Fortissimo Films, the Hong Kong- and Amsterdam-based sales agency, has picked up rights to upcoming Mark Cousins-directed film “Stockholm My Love.”
The film, a portrait of the Swedish capital, stars singer Neneh Cherry as a 47-year-old architect who loves buildings and the way that they influence people’s lives. Cinematography is by Chris Doyle, the Hong Kong-based Australian director of photography who has worked extensively with Wong Kar-wai and Gus van Sant.
The story sees the architect (Cherry) still in shock after a traffic accident, and taking long early-morning walks through the city she loves. Cherry also provides voice overs and five songs in the film’s soundtrack.
Fortissimo will represent the film globally outside the U.K. and Sweden and position it for a festival launch later this year. A show-reel will be available at Berlin’s EFM.
The film was produced and co-scripted by Anita Oxburgh of Migma Film, along with Mary Bell and Variety’s former European Editor Adam Dawtrey at Bofa Prods. The deal was negotiated by Fortissimo’s Nelleke Driessen and Nicole Mackey and Dawtrey.
“We wanted to make a city symphony. Cities are noisy, messy, but teeming with life. Our story tries to capture this,” said Cousins.
Cousins is a film critic, director, producer and TV presenter who is best known for “The Story of Film: An Odyssey,” a 15-part TV series that screened on the U.K.’s Channel 4 and at the 2011 Toronto Film Festival. “Stockholm” is his first feature-length fiction film.
“Stockholm” is a Migma Films and Bofa Prods. production with backing from the Swedish Film Institute, BBC Films, Creative Scotland, Filmcapital Stockholm via regional film funding agency Stockholm-Malardalen and Swedisht Television (SVT).
As a filmmaker Cousins has a strong sense of place. Born in Northern Ireland, Cousins directed “I Am Belfast,” a picture in which the city of his birth is represented by a 10,000-year-old woman. Currently based in Edinburgh, Scotland, he has also transported a 33-ton movie camera around the Scottish Highlands for another project which spawned both a film festival and a documentary “Cinema is Everywhere.”
Ahead of Berlin, Fortissimo also recently picked up a pair of recent pictures by Zhang Wei, a Chinese entrepreneur-turned-director. It is also representing “Ants on a Shrimp,” a documentary that appears in the festival’s Culinary Cinema section.
