The 27 residents on the tiny Danish Wadden Sea island of Mandø, are used to severe weather and flooding. Climate change has only made things worse and now it poses a serious existential threat to the eight-square-kilometer island. However, its last farmer, Gregers, whose family has lived there for eight generations, hasn’t given up in the face of the impending catastrophe. He refuses to build a life elsewhere and instead hopes to find a wife to manage the farm with him.
As a storm is slowly approaching, Gregers and his faithful dog inspect the obsolete dikes that protect his beloved island. In the meantime, Mie blows out the candles of her 100th-year birthday cake, Ellen and Ingeborg complain about the moon disease they suffer from, birdwatcher Niels laments about the rare birds that don’t visit the island anymore, and tourist guide Preben tells stories, about how Mandø’s entire community was almost completely wiped out during a storm surge in 1634, to summer visitors who come and go on a daily basis. Despite the new threats from the rising sea, today’s current generation holds on steadfastly to their little part of the world.
The portrait of this microcosm is accompanied by masterfully crafted shots of the distinctive landscape, shifting skies, and seas that change with the wind and tide. In a sense, the grim fate of these islanders, presented in daily humorous situations, affects us all.
SCREENINGS & AWARDS
World Premiere: IDFA 2023 – International Competition
2024 Gothenburg Film Festival – Nordic Competition
2024 DocPoint Helsinki & Tallinn
2024 True/False Film Fest (North American Premiere)
2024 HUMAN IDFF
2024 Thessaloniki DFF (Greek Premiere)
2024 CPH:DOX (Danish Premiere)
2024 One world Prague (Czech Premiere)
2024 Movies that Matter
2024 One World Romania (Romanian Premiere)
2024 ZagrebDox (Croatian Premiere)
2024 Visions du Réel (Swiss Premiere)
2024 Millenium Docs Against Gravity (Polish Premiere)
2024 Biografilm Festival (Italian Premiere)
2024 MDOC, Melgaco International Documentary Film Festival (Portuguese Premiere)
2024 Dokufest (Kosovo Premiere)
2024 Melbourne IFF (Australian Premiere)
2024 Rockaway Film Festival (NYC Premiere)
2024 Nordkapp Filmfestival
2024 International Human Rights Film Festival Albania (Albanian Premiere)
2024 Nordisk Panorama Malmo
2024 Hamburg Filmfest (German Premiere)
2024 EcoTrip Festival
2024 Pianeta Mare
2024 Festival International du Film de La Roche-sur-Yon (French Premiere)
2024 Ulaanbaatar International Film Festival (Asian Premiere)
2024 Bergen IFF
2024 Folkestone DFF (UK Premiere)
2024 Planet in Focus (Canadian Premiere)
2024 Inconvenient Films Festival / Nepatogus Kinas
2024 IDF – West Lake International Documentary Festival
2024 IFEMA – International Female + Film Festival Malmo
2024 Free Zone Film Festival (Serbian Premiere)
2024 Nordische Filmtage
2024 Bainbridge Film Festival
2024 Glimmerglass Film Days
2024 Northern Film Festival
2024 Gijon International Film Festival – FICX (Spanish Premiere)
2024 L’Alternativa – International Independent Film Festival of Barcelona
2024 Camerimage
2024 EU Human Rights Film Days Türkiye
Upcoming: Tromsø IFF (Jan 13-19), Ekenas Filmfest (Jan 17-19)
AWARDS
- Best Film Award in Green Competition at Inconvenient Films 2024
This film is a unique cinematic experience that not only satisfies a sense of curiosity but also keeps us alert. A clear directorial vision pushes the boundaries of cinema as far as this medium allows and tries to engage in a non-didactic, meaningful conversation with the audience. As you’re watching a small community going about their lives, while their island is being swallowed by the sea, you start to feel as if also slowly drawing together. It is melancholic to witness something that soon will be gone, but also there is the joy that it all existed. This film is almost a statement, a time capsule for the future – see how we lived! And see how we drowned.
Jury Statement, Best Film Award in Green Competition at Inconvenient Films 2024
- Best Spanish Feature Film Prize at Gijon International Film Festival 2024
The Spanish Cinema Jury has decided to award the Best Film Prize to As the Tide Comes In, directed by Juan Palacios, for immersing us in an extremely powerful visual universe full of poetry and environmental reflection and offering us the portrait of a small community in transformation from a sensitive perspective and with sense of humour. Juan Palacios has been able to capture the essential connection between human beings and the natural environment with an anthropological gaze, revealing the small epiphanies that arise in the simplest moments.
