Cross-media

Twingo the filmmaker

Name: Twingo the filmmaker
Director: Matija Radeljak
Released: 2012

2012 · documentary-comedy travelogue package with web series, TV mini-series, and feature documentary modules · cross-platform documentary project

Road-documentary concept where a runaway car reframes Europe's film economy and survival realities.

Cestovni dokumentarac u kojem odbjegli auto postaje leća za europsku filmsku ekonomiju i svakodnevno preživljavanje njezinih radnika.

This project credentials: Cross-media & events

Notes from the producer

Twingo was the most honest thing we ever pitched, because the pitch was just our own situation with a punchline: to keep Aning Film alive, we would sell the car. I wrote and directed it, Bojan produced with me, and for a while it worked the way development is supposed to. We got into i_Doc in Nyon and onto BDC's Discoveries program, shot a first test, printed the badges, planned the Indiegogo, and drew the route across half of Europe on a blackboard.

What I will not pretend is that it reached the finish line. The pilot we scheduled for that summer never closed in any file I can point to, and the campaign and the co-production never turned into a release. I still think the idea was right, and the paper trail shows we knew how to move it through the European system. It just did not become the film.

- Matija Radeljak

The story

Twingo began as a joke Aning Film could not afford to make, and made anyway. The premise, spelled out on the project's own Facebook cards in early 2014, was disarmingly honest: Bojan Kanjera and Matija Radeljak were two young producers trying to live and work for culture without ending up under a bridge, and to keep the company afloat they would have to sell their car, a small and loyal Renault Twingo. From that comic surrender the studio built a cross-platform documentary, a web series, a TV mini-series and a feature-length film, all running off the same story about how European film workers actually survive.

The development was disciplined even when the money was not. An operating plan running from June 2013 laid out concept, treatment and a pilot screenplay against HAVC's spring 2014 deadlines. By January 2014 there were partner-, investor- and sponsor-facing proposals in Croatian and English; by February the team had scripted and shot a Berlinale intro video rather than waiting for financing to arrive first. The route itself became design, chalkboard maps tracing a line through Brussels, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Helsinki, Vilnius and Warsaw, with a separate Cannes leg where, in the fiction, the car goes missing.

April 2014 was the hinge. A HAVC supplement dated 9 April reported the project accepted into the i_Doc workshop in Nyon and attached to the Balkan Documentary Center's Discoveries 2014 program, and it reset the budget from a 50,000 EUR proposal (with a 7,500 EUR Indiegogo target) to a full production architecture of 176.886,21 EUR / 1.344.335,16 HRK reaching through 2017. The costs stopped being hypothetical: a first test shoot was completed that month, and a 1,000 EUR participation fee for BDC Discoveries was paid on 22 April (with 200 campaign badges and two promotional booklets already invoiced in February).

The public traces are real but modest. tportal covered the crowdfunding drive in February 2014; the project surfaced in HAVC's 2014 documentary funding results as "Odbjegli Twingo: Malo Europe i kulture u 40 dana" and on Nordisk Panorama's Balkan Delegation slate. A 60-day Indiegogo campaign was mapped for 20 August to 20 October 2014, and BDC pitch updates show the team still developing the project into 2015.

What the archive does not show is an ending. The 60-minute pilot planned for July 2014, and the final release path, whether broadcast, festival or online, are not documented in the surviving files. As a portfolio entry Twingo is honest about that: it is proof of development and packaging work, a small studio moving an idea through European workshops (i_Doc, BDC), a crowdfunding plan and a co-production dossier, rather than a finished film. The service it demonstrates is getting a cross-media project written, costed and into the room.

Milestones

2013-06 — Development begins; operating plan sets concept, treatment and pilot script against HAVC deadlines
2014-01 — Partner, investor and sponsor proposals prepared in Croatian and English
2014-02 — Berlinale intro video scripted and shot
2014-04 — First test shoot completed
2014-04-09 — Accepted to i_Doc (Nyon) and BDC Discoveries 2014; budget revised to 176.886,21 EUR
2014-04-22 — 1,000 EUR BDC Discoveries participation fee paid
2014-08 — 60-day Indiegogo campaign mapped for 20 Aug to 20 Oct 2014
2015 — BDC pitch updates; project still in active development

Outcomes

Development selection — Accepted to the i_Doc workshop in Nyon and the Balkan Documentary Center Discoveries 2014 program
Test shoot — First test shoot completed in April 2014, with a trailer attached to the HAVC project update
Campaign collateral — 200 badges and two promotional booklets produced (invoiced February 2014)
Industry listing — Featured on the Nordisk Panorama Balkan Delegation slate and in HAVC 2014 documentary funding results as "Odbjegli Twingo"
Not completed — The 60-minute pilot planned for July 2014 and a final release path are not documented in the surviving files

Credits

Matija Radeljak — Writer, director, producer
Bojan Kanjera — Producer
Aning Film (Aning usluge d.o.o.) — Production company