animation – made in germany

GERMANCINEMA

Kino AT CANNES

in Competition

RUSSIAN ARK

by Alexander Sokurov

in Un Certain Regard

TEN MINUTES OLDER

by Werner Herzog,

Wim Wenders, et al

GERMAN FILM AWARD

… and the nominees are …

SPECIAL REPORT

Animation –

Made in Germany

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EXPORT-UNION

OF GERMAN CINEMA

2/2002

German F i lms IN THE

in Competition

Russian Ark (Germany/Russia)by Alexander Sokurov

World Sales: Celluloid Dreams, Paris/Francephone +33-1-49 70 03 70fax +33-1-49 70 03 71

in Competition

The Man Without a Past

(Finland/Germany/France)by Aki Kaurismaeki

German co-producer: Pandora Film,Cologne/Germany

phone +49-2 21-97 33 20fax +49-2 21-97 33 29

World Sales: Bavaria Film International,Geiselgasteig/Germany

phone +49-89-64 99 26 86fax +49-89-64 99 37 20

in Competition

The Pianist (Germany/France/Poland/United Kingdom)by Roman Polanski

German co-producer: Studio Babelsberg, Potsdam/Germanyphone +49-3 31-7 21 30 01 fax +49-3 31-7 21 25 25

in Competition

Sweet Sixteen(United Kingdom/Germany/Spain)

by Ken Loach

German co-producer: Road Movies, Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-8 80 48 60fax +49-30-88 04 86 11

OFFICIAL PROGRAM OF THE

Cannes Fes t i va lin Un Certain Regard

Ten Minutes Older

by By Aki Kaurismaeki, Víctor Erice, Werner Herzog, Jim Jarmusch, Wim Wenders,

Spike Lee, Chen Kaige, et al

World Sales: Road Sales,Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-8 80 48 60fax +49-30-88 04 86 11

in Directors’ Fortnight / En avant !

Phantomby Matthias Mueller

World Sales: Matthias Mueller,Bielefeld/Germanyphone/fax +49-5 21-17 83 67

in Directors’ Fortnight

Deux(France/Germany)

by Werner Schroeter

German co-producer: Road Movies, Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-8 80 48 60fax +49-30-88 04 86 11

(Credits not contractual)

K I N O 2 / 2 0 0 2

6 Animation – Made in Germany

On the History and Current Situation of

Animation Films in Germany

16 The Unbearable Lightness of Film

Director’s Portrait Andreas Dresen

17 ”I’m Interested in People Who

Cross Over Boundaries“

Director’s Portrait Elfi Mikesch

20 Cinepool’s Dream Team

World Sales Portrait Cinepool

22 Creating a Quality Brand

Producers’ Portrait MTM Medien &

Television Muenchen

24 KINO news

30 In Production

30 Der alte Affe Angst

Oskar Roehler

30 Das fliegende Klassenzimmer

Tomy Wigand

31 Gate to Heaven

Veit Helmer

32 Gruesse aus Dachau!

Bernd Fischer

32 Das Jesus Video

Sebastian Niemann

33 Der Laufbursche

Yueksel Yavuz

34 Nach Haus in die Fremde

Andreas Kleinert

34 Olgas Sommer

Nina Grosse

35 Die Paepstin

Volker Schloendorff

36 SimsalaGrimm – The Movie

Gerhard Hahn

36 Die Suenderin

Sherry Hormann

37 Sugar Orange

Andreas Struck

38 The 100 Most

Significant German Films (Part 5)

