannes Critics’ Week Grand Prix, La cordillera, Cannes UCR, & Petite fleur, Laurent Cantet’s Return to Itaca, Venice days Grand Prix, Erige Sehiri’s Under the fig trees,15 aine des réalisateurs Cannes, Godland by Hlynur Pálmason, Cannes UCR, and recently Une nuit by Alex Lutz, Cannes UCR, Me Too by Judith Godrèche, and MOTEL DESTINO by Karim Aïnouz, Cannes Competition.

The host Johanna Koljonen is a media analyst, broadcaster, and experience designer. She is the author of the Göteborg Film Festival’s annual Nostradamus Report on the near future of the screen industries, which is in its 11th year. She lectures internationally on changes in the media sector, and on participation and narrative design. Her background is in public service broadcasting; in 2011, she received the Swedish Grand Journalism Award in the Innovator category.

The Berlinale’s European Film Market is the first international film market of the year, where the film industry starts its business. Industry Insights - The EFM Podcast puts a spotlight on highly topical and trendsetting industry issues, thereby creating a compass for the forthcoming film year. The year-round podcast is produced in cooperation with Goethe-Institut and co-funded by Creative Europe MEDIA. This episode has been developed in collaboration with the Berlinale Co-Production Market.

Previous Episode

Pathways to Equity: the Special Edition Seminar Podcast

Industry Insights – The EFM Podcast is presented by the European Film Market of the Berlinale. Hosted by Curator and Impact Producer Nadia Denton, it delves deep into the rapidly evolving film industry.

Funded by Creative Europe MEDIA and taking place yearly at the EFM 2023, 2024 and 2025, the Equity & Inclusion Pathways Seminar is an industry-wide consultation forum that brings together European decision-makers, advocacy groups, stakeholders and change-makers with the aim of shifting the needle regarding equity, inclusion and accessibility in terms of policymaking, strategy, measures and actions. The change and advances that this Seminar aims to bring about for the European film industry are resolutely structural, and involve not only integrating marginalised groups into a European film sector that is free of biases, barriers and exclusions but also valuing the hitherto unrealised potential of the contributions of marginalised film professionals to the industry as well as redistributing resources and decision-making power more equitably. Featuring the Seminar’s 3 moderators (Nadia Denton, Yolanda Rother and Sailesh Naidu), one of the Ambassadors, Tina Trapp (EAVE), the leadership of OMNI Inclusion Data, Helge Albers (MOIN Film Fund) and a speaker and representative of an advocacy group, Julian Carrington (REMC - Racial Equity Media Collective), this episode will explore the mission, vision, objectives and challenges to implementing effective, long-lasting and sustainable DEI and accessibility policies at institutional level across the European screen industries.

OMNI Inclusion Data aims to underpin the diversity of the media and culture sector and the people working in it with factual data. At the same time, OMNI Inclusion Data aims to close the blank spots due to a lack of data. OMNI also intends to collect data that is compliant with data protection legislation from cast and crew on a voluntary basis and provide the industry with the most up-to-date analysis on inclusion statistics. With the OMNI project, the initiator MOIN Film Fund, in co-operation with Australia’s The Everyone Project, is taking on this important task for the European film industry and, more importantly, taking a leadership role in promoting diversity in the industry.

The host Nadia Denton (she/her) has worked in the UK film industry for over a decade as an Impact Producer, Curator and Author. She specialises in Nigerian Cinema and coined the term BEYOND NOLLYWOOD. She has worked with the BFI London Film Festival, Berlinale EFM, British Film Institute, British Council, Doc Society, London Film School, Sundance Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival and Comic Relief. Her books include The Nigerian Filmmaker’s Guide to Success: Beyond Nollywood and The Black British Filmmaker’s Guide to Success: Finance, Market and Distribute Your Film. She is an Honorary Research Fellow with the University of Exeter.

Yolanda Rother (she/her) is co-founder of "The Impact Company", a diversity, audience and culture consultancy. She moderates and speaks on topics related to digital society, politics and open government, diversity and sustainability. The Berlin native is a graduate (Master of Public Policy) of the Hertie School and has lived in Brazil, France and the United States.

Sailesh Naidu (they/them) is a writer, researcher, and performance artist working in the sphere of migration, gender, and education. Their work interrogates the queer body as territory, ancestral knowledge, and building of queer personal narratives as archive.

Tina or Kristina Trapp (she/her) has worked in the international film industry for over 20 years, amongst others at the German regional film fund MFG-Filmförderung Baden-Württemberg, with the European culture channel ARTE, heading the Film Commission Strasbourg and with the European training programme “Atelier Ludwigsburg Paris”. She joined EAVE in 2004 as Programme Manager. In 2007, she became Deputy Chief CEO and was appointed CEO in 2009. Kristina has been closely working with several European festivals and production companies in her career. She was part of various selection committees and juries for film funds and co-production markets and is member of the European Film Academy and ARTEF (Anti-Racism Taskforce European Film). She was co-director and board member of the umbrella organisation for European training providers, ATC (audiovisual training coalition), as well as member of the advisory board of the CEE Animation Workshop and board member of EWA (European Women’s Audiovisual Network).

Helge Albers (he/him) Helge ...

Next Episode

Innovative Production Tools: Shaping the Future of Filmmaking #2

This episode highlights three EFM Startups alumni of 2024, showcasing their innovative tools and technologies. In response to the growing concerns about AI replacing human roles in the global creative cinema industry, these companies offer valuable insights into current challenges and emerging developments. They demonstrate how AI can enhance production efficiency without replacing human talent, with a particular focus on the ethical implications of using these technologies. While the ethical debate surrounding AI continues, these three companies present cutting-edge solutions that streamline time management and promote greater diversity in the industry.

Applications for EFM Startups are open until January 3rd 2025.

Zoe Ramushu, Founder & CEO, Wrapped

Zoe is an entrepreneur with a legal background and a decade of experience working in film and tv, diversity and advocacy. She is a graduate of Columbia University, a Reuters Fellow of Oxford University and is Student Oscar and BAFTA Nominated. Her production company has completed a Netflix feature film and has an Amazon Original series in development. She has strong ties to the African, European and U.S. film industry and great personal networks. WRAPPED was nominated for an award in Cannes and has been featured in Screen and Variety magazine.

Frederik Merkel, Co-Founder and Product Lead, Phont

Frederik Merkel is an interdisciplinary designer who has been freelancing since the age of eighteen. He has created numerous products and developed several typefaces. For his master's thesis in type design, he started the project PHONT, developing fonts for different types of speech, which has since grown into an award-winning start-up. PHONT is developing the world's first automated creative captioning software for the media industry. With PHONT, AI and parametric design are combined to bring subtitles to life.

Ana Betancourt, CEO, Black Goblin

Ana Betancourt is the CEO of Black Goblin, an audiotech redefining sound design. Black Goblin is a UK-based sound research and technology company on a quest to transform the way creators work with sound. Currently, Black Goblin is developing Thol, an all-inclusive collaboration platform that allows content creators to design high-quality sound easily while fast-tracking the workflow and supporting teams from preproduction to release.