European Films

2007 Romanian Shooting Star Maria Popistasu at the 2006 Karlovy Vary Film Festival. Portrait by Fabrizio Maltese for european-films.net. All rights reserved.

European Film Promotion, the organisation that regroups most of the continent's national film promotion agencies, has announced the full list of 2007 Shooting Stars. The initiative, now in its tenth edition, presents one upcoming actor or actress from each member country to industry and press professionals during the Berlin Film Festival, before going on tour throughout Europe for the rest of the year. Past Shooting Stars include the new 007 Daniel Craig; Rachel Weisz (Best Supporting Actress Oscar winner for The Constant Gardener); Daniel Brühl (Goodbye Lenin, Salvador); Stefano Accorsi (Romanzo Criminale/Crime Novel); Ludivine Sagnier (Swimming Pool) and Anna Geislerová (Stestí/Something Like Happiness, Kráska v nesnázích/Beauty in Trouble). This year a total of 25 Shooting Stars will be presented, including Shooting Stars from new member countries Poland (represented by Agnieszka Grochowska), Slovakia (Tána Pauhofová) and Romania (Maria Popistasu, pictured).

Recently seen as a politically engaged young director in Nanni Moretti's Il caimano (The Caiman), actress Jasmine Trinca will join the 2007 Shooting Stars as the Italian representative at the upcoming Berlin Film Festival. The Rome-born actress debuted in 2001's Cannes Palme d'or winner La stanza del figlio (The Son's Room), also directed by Moretti. She has since co-starred in several highly successful projects, including the Cannes Un certain regard winner La meglio gioventù (The Best of Youth) and Giovanni Veronesi's genial comedy Manuale d'amore (The Handbook of Love), which was one of the country's biggest hits in 2005, raking in over €11 million at home and being released in most other European territories including Germany and Spain.

French actress Mélanie Laurent, who starred in one of the biggest surprise hits of last year, Philippe Lioret's family mystery Je vais bien, ne t'en fais pas (Don't Worry, I'm Fine), will fly the French flag at the upcoming Shooting Stars presentation during the Berlinale in February. The 23 year-old actress made her screen debut in 1999 in Un pont entre deux rives (The Bridge) from Frédéric Auburtin, alongside Gérard Depardieu and Carole Bouquet. Laurent twice played the girlfriend of Gaspard Ulliel (in Embrassez qui vous voudrez/Summer Things and Le dernier jour/The Last Day) and recently co-starred in Audiard's De battre mon coeur s'est arrêté (The Beat That My Heart Skipped) and Rachid Bouchareb's Indigènes (Days of Glory). She recently wrapped Madre e ossa (The First Voice) from Alessandro Capone, in which she is flanked by Isabelle Huppert and Olivier Gourmet.