38 Liebelei

Max Ophuels

39 Wintergartenprogramm

Max Skladanowsky

40 Lola Montez

Max Ophuels

41 Madame Dubarry

PASS ION

Ernst Lubitsch

42 New German Films

42 Anansi

Fritz Baumann

43 Annas Sommer

AN NA’S S U M M E R

Jeanine Meerapfel

44 Berlin – Sinfonie

einer Grossstadt

B E RLI N SYM PHONY

Thomas Schadt

45 Die Datsche

HOM E TRUTH S

Carsten Fiebeler

46 Dream Dream Dream

Anne Alix

47 Gold Cuts – eine poetische

Reise durch die Gegensaetze

GOLD C UTS – A POETIC TRAI L

TH ROUG H CONTRADICTION

Ernst Handl, Team Gold Cuts

48 Grosse Maedchen weinen nicht

B IG G I RLS DON'T C RY

Maria von Heland

49 Herz im Kopf

H EART OVE R H EAD

Michael Gutmann

50 Nichts Bereuen

NO REG RETS

Benjamin Quabeck

51 Poem – ”Ich setzte den Fuss

in die Luft, und sie trug“

POE M

Ralf Schmerberg

52 Ein Produzent hat Seele

oder er hat keine

Volker Schloendorff

53 Russian Ark

Alexander Sokurov

54 Sternzeichen

ZODIAC S IG N

Peter Patzak

55 Suche impotenten Mann

fuers Leben

I N S EARC H OF AN I M POTE NT MAN

John Henderson

56 Ten Minutes Older

Werner Herzog, Wim Wenders, et al

57 Verrueckt nach Paris

C RAZY ABOUT PARI S

Pago Balke, Eike Besuden

58 Westend

Markus Mischkowski, Kai Maria Steinkuehler

62 Film Exporters

66 Foreign Representatives

66 Imprint

C O N T E N T S

AT CAN N E S

MARKET SC RE E N I NG S

AT CAN N E S


AT CAN N E S


AT CAN N E S


AT CAN N E S


AT CAN N E S

I N COM PETITION

AT CAN N E S


AT CAN N E S

U N C E RTAI N REGARD

Key European Market If one wanted proof that the German animation industry hasbecome a force to be reckoned with in Europe, this was convincingly delivered last year when two of the industry’s top international events – March’s CARTOON Movie andSeptember’s CARTOON Forum – were both staged inGermany.

In fact, it was the third time that the CARTOON Movieco-production market had assembled at the Babelsberg Studios

(returning for a fourth time this spring). And the Bavarian alpine town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen was the latest stop in CARTOON Forum’s trail across Europe, which brought more than 700 delegates together for the pitching of projects foranimated TV series and web-based productions.

The significance of the German animation sector was also broughtout by the fact that 240 of the delegates accredited at the Forumwere from Germany, including 60 potential investors, withGerman animation production outfits involved as lead producer in18 of the market’s 88 projects.

While France is still the leading center for the production of ani-mation in Europe, Germany has now developed in a matter ofonly a few years into the second largest European market, withproduction said to be worth US$130 million annually and new animation studios popping up in some corner of the countryevery month.

Long Tradition in Animation However, before we look at the current situation of the anima-tion industry in Germany, let’s have a brief glance back at some ofthe past highlights in German animation.

Going back to the days of the silent movies, before the FirstWorld War, the first German animation films were made byJulius Pinschewer (Corsets Gebr. Lewandowski, 1910)and Guido Seeber (Die geheimnisvolle Streich-holzdose, 1909/10).

In the 1920s, their involvement in abstract and dadaist art attrac-ted Walther Ruttmann (Der Sieger, 1921) and HansRichter (Rhythmus series, 1921-1925) to make outings intoanimation, but a unique figure from this time who built up anunchallenged international reputation was the animator Lotte

Reiniger, who became famous for her silhouette films createdfrom back-lit paper cut-outs.

She made her first animation film in 1919 (The Ornament ofthe Lovestruck Heart/Das Ornament des verliebtenHerzens) and animated a dream sequence for Fritz Lang’s1924 epic Die Nibelungen, which was widely screened despitebeing removed from the completed version of the film. Reiniger’sclassic The Adventures of Prince Achmed (DieAbenteuer des Prinzen Achmed, 1926) – which was credited by some as being the first feature-length animation film –consisted of 250,000 single images and had a ”multi-plane“ cam-era specially designed and built for the production.

In addition to shooting experimental shorts and silhouette filmsfrom the late 20s to the mid 1930s, Reiniger also contributed sil-houette sequences for such live-action features as GeorgWilhelm Pabst’s Don Quixote (Don Quichotte, 1933)and Jean Renoir’s La Marseillaise (1937). In 1936, Reiniger emigrated with her husband to Great Britain where shelived and worked (Hansel & Gretel, 1955) – among otherthings, for the Crown Film Unit and General Post Office Unit –until 1980 before returning to her native country a year beforeher death.

