Chef de Partie Erasmus Project

Project Title

Chef de Partie

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for youth

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2019

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Creativity and culture; Youth (Participation, Youth Work, Youth Policy) ; Overcoming skills mismatches (basic/transversal)

Project Summary

Chef de Partie is a transnational Icelandic and United Kingdom short film. Lead by youth members of both countries with the intention to create a safe learning and working experience founded on respect and empathy towards all participants.

Our story centers around a young ambitious chef who gets a chance to prove himself to his head chef, who accepts nothing short of perfection.
The short film by Ágúst Þór Hafsteinsson is based on his time working in a fine dining kitchen under a menacing head chef.
This will be a culinary film unlike any other. Tense and claustrophobic, much like a war film. There is no critic to appease, no Michelin guide to satisfy, only the young chef’s responsibilities and the determination to rise above and be recognised.

The goal of the project is make a transnational film production where every participant gets a chance to further their knowledge of their filmmaking craft and move forward in their career in the film industry. The intended result is to raise awareness and start a dialogue in which the themes of toxic masculinity and workplace bullying are expressed within the culinary industry as well as other fields of the working world.

A young Icelandic team of four filmmakers will team up with four young UK filmmakers, all of varying skill and experience.
The Icelandic production organisation will work closely with a post-production sound organisation and a production organisation from the UK side. The project will mix young learning filmmakers with older experienced veterans where the young participants will learn the ways of their older, wiser counterparts.

The working grid of different departments of filmmaking, each made up of varying roles in hierarchy and responsibilities, are a proven method through decades of filmmaking around the world. This blueprint for dividing participants and associated partners to their appropriate work within their field will serve our project excellently.

The film is intended to be shown in culinary schools where it can be integrated into the curriculum as a teaching method of workplace ethics. This will hopefully be a step in the right direction of changing the toxic work environment that’s been a part of this culture for too long.

The expected impact is the participants’ growth through this process. The film will act as a stepping stone towards bigger projects in the future. The resulting product will be a showcase of the participants hard work, skill and thoroughness that will serve as a calling card to secure them further work.

After the film’s official conclusion it will be kept in a perpetual cycle of viewing. Screenings at film festival and culinary schools will be followed by releases to VOD services and television screenings around Europe, and finally uploaded to the internet where it will be released without obligations. To be viewed by anyone for years to come.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 27075 Eur

Project Coordinator

Atli Óskar Fjalarsson & Country: IS

Project Partners

• April Kelley
• 344 Audio Limited