The Age of Reason

The 11th edition of the Production Value workshop was held in Bilbao (Basque Country, Spain), January 7-15, 2017. Six Junior Line Producers, 6 Junior Assistant-Directors, 7 Producers and 4 directors, 6 Seniors as tutors, coming from 14 European countries, gathered together for this workshop, which focused on the process of budgeting and scheduling 6 feature films in development. The workshop—coproduced by FOCAL resource (Amsterdam), FOCAL (Lausanne), the Norwegian Film Institute (Oslo), the Swedish Film Institute (Stockholm) and the Finnish Film Foundation (Helsinki)— was supported by CREATIVE EUROPE, a program of the European Union and the BILBAO BIZKAIA Film Commission.

PV17 Denis Rabaglia

There can be no Production Value without you, Denis!" a phrase that has been said several times over the final evaluation evenings closing the first 10 editions of Production Value. It referred to Denis Rabaglia (on the left, with Michael Schwarz), writer-director who designed and ran the first 10 editions. A statement coming with no doubt from the heart but which had to be challenged and this was the year for the 11th edition, Denis passed on the leadership of the workshop to Kaare Storemyr, who had been Senior Line Producer in 7 of the first 10 editions.

Kaare was therefore in charge of selecting the participants and the projects, as well as composing the team of Seniors who would coach the scheduling and budgeting process. Though being part of the PV adventure for quite some time, preparing the workshop – which comes down to balancing many parameters to making it work – was new to him and, as he said, “I have carefully tried to walk in the footsteps of Denis”.

PV17 Juniors

The 11th edition turned out to become as successful as the previous editions. Actually, there are some good reasons for it. The main one is that Production Value fills in a lack in the industry – where can young talented assistant directors and line producers (both important pillars of any production) get further training after a couple of years of professional experience? And how would it be if for once if they would be in charge of designing the main parameters of making a film instead of just being told what to do?

Experienced assistant directors and line producers know the game. All throughout their careers they survived many difficult situations, being put under intense pressure and torn between different forces and yet, get paid and valued to deliver in “time and budget”. Where can a young professional dealing with budgets of 1-3 mio Euro can understand what it takes to deal with a budget of 10 or more? There’s only one place and that is Production Value.

PV17 SCott Kirby PV17 Stuart Renfrew

Kaare called back 5 of the colleagues he had been working with all throughout his time at Production Value. Seniors who know their job and know the unique format of the workshop. To coach the schedules, he called UK 1st AD Stuart Renfrew (on the right) and American-German 1st AD Scott Kirby (on the left). The first one has been teaching steadily at Production Value since PV08 and the second visited the workshop for the 4th time. Each of them was involved with 3 heavy scripts, implying complex scheduling and close monitoring of the Juniors’ processes, as it must be stressed that the Producers and Directors of each project are invited to join the workshop and discuss the results. The experience at Production Value is that 100% of the projects assigned managed to be properly scheduled by the time their Producers and Directors arrived at the workshop.

PV17 Final Evalutation PV17 Marco Valerio Pugini PV17 Michael Schwarz

The same was not always the case with the budgeting process. For German Line Producer Michael Schwarz (on the right), “it’s insane to believe we can complete a budget of several millions of euro with less than a week but it’s not about the final figure, it’s about the structure of the budget, the thoughts behind it, and that we can deliver!”. As a matter of fact, all budgets are fine-tuned by each Junior in the week after the workshop and delivered as part of the final results. Here lies the reason why Senior Line Producers are 3 and not 2 like the Senior Assistant Directors – because each of them handles 2 budgets only. “And it’s already crazy like that” add the 2 other present in Bilbao, German Mathias Schwerbrock and Italian Marco Valerio Pugini (on the left).

