European Film Academy CEO Matthijs Wouter Knol said he was encouraged by the number of Balkan films that have started to surface in the last few years, pointing to last year’s Kosovo project Hive. The Oscar-nominated feature debut from Blerta Basholli made history last year as the first Kosovan director to make it to the shortlist for Best International Feature. It was also nominated for Best Feature Film at last year’s EFAs.
“I think it was a sign in a country like Kosovo and other Albanian-language speaking countries in the Balkans that there’s a lot happening and there are a lot of female voices coming to the surface that are releasing films that are quite visible,” said Wouter Knol when he stepped into Deadline’s Zurich Summit Studio.
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This year, Wouter Knol said there were some “very strong” documentaries from Poland and Denmark again as well as interesting projects coming from Ukraine, which weren’t necessarily tied to the current political situation as many were made before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
“It’s interesting to see these films because they do depict and show what has been going on for a long time in Eastern Europe and people watch these films in a different way since February,” he said.
Earlier this year, EFA, which works across 52 countries in Europe, decided that it would boycott Russian films for its upcoming awards selection.
“It’s not the right time to include Russian-financed films or Russian-produced films, because I think in a time of a war promoting films coming from a country or being seen from coming from the country, it’s not the right way to do it,” said Wouter Knol.
“It’s the right thing to do because films that have been made with money from Russia, will be celebrated as Russian films again – it’s not the filmmakers only who get the award – it’s also the country.”
He added, “I think it’s ok to draw a line right now.”
The exec also talked about how the organization is stepping away from just organizing its awards show, which this year is happening on December 10, and is focusing on a larger remit of promoting European film across the board in the run up to the event.
Post pandemic, he said it’s been “eye-opening” for the academy and they have seen there is a chance to play a more active role in working with cinemas as streaming platforms to promote European film.
“It’s important to reach out to audiences, which we also want to do – not just our members but also audiences,” he said. “It’s important to see where audiences are instead of telling them where to go. Audiences are increasingly watching films on streaming platforms, I think it’s only natural to sit around the table with them and see what they are doing, see what their strategies are.”
Take a look at the video above.