The 69th Cannes Film Festival (11-22 May) was a big success for the Freeway Entertainment team attending the festival and the market led by Cecile Huberts, Martijn Meerstadt and Gadi Wildstrom who were joined by executives Zoltán Árvay (Managing Director, Freeway Spain), Ivar Combrinck (US Consultant), Senior Account Managers Rita Járdán and Katalin Cser, Dániel Simonyi (Legal Counsel & Relationship Manager) and Claudia Romero (Marketing and Sales).
Two of the films premiering in this year’s Official Selection were represented by Freeway, Ken Loach’s Palme d’or winner I, Daniel Blake, marking the second time the director has won the festival’s top prize after The Wind That Shakes The Barley (2006); and American Honey, collecting a third Jury Prize for filmmaker Andrea Arnold following her debut feature Red Road (2006) and Fish Tank (2009).
Away from the Palais’ red carpet, business talk on the Croisette was strongly focused on the activities of the big new media players Netflix and Amazon Studios whose production investment for their VOD and SVOD are changing the industry landscape for mainstream and independent films, both in terms of content financing and production and delivering to the consumer.
Freeway partner Gadi Wildstrom said: “I believe we are looking at one of the most dynamic periods that our industry has ever faced with new media creating exciting opportunities for investment as well as enabling a wider range of content to find audiences globally. However, whilst this industry continually demonstrates that it has the strength to adapt, increased risk-taking at every step of the investment and rights acquisition chain is inevitable and being present in this environment to support our clients is crucial to Freeway."