PV17 Hans van Helden

Yet, one additional Senior was somehow overloaded this year. Since PV13 in Switzerland where it was introduced for the first time, Hans van Helden had joined the workshop as Post-production supervisor, giving an additional input to the post sections of the budgets. This year, he combined the position with being also the VFX consultant to all 6 projects, making him the man who ran around the whole day long, going from one room to the other, from one project to the other – “This has been exhausting, almost too much, but it’s been thrilling to be able to be so close to every participant and project, it’s a very unique perspective on the way each of them thinks and works”.

PV17 Joona Mielonen PV17 Joe Kotroczo

Screen adaptations of comics have become very common in the last years. The Belgian one BLAKE & MORTIMER is a cult Belgian comics whose adaptation is in the hands of German producer Marco Mehlitz and German screenwriter Oliver Huzly. Set in London in the 50ies but to be shot mostly in Belgium and Hungary, this is a classic case of a very complex film involving tons of VFX, stunts and demanding production design. Junior Line Producer Joe Kotroczo (Luxemburg) (on the right) and Junior Assistant Director Joona Mielonen (Finland) (on the left) were on board. Their journey through the script was quite massive: the first draft was 77 days and the final one 60 for a budget of over 25 mio euro! The whole process could only be completed thanks to the active participation of the Producer and the Screenwriter who took part in some creative decisions simplifying this challenging project.

PV17 Dominika Fáberová PV17 Benoît Monney

At the other end of the production spectrum was THE ADVENTURES OF HALVDAN VIKING based on a famous series of novels very popular in Scandinavian children's literature. A kind of an action film with a moderate budget. To deliver, Junior Assistant Director Benoît Monney (Switzerland) (on the right) and Junior Line Producer Dominika Fáberová (Slovakia) (on the left) Junior Line Producer Domenika decided that “we had to start thinking about the production design or camera movement or VFX by ourselves and so we came up with some ideas that offered solutions for complicated issues“. In particular, they designed a village which could be redressed easily into another one and therefore save time and money and yet provide great – guess what – production value, much to the delight of their producers Jessica Ask & Karolina Heimburg.

PV17 Zahra Waldeck PV17 Greta Warts

Another children film but of other nature was WERECUB, the story of 11-year-old “werewolf” boy coming to terms to becoming a teenager. The project combined shooting with minors, prosthetics and tons and VFX, SFX and stunts. Exactly the kind of project which is a nightmare to schedule and budget properly, giving all the options available. Here again, Junior Assistant Director Greta Warts (Estonia) (on the right) had to break down every single piece of the script to build up the main blocks and Junior Line Producer Zahra Waldeck (Norway) (on the left) – who had been applying for the fourth time to PV! – had to deal with a complex shoot between the UK and the Czech Republic. As in most cases this year, writers-producers Steve Chatterton & Mark Anthony Galluzzo – who had been already twice to PV – were extremely collaborative to the process, taking new directions as they were facing some realities that the PV team brought in evidence.

PV17 Rodica Popa and Saku Suksi

Other returning producers were Alexandra Hoesdorff & Alexandra Dondelinger (Luxemburg) who brought STROLL TO THE SKY, the story of Bessie Coleman, the first African American female pilot to earn a license back in the 20ies. This story involved lots of flying sequences and period settings but had to be shot mainly in Europe, though the action takes place mostly in the US. Junior Line producer Rodica Popa (Romania) (on the left) saw “the main challenge was to deliver a full budget as my previous experience was only on service production in Romania, taking care of only one part of the budget” whereas her colleague Junior Saku Suksi (Finland) (on the right) realized how much “an AD has to evaluate whether to do the scenes for real or use VFX or a combination of both, in order to get a grip on his schedule”.

