_{Erik Glijnis}

Erik Glijnis (the prolific Dutch Producer on the Move in Cannes this year) was part of the class of 2014 at the Netherlands Film Academy, but he had been making shorts and working as an assistant director long before that. In the decade since he graduated, he has remained relentlessly busy. His feature documentary Stranger in Paradise* (2016), which he developed and produced as a freelancer, opened IDFA in 2016, the year he joined leading Dutch production outfit Lemming. Look him up on industry website IMDB Pro and you’ll find over 30 credits already to his name, a huge haul for someone who has only really been active in the industry for 10 years or so.

“Even in high school, I was making videos with my friends,” the young producer remembers. Glijnis grew up in the countryside, far away from the Dutch media scene. “I had no people around me who had any cultural roots,” he notes. That didn’t hold him back. He and his friends posted their early films on YouTube.

With no obvious route into the movie business, Glijnis studied economics in Haarlem. As a student, he did an internship at Reinier Selen’s Rinkel Film, working among others on Dutch-based Polish director Urszula Antoniak’s arthouse hit Nothing Personal (2009). “That’s where I really found out about producing,” he remembers how he learned the rudiments of what was to become his future profession. “It [producing] just suited my skill set best in the film industry.”

Lemming boss Leontine Petit was quick to notice Glijnis’ abilities and work ethic. On his part, he was impressed by the movies that Lemming was then making, films ranging from Amat Escalante’s Heli* to Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Lobster* and David Verbeek’s Full Contact*. The company had an international vision but was also supporting strong Dutch auteurs.

From the moment he joined, Glijnis relished being at Lemming. “It gave me a kick start but, for me, it all starts with the people. I really had a good feeling. Leontine is known for really giving a chance to young producers to ‘dive in at the deep end,’ as they say in the Netherlands.”

The fledgling producer was quickly given the chance to nurture his own projects while also working on big international projects. One of his first assignments was on the ambitious kids’ movie My Giraffe**, directed by Barbara Bredero. This was a Dutch-Belgian-German co-production and was on a 'way bigger' scale than any of his previous features.

Glijnis enjoyed the camaraderie at Lemming. “I didn’t want to work alone any more. Producing is quite a tough job. I wanted to work with colleagues, and share thoughts. We influence each other a lot and there is a lot of cross-collaboration.” He is now one of the senior figures at the company, working alongside Petit.

When he arrived at Lemming, Glijnis hadn’t worked on any co-productions or attended any of those pitching events like the Rotterdam Festival CineMart or the Berlinale Co-production Market. “I had done stuff myself, on really tiny budgets,” he recalls of how he used to work on his own. “[Then] all of a sudden, I was at the table, learning, making films with people I admired. That gave me a push.”

With his economics background, Glijnis is naturally skilled at budgets and the fiscal side of pulling projects together. “I like to be working on those puzzles… we are a tiny country. Every production or almost every production I do is a co-production. There is always a way of listening to the other side and, with that, making the decisions that are best for the film. We take our time carefully to choose our partners because they help us navigate. We are relying on them and they are relying on us.”

One of the international projects on which Glijnis has been closely involved is Mexican Amat Escalante’s Lost in the Night**, which screens in the Premiere section of Cannes. It’s a thriller about a man from a small Mexican mining town searching for those behind the disappearance of his activist mother.

_{Lost in the Night by Amat Escalante}

“I think his work on [Netflix series] Narcos has influenced him and that he has been super-brave in trying new things within this film,” the Dutch producer says of Escalante. “I think Amat’s films are accessible anyway, but that this one will find a wider audience.”

The film’s main producers are Nicolás Celis (also behind Oscar winner Roma), Fernanda de la Peza & Amat Escalante, and the other European partners alongside Lemming include German outfit Match Factory and Danish company Snowglobe. In spite of his status as one of Mexico’s leading auteurs, Escalante was ready to take notes from his co-producers. Dutch elements include VFX, colour grading and sound editing.

As a producer, Glijnis is always drawn to directors with “an outspoken vision.” You won’t find him making conventional genre pictures. Lost in the Night is just one of several new projects on which he has been working, all of them distinctive. On the Dutch side, there is Stefanie Kolk’s surreal drama Milk**, about a mother whose baby is still-born but whose breasts produce huge amounts of milk, and Ena Sendijarević’s very ambitious period drama Sweet Dreams**, set in a sugar plantation in 1900 and looking at the dark side of Dutch colonial history. These are both in post-production.

Minority films in post and on which he is also involved include Justin Anderson’s Swimming Home**, Isabella Eklöf’s Kalak** and Wang Xiaoshuai’s Above the Dust**. He is also currently in production on David Verbeek’s latest feature The Wolf, the Fox & the Leopard** (a Dutch-Irish-Luxembourg co-production).

Now, as he heads toward Cannes, Glijnis is looking forward to hanging out with all the other young producers chosen as part of European Film Promotion’s Producers on the Move programme. “A lot of times when I meet another producer, it is immediately about the project. The programme is a fantastic way to get inspired by people - to talk about life and films. From there, I am pretty sure projects will arise.”

For a full overview on everything from the Netherlands at Cannes, click here.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

*Film is supported by the Netherlands Film Fund
**Film is supported by the Netherlands Film Fund and Film Production Incentive