This final session of the year once again enabled us to analyze some excellent entries from all areas of audiovisual production: live-action series and films, as well as numerous animation projects.
Meeting on Monday December 16, the decentralized co-production council approved the co-financing of nine new projects, committing 1,290,000 euros to generate 8.7 million euros of audiovisual expenditure in the Walloon Region, representing a reinvestment of around 674%. And of course we’re not talking here about all the direct and indirect expenditure not related to the sector.
Two series, four live-action features.
Alma (Sequel Prod)
This Belgian-initiated series (6 episodes of 52 minutes), directed by Gary Seghers and Julien Henry, will benefit from extensive filming in Wallonia (30 days out of 57), and will call on many local talents, both technical and artistic. The project also stands out for its ambition to create a permanent hospital setting in Charleroi, an initiative that could, temporarily at least, transform the region into a magnet for film shoots.
Eldorado (Beside)
Directed by Louis Farge (Culte), this series initiated in France, with the support of Arte, revisits the sniffer plane scandal. 14 of the 44 Belgian shooting days will take place in Wallonia. 27 technicians will be working on the Belgian part of the shoot, while several post supervisors will be on location throughout, including in Senegal. In addition to rental from KGS, Tigreville, Macadamcar and the canteen from Eat me, Bardaf will handle post-production and The Pack Wallonia special effects. Audio description will be provided by Chambre noire in Mons.
The stranger (Tarantula)
This Faustian thriller, directed by Paolo Strippoli (Piove) and featuring an international cast led by Jasmine Trinca, Matilda de Angelis and Isabelle Huppert, will be shot in France and Italy, with Walloon spending mainly on sound, with a team on location, editing and sound effects at Genval-les-Dames and mixing at Mute and solo. Propaganda, the Italian producer, has become a privileged partner for Tarantula over the years. It will be contributing part of the budget for the first feature film by Nicolas Boucart (author of the fantastic short Icare), currently in pre-production in Liège. An important strategic reciprocity in an Italian context that is more delicate than ever.
Les Parfaits (Umedia)
The screenplay for this hilarious comedy, to be directed in Belgium by the experienced Ludovic Bernard (L’ascension, 10 jours sans maman…) and starring a hell of a duo including Audrey Fleurot and Ramzy Bedia, was a lot of fun. That’s a pretty good sign. It will benefit from Walloon financial support for equipment rental, special effects and rushes management. KGS Wallonia, Macadamcar, One Two One Two, FX Factory, l’Équipe Wallonie and Benuts are the regional partners involved in this project, which has every chance of making an exciting run in French-speaking cinemas and, later, on small screens.
Blitz (Wrong Men North)
Directed by writer David Trueba, this drama shot in Spanish and English will benefit from an 8-day shoot in Liège, involving Walloon technicians and actors. Wallimage will also support the film’s post-production, confirming its commitment to co-productions with Spain, a complex but promising market that Wrong Men North has been exploring with some success over the past few months.
Karateka (Wrong Men North)
Same Belgian producer and same country of origin for this sports film directed by Aritz Moreno, which will be released on Netflix and follows the journey of a once-promising karateka determined to regain her place on the Spanish national team after a long break necessitated by her mother’s state of health. Sound effects, editing, mixing and special effects are handled by Cob, Bardaf and MPC respectively. A fine grouping for Pôle Image’s service providers in Liège.
Animation still very much alive
Five animation projects were presented to us, and painful choices had to be made. This has been the case for some years now at every session, and if the first rumors are to be believed, it will be even more so in January. This is hardly a surprise, since if there’s one sector that has benefited greatly from Wallimage’s in-depth work, and can only rely on it to prosper despite increasingly fierce international competition, it’s this one.
Hamsters “the déménagement“ (20 Pictures to Midnight)
This 2D animated series returns for a second season with a more adult and international ambition. Wallimage will once again be supporting its production, which is currently mainly handled by the Enghien studio20 Seconds to Midnight (soon to move into the Parc Initialis in Mons), in collaboration with Picture Factory from Liège, who are featured in the following dossier. The main actors and all the voices for the international versions will be recruited in Wallonia. All in all, this will represent around 3,300 man-days, or 15 full-time equivalents over the course of a year.
The last dinosaur (Freaks Factory)
Supported by five international partners, this ambitious animation project also involves the Walloon studio Picture Factory, which is expanding rapidly in the Ardente city. The young entity will be responsible for part of the storyboarding, FX Anim/SIM (with The Pack Wallonia studio in Mons), before moving on to lighting & compositing and voice recording. The task will represent some 2,953 man-days in Belgium, or 13 full-time equivalents over one year.
Jim Queen (Umedia)
Off the beaten track, this 2D animated feature, aimed at a more mature audience, tackles LGBTQIA+ themes with spectacular self-mockery and audacity. Waooh! will be working on this film, which, as you may have guessed, is closer to Les Reines du drame than Bambi. The Pôle Image studio in Liège will handle most of the layout and animation, providing the project with its own production manager. Waooh! will also handle the 2D digital special effects and compositing for around 40 weeks of production and 49 weeks of work split between the different teams. In total, the work of the 33 operators will represent 2,984 man-days (or 13 FTEs over one year).
In 2025, Wallimage will once again be organizing five financing sessions, with submissions scheduled for January 16, March 20, June 5, September 11 and November 13. So there’s less than a month left for interested producers to sharpen up their next applications, and for the Wallimage Coproductions team to catch its breath before diving back into new, in-depth analyses.
Happy holidays anyway…