TOY CINEMA
UKRAINE
Company Profile
Toy Cinema was founded in 2003 as a service production company. In 2015, the company shifted its focus to produce own content and financed its first feature films in 2017.
Currently, Toy Cinema is a member and co-founder of the Film Industry Association of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Film Academy, and a trusted Ukrainian State Film Agency partner. The company's primary focus is twofold: supporting the new generation of Ukrainian auteur filmmakers and bringing high-quality international co-productions and service projects to Ukraine.
Before the 2022 invasion, Toy Cinema had an in-house team of approximately 18 people and a small team in Kazakhstan. Currently and temporarily, we are continuing operations from Poland, sustaining a team of key members. In addition to providing services for short and long formats in Ukraine, Poland, Georgia, and Kazakhstan, Toy Cinema is dedicated to promoting the development of the Ukrainian film industry and nurturing emerging talent.
Company Highlights
GROUND ZERO (IN DEVELOPMENT)
Format: Feature Film
Genre: Drama
Director: Zhanna Ozirna
Screenplay: Zhanna Ozirna
Marina lives in Paris and writes PhD about the Soviet monotowns - the industrial settlements built for the needs of one giant factory. To finish her research she goes back to her native Ukrainian monotown which still remembers the suicide of her father. Marina makes unexpected discoveries about her roots and faces a difficult personal choice: to restore collective memory as a scientist or to honor private memories as a daughter.
TWINS (IN DEVELOPMENT)
Format: Feature Film
Genre: Drama
Director: Eva Neymann
Screenplay: Eva Neymann
During the Ukrainian tour of the virtuous piano duo “The Osaka Twins”, the elder brother (Yosuke) meets Arina. The time has come for the inseparable twin brothers to part. Yosuke chooses to stay in Ukraine for love's sake, and his younger twin Akira should return to Japan alone. Born a couple of minutes later than Yosuke, Akira is destined to have his brother's face, body, desires and dreams. The resemblance becomes a damnation driving the younger twin from love to murder and from happiness to death. In the end, his own shadow pretends to be the ghost of his brother, haunting him like an inevitable fate.
UNSPOKEN (IN DEVELOPMENT)
Format: Series
Genre: War Thriller
Screenplay: Filip Syczyński, Zhanna Ozirna
"Unspoken" is a semi-documentary thriller based on the events of the first days of Russia's war in Ukraine. Yevgeniy rushes from Poland to Ukraine to his wife and three children, who are in mortal danger due to the Russian invasion. Their voices on the phone will tell what was left unspoken in the news.
MY THOUGHTS ARE SILENT 2019
Format: Feature Film
Genre: Drama, Comedy
Director: Antonio Lukich
Screenplay: Valeria Kalchenko, Antonio Lukich
Cast: Andriy Lidagovskiy, Irma Vitovska, Iryna Verenych-Ostrovska, Istan Rozumny
Twenty-something Vadim is a sound engineer and a downer who is moving from Ukraine to Canada in three months. However, before he departs from the country he is assigned to record the voice of a very rare bird, which dwells only in the Transcarpathian mountains of Ukraine...
Press Articles
https://cineuropa.org/film/374675/
https://cineuropa.org/en/newsdetail/374760/
https://cineuropa.org/en/newsdetail/375158/
https://blimey.pro/review-of-the-movie-my-thoughts-are-silent/
Vilnius Meeting Point WIP GrandPrix 2019
KVIFF Special Jury Prize in East to the West Competition 2019
Raindance Film Festival Discovery Award 2020
OIFF 2019 National Program Audience Award, Best Actress Award and FIPRESCI Award
National Film Academy Award Golden Dzyga for Best Film 2020
LEGACY OF LIES 2020
Format: Feature Film
Genre: Thriller
Director: Adrian Bol
Screenplay: Adrian Bol
Cast: Scott Adkins, Anna Butkevych, Yuliia Sobol, Honor Kneafsey, Martin McDougall, Leon Sua
Ten years ago, a fatal misjudgment made Martin Baxter resign MI6. Now he’s on his last legs, bouncing cheap night clubs and moving around Europe with his 12-year-old daughter Lisa. One night, Martin is approached by Sasha Stepanenko, a young Ukrainian journalist who is determined to find the secret files that were at the heart of Martin’s failure as a secret agent. Martin refuses to help her, afraid to be thrown back into the world of espionage and high stakes. But then, as Martin exits his house, two men in familiar black suits are waiting for him. When he comes to, he sees Tatyana, an agent of the Russian Secret Service, and his daughter Lisa. Tatyana gives Martin an ultimatum: he will bring her the files and Sasha, or his daughter will disappear. The ex-MI6 agent has 24 hours to complete his mission.
Press Articles
https://www.lionsgatepublicity.com/home-entertainment/legacy-of-lies
Ferrara Film Festival (Best Feature WORLD, Best Director)
Malta Film Festival
Ukrainian Film Academy Awards
London Independent Film Awards (2020 Winner Best British Feature)
Birmingham Film Festival
Burbank International Film Festival
Santa Monica Film Festival