Boy Meets Girl
Who says networking must be boring or intimidating? Gifted girls meet talented boys in search of their professional soulmates - an odd yet enjoyable kick-off of the Berlinale Talent Campus 2011.
Talents at the Global Speed Matching event
A good looking guy sits opposite a handsome girl. A bell rings. They have three minutes to get to know each other and more if they hit it off. Things start wonderfully: They realise that they’re coming from the same country, Austria. Incredibly, they are doing the same job: They are directors and screenwriters. But the biggest common ground is that both have been chosen to be part of the recent Berlinale Talent Campus, like 350 other young directors, actors, screenwriters, directors of photography, producers and music composers. As to this strange event that looks like a speed dating, it’s actually a “global speed matching”: a one hour long round organised by the BTC to help “Talents” meet future partners and maybe, to kick-start projects.
“This is the best way to break the ice and to make you forget about your timidity”, explains Matthijs Wouter Knol, programme manager of the BTC. You may be shy in the beginning and make a few mistakes, but after twenty short meetings like this, you’ve learnt what you can or cannot say, how to present yourself and your work most effectively. And you feel no fear anymore.”
Let’s check this theory with our two Talents from the beginning. She is Catalina Molina. He is Michael Rittmannsberger: They are 26 and 28 years old and actually seem comfortable. Maybe because they’re not exactly beginners. She just finished a 40-minute feature coproduced by Austria and Argentina, TALLERES CLANDESTINOS. He’s just won the Stockholm Film Festival “iAward” with his moving, silent short SISTER, which was in competition at Slamdance Film Festival, Park City, US. They’re already thinking about what’s next and surrounded by so many peers, they look pretty optimistic.
Networking at first seemed an intimidating and boring activity to me. But maybe I was wrong. Today I saw gifted girls meeting talented boys and it looked only slightly odd. But for next year, I suggest that my colleagues from Talent Press join up. After all, film critics need to meet their professional soulmates too, even if just for three minutes.
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