Wild Love
A dating show turns into a grotesque fight for survival when a hidden experiment is unleashed.
The legendary reality show returns for its 20th anniversary, gathering Baltic contestants on Saaremaa Island for trials of endurance and emotion, winnable only as a couple. Aging hosts Robertas and Inga need real drama to stay relevant and they get it when contestant wanders into an abandoned Soviet lab and is bitten by a mutated creature, infecting her with a decades-old serum that begins to spread.
As the script blurs into reality, the hosts choose ratings over rescue. In the chaos, idealist Arnas and game-player Kotryna find something unscripted: real feelings. But when only pairs can win the final challenge, Kotryna chooses the game over Arnas. Was their love real, or just television?
Producers' note
"Wild Love" is a provocative work exploring the fragility of truth, reality, and emotion in contemporary media society. As producers, we see this film as a thematically timely, audience-accessible genre hybrid, blending psychological satire, social commentary, and horror elements. Director Jonas Trukanas has already shown a strong ability to blend arthouse and genre filmmaking, delivering a debut feature filmed on a modest budget that found both festival recognition and commercial success.
It is an ambitious project that presents considerable production challenges, but one that is deeply intriguing and complex on a conceptual level. The film is being developed as a uniquely pan-Baltic project from the ground up. The concept draws directly on memories of the reality show "Robinsons" - a survival series that became a massive cultural phenomenon across all three Baltic states in the 2000s, watched by entire families. As with the original show's participants, the cast will be made up of representatives from Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. For the lead role, we are in talks with Arnas Fedaravičius, one of the most recognized Lithuanian actors internationally.
The project is currently in development. In July 2026, we confirmed Lithuanian Film Centre funding for pre-production work.
We are working to secure co-production partners in Estonia and Latvia, who would help scout locations, secure permits, and bring in local actors and creative talent, while supporting applications to national funds and the Saaremaa regional fund.
The Baltic Event Co-Production Market is a strategic fit for “Wild Love”, as it is the natural home for a project built on shared Baltic cultural memory. Presenting the project here will help secure co-production partnerships, build visibility and position the project within the wider Baltic industry network ahead of its 2027 financing round, with principal photography targeted for summer 2028 in Saaremaa (Estonia) and Lithuania.
Director's note
"Wild Love" is not a parody. Both thematically and directorially, we want to blend two realities: the glossy, colorful world of a reality show, and a far colder, more frightening reality. This collision is more ideological than comedic: it's a battle between surface image and authentic experience, between a constructed world and human suffering. Over the course of the film, these concepts flip several times. The film asks: is it still possible to tell a real feeling apart from a performed one? What is truth today at all, if it depends on the narrator, the editing, and the camera angle? And what really separates the old Soviet serum that reprograms a person from a modern format that does the same thing, just with ratings?
The film starts inside a reality show's polished, colorful world, performed sincerity, dynamic editing, artificial intimacy. Then we hear "cut," and the tidy reality collapses into danger. The staged aesthetic and real world blend; we first feel close to people whose emotions are fake, then pull away and only then feel them for real.
It's also horror: the infected lose consciousness, spitting Russian phrases, their identity disintegrating rather than their bodies decaying. They repeat what was implanted in them, just as contestants repeat what the director wants.
The characters' journeys shape both the emotional and visual language of the film. At the center is Arnas, a man who idealized the reality the show offered, gradually realizing there is no truth in it. Kotryna is the only one who accepts reality as it is and plays the game to the end, though beneath her cynicism lies simple maternal love. Robertas and Inga are the hosting duo for whom the show is not a job, but the only life they have; they are ready to sacrifice everything just to keep the cameras rolling.
"Wild Love" speaks to people's longing to find something real even in the most staged environment and about what happens when the storytellers themselves begin to believe their own lie.
Biography
Jonas Trukanas graduated with honors in Film Directing from University for the Creative Arts in Farnham, United Kingdom in 2012 and is a two-time Berlinale Talents alumni (2013 and 2017). His debut short film “Booksmuggler” (2011) won an Audience Favourite Award at Vilnius International Film Festival. His other short films “Ghost I Don’t Remember” (2015); “Trolleybus-Man” (2016); and “When the Lights Go Out” (2018) also screened at many international film festivals including Neuchatel Fantastic Film Festival, Sedicicorto International Film Festival, Brussels Fantastic Film Festival and Gijon International Film Festival. “Pensive” is his feature debut.
Filmography
Filmography
Rupintojelis (Pensive, 2022)
Biography
Titas Laucius finished his BA in Scriptwriting at Lithuanian Music and Theatre Academy, followed by an MA in Film Directing. His short fiction film "Snake" (2018) won the award for Most Promising Director in the student film competition of Vilnius Film Festival Kino Pavasaris. His second short film "Family Unit" (2019) won the Best Short Film at Vilnius Film Festival Kino Pavasaris and National film award for best student film. "Parade" is his feature film debut.
Filmography
Filmography
Parade (2022)
Profile
Afterschool was established in 2014 by director/cinematographer Laurynas Bareiša and producer Klementina Remeikaitė. Most recently, Bareiša's feature film DROWNING DRY won Best Director and Best Performance in the main competition of Locarno 2024, while his debut feature PILGRIMS received the award for Best Film of Venice's Orizzonti section in 2021. PARADE (2022) by Titas Laucius (connecting cottbus 2020) screened at Tallinn Black Nights and won Best Director at goEast as well as two Lithuanian Film Awards in 2023. The company has also produced over 10 short films, including Bareiša's DUMMY (Berlinale Shorts 2020), KAUKAZAS (Locarno 2018) and BY THE POOL (Venice 2017), and Vytautas Katkus' PLACES (Venice 2020). Currently working on minority co-production and developing debut features films with Lithuanian talents.