Development slate

Haunted by city lights

2018 · screenplay-led development package · feature film project

Greek dystopian feature project mapping surveillance capitalism onto contemporary Athens and stratified urban life.

Grčki distopijski dugometražni projekt koji nadzorni kapitalizam preslikava na Atenu bliske budućnosti i njezin raslojeni gradski život.

Haunted by city lights — production still

Notes from the producer

On Haunted by City Lights, Aning Film was the Croatian co-production leg. Stratis and Syni owned the story; my job with Giannis at Real Eyes was to build the international spine around it, carry it through the labs, and structure a financing plan a Greek-Croatian feature could actually stand on. That included the HAVC minority line and the Croatian side of the paperwork, and it is where I signed a letter of commitment in 2015.

I will not dress this up. The development worked - SOURCES2, BABYLON, Cross Channel Film Lab, a real budget and a real visual package. The financing did not close, the Sarajevo pitch stayed an intention, and the film has never shot. What it proves is the part I can stand behind: taking an author-driven dystopia and giving it a credible cross-border production and financing architecture. The rest was the market, and the market said no.

- Matija Radeljak

The story

Haunted by City Lights is a feature project that treats Athens as a machine rather than a backdrop. Written and directed by Stratis Chatzielenoudas with co-writer Syni Pappa, it imagines a near-future city where a private corporation, A2Z, has absorbed the functions of the state, sorting people by class into separated zones and holding them in line with checkpoints, surveillance, detention infrastructure and media messaging. Across treatment, synopsis, artistic statement and screenplay, three intersecting lives keep hitting the same pressure point: when fear organizes daily life, ordinary people either collaborate, hide, or resist in small and dangerous ways.

It was run as a long development campaign, not a single submission. A 2014 SOURCES2 workshop, documented in a letter from dramatic advisor Arash T. Riahi, was followed in February 2015 by the first BABYLON workshop in Vienna and a recommendation from programme director Fiona Howe, and then by selection into the Cross Channel Film Lab 2015 Core Training Programme. The same package circulated through CoCo, NCN, Sofia Meetings and When East Meets West, and a Cross Channel Film Lab note records the project going to a Cinemed development meeting. Underneath the labs sat a concrete cross-border spine: Real Eyes Productions in Athens, Aning Film in Zagreb, and Margot Filmhouse, with Bait Studio later attached in co-production.

The visual development is where the ambition stops being abstract. A cinematography and colour-palette folder builds a black, muted, hostile night city; there are rooftop references and a dedicated rooftop shot list, dystopian costume boards, raw concept art carrying A2Z iconography, and handmade mask prototypes. A promo shooting script dated 12 February 2016, prepared under Real Eyes Productions, shows this was operational intent about what to film and how to stage it, not only mood-boarding.

Financial planning reached feature scale by August 2015. The budget lands around 842,625 EUR, with the weight in film production (240,000 EUR), post-production (214,000 EUR) and production fees (195,000 EUR). The financing plan totals 846,000 EUR and names its targets plainly: 300,000 EUR from the Greek Film Center for 2016, an 80,000 EUR Croatian minority co-production line from HAVC for 2017, a 20,000 EUR national broadcaster presale, and 35,000 EUR of Margot Filmhouse own investment. Own-investment from Margot and Aning is recorded as committed; the external lines stayed marked as targets.

What the project proves is the development and co-production work: a mature dystopian screenplay world, validation across three international script labs, a coherent Greek-Croatian production identity, and a visual package solid enough to launch a feature. What it did not reach is equally clear. The stated Sarajevo Talents Pack and Pitch is documented as intention, not completion; the financing never closed into a shoot; and the film sits on IMDb as In Production. This is the honest shape of ambitious development that built strong foundations and then hit the familiar wall between a finished package and a financed film.

Milestones

  • 2014-06 — SOURCES2 script workshop collaboration (letter from dramatic advisor Arash T. Riahi)
  • 2015-02 — First BABYLON workshop, Vienna
  • 2015-03 — BABYLON recommendation letter from programme director Fiona Howe
  • 2015 — Selected for the Cross Channel Film Lab 2015 Core Training Programme
  • 2015-05 — Aning Film letter of commitment to development and production
  • 2016-02 — Promo shooting script prepared under Real Eyes Productions

Outcomes

  • Cross Channel Film Lab 2015 — Selected for the Core Training Programme
  • Lab development validated — Package developed through SOURCES2, BABYLON 2015 and Cross Channel Film Lab 2015
  • Committed own-investment — Financing plan records confirmed own-investment from Margot Filmhouse and Aning Film
  • Feature development package — Screenplay, treatment, lookbook, promo shooting script and visual development completed
  • IMDb listing — Registered as In Production (tt4082880)

Credits

  • Stratis Chatzielenoudas — Writer / Director
  • Syni Pappa — Co-writer
  • Matija Radeljak — Producer (Aning Film)
  • Giannis Sotiropoulos — Producer (Real Eyes Productions)
  • Vangelis Fakinos — Line producer
  • Arash T. Riahi — Dramatic advisor (SOURCES2)
  • Real Eyes Productions — Production company (Greece)
  • Aning Film — Co-production company (Croatia)
  • Margot Filmhouse — Co-producer
  • Bait Studio — Co-production (per IMDb)

Press & links

Related work: Sofkes Welt

Aning Film