6 Kino 2/2002

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7Kino 2/2002

– MADE IN GERMANY

Another important figure was the avant-garde animator and paint-er Oskar Fischinger who co-owned an animation company inMunich by the age of 22 and produced a number of experimentalfilms. In an attempt to combine his two passions of music and the graphic arts, Fischinger experimented with photographing multiple forms – melting wax, cardboard cutouts, swirling liquids.According to Fischinger historian William Moritz, he devised”a machine that would slice very thin layers from a prepared blockof wax, with a camera synchronized to take one frame of theremaining surface of the block. Any kind of image could be builtinto the wax block – a circle getting smaller would be a simplecone, for example.“

Fischinger worked at the UFA studios in Babelsberg on the special effects for Fritz Lang’s silent science fiction filmWoman in the Moon (Frau im Mond) in 1928, and someof his shorts took the form of advertisements. Muratti Getsin the Act (Muratti greift ein, 1934), for example, was fora popular cigarette company and had cigarettes marching in madgoose-stepping formation – as a precursor to his later work with

Walt Disney on Fantasia (1940) where broomsticks did the marching in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice episode.

Fischinger’s pioneering use of multiple overlapping projected ima-ges and light shows alongside his abstract animation won him afollowing outside of Germany at film festivals around the world for bringing the last word in modernism. But the Nazis didn’t share the same enthusiasm declaring his work as ”degenerate“ in 1936. Forced to leave Germany, Fischinger created shorts for Paramount and MGM, worked for a year at Disney onFantasia and at Orson Welles’ Mercury Theater on aproject that was never realized. As Moritz notes, ”he was theonly avant-garde filmmaker of the 20s who also continued hiswork in the 30s and 40s in his new home of Los Angeles and sohelped to spur on the experimental film movement in America“.

Animation During the Third ReichAny development of artistic dimensions to animation was nippedin the bud by the draconian measures of the Nazi regime from1933 onwards even though there was a (failed) attempt in 1942by the Film Ministry to establish an official Deutsche ZeichenfilmGmbH. The Film Ministry did command however the most distin-guished animators still in Germany to step up their production andconcentrate on theatrically viable animation features.

One figure working during the 30s was Wolfgang Kaskeline(Zwei Farben, 1933, and Der blaue Punkt, 1936), who,despite the general restriction of artistic freedom, was mainlyactive in the field of advertising and ran his own studios in Berlin and Bonn-Bad Godesberg after the war until his death in 1973.

Short animated commercials were the focus of the work at thistime by the three Diehl brothers – Paul, Hermann andFerdinand Diehl – who initially started in classical animationand silhouette films before moving into puppet animation whenthey set up their studio in Graefelfing, near Munich, in 1929. Their film work specialized on fables and fairytales, but their greatest success was with the tales spun around the figure of”Mecki“ (1937) who captured children’s (and adults’) heartsfrom the 1950s onwards and spawned a veritable flood of toysand books, even to this day. Until 1970, the Diehls made morethan 60 films – some combining puppet animation with live-action – and over 100 commercials.

Meanwhile, ”audience darling“ Hans Fischer – also known asFischerkoesen – directed and produced animated fairy talefantasies -– such as Schall und Rauch (1933), Das blaue Wunder (1935) and Snowman (Der Schneemann, 1944)– which some observers deemed could hold their own with thelikes of Disney. As a result of Fischerkoesen’s success in adverti-sing films, Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels ordered him tomove his staff and studio from the Leipzig area to Potsdam tomake himself available for consultations and special effects on features and documentaries.

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A N I M A T I O N – M A D E I N G E R M A N Y

Kino 2/2002

Disney DominanceAfter 1945, Germany was flooded with animated films from theUS, particularly from Walt Disney. People who had just livedunder 12 years of terror wanted to catch up on all of the plea-sures forbidden them by the Nazis and this included films fromHollywood.

