At a press conference on Wednesday morning at the premises of Sparinvest in Luxembourg, details of the 3rd annual Nordic Film Festival in Luxembourg were announced.

The festival will take place from Friday 3 June to Tuesday 7 June 2016 and the line-up includes five films, one each from the five Nordic countries: Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden.

All films are new and have not been screened until now in Luxembourg, and all are being screened in their original language with sub-titles in English or French. This will make them accessible to all Nordic residents of the Grand Duchy and Greater Region, as well as the wider cinema-going public.

The films will all be screened at Ciné Utopia in Luxembourg-Limpertsberg including both the Opening Screening and the Closing Screening, as well as at the Cinémathèque for the first time. This year there is a stronger emphasis on award-winning films and sports dramas, enabling the organisers to show first-hand that there is a lot more to Nordic cinema than just crime, political and psychological dramas.

Geoff Thompson, festival organiser, explained "The inaugural Nordic Film Festival in Luxembourg was borne out of the increasing popularity and success of the British & Irish Film Season which started in 2010 and continually attracts more and more interest from both the cinema-going public and sponsors, without whom such cultural feasts would not be possible. The approach of selecting films from five different countries/regions, and ensuring a mix of genres, is the same; here we focus on the amazing cinematographic talents from Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland and Iceland. This year we are working on the successful model deployed over the past two years and are creating a real festival for Nordic Film here in the Grand Duchy"

The Nordic Film Festival features both independently produced films and those from established production houses, giving Luxembourg’s diverse and cosmopolitan cinema-going public the chance to see both established stars as well as up-and-coming actors from the Nordic countries, often in co-productions involving other countries.

Gold Sponsor

The organisers are delighted that Sparinvest in Luxembourg is supporting the 2016 Nordic Film Festival as Gold Sponsor.

"We are proud to sponsor The Nordic Film Festival. Having offices in both Denmark, Sweden and Luxembourg Sparinvest sees it as a natural part of our business to promote culture from the Nordic countries in Luxembourg. As a relatively small fund boutique we also like the idea of punching above ones weight class as Denmark do in film, in TV dramas and as the Danish National Team did in The European Championships in 1992," says CEO at Sparinvest, Per Noesgaard as a reference to the opening film at the festival.

 
Audience Award & Audience Prize

The Audience Award at the Nordic Film Festival 2016 is an opportunity for the cinema-going public to be directly involved in the event. This will apply to all five films being screened, with those attending voting on the films, with the winning film announced after the festival, on Wednesday 8 June.

In addition, one of the voting slips will be drawn after the 4th film screening on 6 June, with the winner invited to attend the Closing Screening, at which he/she will be presented with the Audience Prize, a Luxair voucher for 2 return tickets to Stockholm or Copenhagen.

Programme

- Fri 3 June @ 19:00 @ Ciné Utopia: Sommeren ‘92 / The Summer of '92 (DK / UK; EN sub-titles; sports drama; preceded by opening speeches and followed by reception; followed by Q&A session with director Kasper Barfoed, moderated by Geoff Thompson

- Sat 4 June @ 19:00 @ Ciné Utopia: Hrútar / Rams (IS / DK / NO / PL; EN sub-titles; drama)

- Sun 5 June @ 17:00@ Cinémathèque: Bölgen / The Wave (NO; EN sub-titles; thriller)

- Mon 6 June @ 19:00 @ Ciné Utopia: En man som heter Ove / A Man Called Ove (SE; FR sub-titles; comedy drama)

- Tue 7 June @ 19:00 @ Ciné Utopia: Miekkailija / The Fencer (FI / ES / RU; EN sub-titles; sports drama) preceded by the Audience Prize

Tickets

€8.80 for a single screening, with €25 for a Season Ticket for all 5 films from www.nordicfilmfestival.lu  only, from Monday 16 May. Tickets are also available from www.luxembourg-ticket.lu  for the Cinémathèque screening. Tickets are not available for sale from www.utopolis.lu  for the Ciné Utopia screenings. Tickets will also be available for sale (cash only) at the venues subject to availability.

See www.nordicfilmfestival.lu  for further details.

Photo (L-R)): Claes-Johan Geijer, Consul General for Sweden in Luxembourg; Christine Doerner, Consul General for Norway in Luxembourg; Beate Ludovicy-Blom, Scanpost; Mikkel Strørup, Sparinvest; Louise Bang Jespersen, Danish Ambassador to Belgium, Luxembourg and the EU; Geoff Thompson, Nordic Film Festival Organiser