PV17 Bart Le Belle PV17 Maarten D’Hollander

It’s as if Norwegian Producer Finn Gjerdrum would not like to miss one edition of PV since he returned this year for the 4th time with a project. He who is one of the most prolific and experience producer in Norway knows how much our process is cost-effective. With THE WORLD AT NIGHT to be directed by Erik Poppe, one of the most prominent Norwegian film directors, he wanted to find out if a film entirely set in Buenos Aires could almost be entirely shot in Europe and where. After vast investigations and numerous options and calculations, Junior Assistant Director Bart Le Belle (Netherlands) (on the right) Junior Line Producer Maarten D’Hollander (Belgium) (on the left) went for Hungary and managed to implement there most of the shoot. “I will be back”, commented Finn at the final evaluation evening where each team presents its results and producers get the chance to comment the performances…

PV17 Charli Rosal and Mia Welin

The last project was brought by the man who had been quoted many times despite his absence until the last 3 days: Denis Rabaglia himself. Using his time off as head of studies, he suggested to Kaare Storemyr to bring his beloved project CONJUROR, based on the real-life story of Chung Line Soo, a false Chinese magician who died on stage during WWI performing a dangerous trick, for an in-depth analysis of how to make this period drama set in New York and London, almost entirely in backstage theaters. The project was assigned to Junior Assistant Director Charli Rosal (Spain) (on the left) and Junior Line Producer Mia Welin (Sweden) (on the right) who also had to deal with a very specific challenge, unique in many ways – how to stage magic acts in order to make them real, now that today’s audience knows instinctively that everything can be faked through VFX!

Well, Denis is certainly no magician himself but he did invent a magic act and it’s Production Value! A magic act he transmitted to Kaare Storemyr who then performed it brilliantly, leaving the original workshop designer with these words: “I feel like the director of a season one TV series, I have not made season 2 but I feel at home in each episode”.

Projects

Werecub UK / Czech Republic
Junior Line Producer Zahra Waldeck – Norway
Junior Assistant Director Greta Varts – Estonia
Senior Line Producer Michael Schwarz – Germany
Senior Assistant Director Stuart Renfrew – UK
VFX Supervisor Hans Van Helden – Netherlands
Guest Participants Steven Chatterton (producer)
Mark Anthony Galluzzo (Director)
Blake & Mortimer Germany / Belgium / Hungary
Junior Line Producer Joe Kotroczo – Luxembourg
Junior Assistant Director Joona Mielonen – Finland
Senior Line Producer Marco Valerio Pugini – Italy
Senior Assistant Director Stuart Renfrew – UK
VFX Supervisor Hans Van Helden – Netherlands
Guest Participants Marco Mehlitz (producer)
Oliver Huzly (Screenwriter)
Stroll To The Sky Luxemburg/Belgium
Junior Line Producer Rodica Popa – Romania
Junior Assistant Director Saku Suksi – Finland
Senior Line Producer Mathias Schwerbrock – Germany
Senior Assistant Director Stuart Renfrew – UK
VFX Supervisor Hans Van Helden – Netherlands
Guest Participants Alexandra Hoesdorff ( producer)
Alexandra Dondelinger (associate producer)
The World At Night Norway/Argentina/ Hungary
Junior Line Producer Maarten D´Hollander – Belgium
Junior Assistant Director Bart Le Belle – Netherlands
Senior Line Producer Marco Valerio Pugini – Italy
Senior Assistant Director Scott Kirby – Germany
Guest Participants Finn Gjerdrum (producer)
Conjuror Switzerland/ Bulgaria / UK
Junior Line Producer Mia Welin – Sweden
Junior Assistant Director Charli Rosal – Spain
Senior Line Producer Michael Schwarz – Germany
Senior Assistant Director Scott Kirby – Germany
Guest Participant Denis Rabaglia (Co-writer & producer)
Halvdan Viking Sweden/Norway/Germany
Junior Line Producer Dominica Faberova – Slovakia
Junior Assistant Director Benoit Monney – Switzerland
Senior Line Producer Mathias Schwerbrock – Germany
Senior Assistant Director Scott Kirby – Germany
Guest Participants Jessica Ask (producer)
Karolina Heimburg (Line Producer)

Photo Gallery

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Production Value 2017 was proposed by
FOCAL resource
FOCAL
Norwegian Film Institute
Austrian Film Institute
Swedish Film Institute
with the support of
The MEDIA Programme