As Albrecht Ade, founder of the internationally-renowned animation festival in Stuttgart, pointed out in an touring exhibitionbrochure of the new generation of animators in 1984, Disney etal then set the agenda for a long while regarding the audiences’tastes, and it was only in the second half of the 1960s that newefforts came from art academies and individual enthusiasts to givespace once more to experimentation in animation and find newforms of expressions and new audiences.

In the fifties, animation in (West) Germany was – with a fewexceptions – more about mannered style and perfect animationtechnique than the quality of the drawing and imagination in thedramaturgy. Any prospects for a continuity in the development ofthe animation sector withered away when the tax incentives forcultural films (Kulturfilme)– and thus for animated shorts – wereabolished. For many years, animation was alive and well inGermany – but only in the world of advertising.

The Oberhauseners and AnimationIn February 1962, a group of young filmmakers signed theOberhausen Manifesto, including a handful of animators.One of the signatories, Wolfgang Urchs had made the shortDie Gartenzwerge in 1961, pointing up social aspects of lifein the young Federal Republic. At the time, the press described itas ”the first competitive West German animated short“ andUrchs followed with highly political short films like Die Pistole(1963) and Kontraste (1964).

It was over two decades, though, before Urchs embarked on hisfirst animated feature for Michael Schoemann’s studio, Inder Arche liegt der Wurm, which was made between 1985and 1987 and known as Stowaway in the Ark in the US. Hefollowed this in 1990 with Peterchens Mondfahrt.

Meanwhile, fellow Oberhausener Helmut Herbst, who laterprogressed to live action features, brought the Axel Springer con-cern into his sights with Schwarz-Weiss-Rot (1963/1964).He then established the animation studio Cinegrafik inHamburg which worked on animation sequences for industrialfilms and for Time Life as well as promotional trailers for thethird channel of local public broadcaster NDR. One of the stu-dio’s collaborators was Franz Winzentsen who had co-founded an experimental puppet theater in 1960 and worked onanimation films at Cinegrafik until 1973.

In the 1970s, Winzentsen and his first wife Ursula made many animation films for children’s television at NDR and WDR, continuing this work into the 1980s after their separation withsuch children’s films as Hin- und Rueckfahrt (1984/85) andTelefonfieber (1984/85), playing with the possibilities of themedium.

A previous film, Flamingo – Aus meinem Anima-tionstagebuch (1982), had seen Winzentsen – who has beenserving as professor for animation at the Academy of Fine Arts inHamburg since 1987 – combining various animation techniqueswith photographs he had collected or taken. This approach wascontinued in a collaboration with Thomas Mitscherlich onthe feature Der Fotograf (1990).

Doyen of German Animation: Curt Linda Back in 1969, the first German feature-length animation film wasproduced in color – Die Konferenz der Tiere – by CurtLinda who was awarded a Honorary German Film Award last yearfor his outstanding services to German cinema. ”I unfortunatelydidn’t invent any Mickey Mouse“ was what Curt Linda is supposed to have said when asked why he hadn’t become asfamous as his US colleague Disney.

But generations of German children have been neverthelessenchanted by the magical figures coming from his Linda-FilmProduktion animation studio since its launch in December1961 with such features as Shalom Pharao (1982), Haroldund die Geister (1988, with live-action sequences), Daskleine Gespenst (1992) and Die kleine Zauberfloete(1998).

”What distinguished Linda’s works was not the conveyor beltwork of hundreds of animators or lots of computers, but thehandicraft of a few possessed souls who pottered about in hisMunich studio between sketches, overflowing files and full shelves,between prizes, certificates and cluttered up desks“, the GermanFilm Award organizers declared last year. Linda and his team wanted, above all, to offer an alternative to the “American style of over-dynamic movements and the mad hectic pace of thecharacters“ with imaginative stories, the soft and gentle approachand careful drawing. Often, more than 400,000 individual draw-ings were needed for just one 90-minute film.

Apart from his feature films, Linda also worked for television withsuch series as Sensationen unter der Zirkuskuppel(1971-1974), Spass an der Freud’ (1973-1974) and OperaPresto (1976-1977).

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DEFA Animation StudioMeanwhile, over in the former German Democratic Republic(GDR), the DEFA Animation Studio was founded inDresden in 1955 and became a gathering place for artists from avariety of related disciplines including graphic design, commercialgraphics, puppetry and information films, as well as productiongroups specializing in puppet animation films, silhouette films andthe ”classic“ 2-cell animation.