Jury Statement, Best Spanish Feature Film Prize at Gijon International Film Festival 2024
- Premio “RCSERVICE” Award for the Director of the Best Spanish Feature Film for Juan Palacios at at Gijon International Film Festival 2024
PRESS
Reviews: Deadline, Cineuropa, Business Doc Europe, The Film Verdict, Screen Daily
Interviews: Variety
***
“Impressively, the film walks that delicate line of both celebrating Mando as an entirely unique place, an island lost in time, and holding it up as a King Canute-esque symbol for humanity’s ongoing fight to hold back the tide.”
Nikki Baughan, Screen Daily
“Directors Juan Palacios and Sofie Husum Johannesen find beauty and sadness in this visually exquisite documentary about a tiny island community menaced by climate change.”
Stephen Dalton, The Film Verdict
“The film is an ode to this tough community and its tenacious residents. It shows these people’s love for a nature that gives them what they need but also takes from them what they don’t want to lose. It captures everything in outstanding cinematography and ties it all together in sublime editing.”
Nicole Santé, Business Doc Europe
DIRECTOR’S BIOGRAPHY & FILMOGRAPHY
Juan Palacios
Juan Palacios is a Basque filmmaker and an artistic researcher with a background in Environmental Studies and an MA in Film from the Netherlands Film Academy. With a particular interest in the boundaries between human culture and the non-human, mysticism and materialism, he employs imagery from a natural world to create an alternative universe. His first feature documentary film, Pedaló (2016), was awarded at San Sebastian International Film Festival in 2016. His second feature film, Meseta (Inland) (2019), a sensorial trip through the empty landscape of Spain, won several international awards.
Sofie Husum Johannesen
Sofie Husum Johannesen has a background in Visual Anthropology from Aarhus University and has worked as a core part of Elk Film’s production and producer team since 2017. She has worked alongside world-renowned filmmakers on titles such as The Lost Leonardo (2022), See Me as I Am (2022), Aswang (2019), The Great Game (2018), among others. As the Tide Comes In is Sofie’s debut in directing.
CREDITS
Writer, Director Juan Palacios
Co-director Sofie Husum Johannesen
Cinematography Juan Palacios
Editing Nicolas Nørgaard Staffolani
Sound Design Peter Albrechtsen
Composer Morten Svenstrup
Producer Kasper Lykke Schultz
Production company Elk Film
Original idea, Creative and Executive producer Andreas Dalsgaard
Story development by Juan Palacios, Sofie Husum Johannesen, Kasper Lykke Schultz & Andreas Dalsgaard
WITH THE SUPPORT OF
The Danish Film Institute
PRODUCER’S BIOGRAPHY & FILMOGRAPHY
Kasper Lykke Schultz
Affiliated with Copenhagen based Elk Film as Film Producer. Kasper has a varied background with a solid experience from the film industry both in terms of financing, producing and the creative development of both documentaries and narrative short and features. Kasper is a European Film College Alumni. In addition, he holds a master’s degree in Cross-cultural Studies and a BA-degree in Balkan Studies from The University of Copenhagen. His filmography includes Innocence (2022), The Lost Leonardo (2021), Scandinavian Stars (2020) and The Cave (2019) among others.
PRODUCTION COMPANY
Elk Film is a production company based in Copenhagen. Dedicated to developing and producing documentary films, series and fictional adaptations for global audiences. Elk’s team of producers and creatives specialize in high profile stories backed by elaborate research and finely crafted narratives. We actively help shape narratives and challenge filmmakers all the way from idea to final film. We combine a worldwide network of leading researchers, both journalistic and anthropological, with a lean experienced production infrastructure, state-of-the-art equipment department, editing suites, production managers, financial department, and financing team. Our aim is to bridge filmmaking talent with a global market and financing infrastructure. We are well positioned in the existing North European production structure, involving public film funds and broadcasters. We are also engaged in the intersection of the new developing equity and streamer market, bridging distribution and equity financing already from a development stage. The company was founded in 2013 by CEO Andreas Dalsgaard and Editor Nicolás Nørgaard Staffolani.
Elk Film
Copenhagen, Denmark
contact@elkfilm.dk
https://www.elkfilm.dk
