The inaugural Nordic Genre Lab at Helsinki’s Finnish Film Affair showcased eight genre projects, providing mentorship from Claire Willats and Todd Brown and highlighting the depth of Nordic talent.
The Finnish Film Affair industry conference, held September 23‑25 at the Helsinki International Film Festival, launched the inaugural Nordic Genre Lab. Eight high‑end genre films were selected from 29 submissions and were pitched to more than 500 delegates, with workshops and mentorship from Two Magpies Entertainment’s Claire Willats, a former Netflix commissioner, and genre expert Todd Brown, formerly head of acquisitions at XYZ Films.
Willats and Brown said the lab aims to strengthen the Nordic genre ecosystem. Brown told Variety that “the base of talent is deep” and that Nordic creators balance critical quality with audience accessibility, though he noted a lack of institutional genre knowledge within funding bodies. Willats added that there is “a huge appetite for Nordic genre in the global market” and expressed hopes to expand the lab next year to include Sámi, Icelandic and Greenlandic projects.
The eight finalists span a range of sub‑genres, including the Finnish thriller “Alma,” the Faroese horror “Whistler,” the Norwegian dystopian road movie “Long Way Home,” the Finnish anime horror “Echo Chamber,” and the Swedish backwoods horror “Trespassers.” Participants such as producer Jón Hammer ("Whistler") and producer Pauliina Piipponen ("Alma") said the mentorship and development support were “incredibly exciting” and timely for their projects’ financing and production strategies.
The lab is backed by Nordisk Kulturfond, the Finnish Film Foundation and Nordisk Film & TV Fond. While organizers plan to repeat the event, details about future editions and the inclusion of additional regional projects remain limited.