As a Goethe Institute brochure accompanying a GDR animation retrospective in 1992 observed, ”their love for the very special art of animation, this unique combination of the visual and the dramatic, formed a common bond which lasted for decades“.

Until 1990, over 2,000 films were made – for the cinema, tele-vision and other institutions. Each year saw about 15 films andseries with episodes of between five and thirty minutes beingmade for the Children’s General Program (Kindersammelpro-gramm) to be shown to kindergarten and nursery school groups.

Often, the films served as supporting films before the main fea-ture in the cinemas, and some of them served an educational pur-pose for both children and adults. One series of 30 episodes,Theo, for example, was on the issue of safety at the workplace,while the figure of ”Kundi“ appeared in another series on behalfof the German Hygiene Museum to teach children abouthealthy living.

Among the leading figures from the DEFA Animation Studiowere co-founder Kurt Weiler and Sieglinde Hamacher,whose works were celebrated in retrospectives at last year’sLeipzig International Festival for Documentary andAnimation Film.

While 80-year-old Weiler is known for his puppet animation onsuch films as Die Geschichte von Kalif Storch and Vomfaulen Toepfer und dem fleissigen Waescher, 65-year-old Hamacher is known for her artistically challenging and politi-cally non-conformist films, such as Kontraste (1982) and TheSolution (Die Loesung, 1988), made when the days werenumbered for the East German state.

The Dresden studio was also a stage in the career of 1961-bornHeinrich Sabl, one of the most innovative figures of Germananimation in the 1990s, whose films include the shorts Wolfbleibt Wolf (1994), The Cock (1994), and 100 JahreKino (1995), as well as Père Ubu (1997) and Mère Ubu(1998). In 1989, the Filmfest Dresden was established on the grounds of the DEFA studios, focusing on the city’s long tradition of animation film. Since then, the festival has developedinto and remains a leader in the specialized area of animation.

In 1991 however, all of the studio staff were laid off and the stu-dios closed down, bringing the production of puppet animationfilms to a halt. In December of the same year, though, some ofthe animators banded together to found Hylas TrickfilmDresden to produce and distribute puppet films for children andadults. The following year, production began with support fromthe state of Saxony on the making of Von der Fee, dieFeuer speien konnte. The arts authorities in Dresden helpedthe new group set up a studio outside of the former DEFA infra-structure, and they also produced the puppet film Wie derMistkaefer Bernhard zum Verstand kommt (1995).

German Animation from the 1990s Animation films are traditionally targeted first and foremost atchildren, but this changed at the beginning of the 1990s inGermany when producers, in particular Michael Schaack,came upon the idea of bringing movement to the characters inthe cult Werner comic strips by Roetger ”Broesel“Feldmann. Director/producer Schaack’s animated featureWerner – Beinhart! (1990) was the result, and the beginningof a highly successful franchise which has now entered into pro-duction on its fourth edition with Hayo Freitag’s Werner –Ein Volk, Ein Koenich (2002).

The German animation industry has since become the envy of therest of the European animation community for being able to scorebox-office success with ”adult“ features such as GerhardHahn’s Werner – Volles Roaaa! (2.7 million admissions)and Schaack’s The Little Bastard (Kleines Arschloch, 3 million admissions), as well as with ”traditional“ animation forchildren such as Schaack’s Pippi Langstrumpf, and ThiloGraf Rothkirch and Piet de Rycker’s The Little PolarBear (Der kleine Eisbaer, 2001).

Animation targeted mainly at children is naturally at a disadvantagebecause such films normally can only secure afternoon and, possibly, early evening screening slots in the cinemas and will havelower takings since the bulk of the box-office comes from thelower priced tickets for children. Films aimed at a wider, adultaudience, however, will also have access to evening slotsand thus have the potential for higher box-office returns.

It is no surprise then that European animation producers areincreasingly adopting the moniker of ”family entertainment“ todescribe their output so as to escape the ”children’s film ghetto“.

As Michael Schmetz, consultant to studio Hahn Film andFilmboard Berlin-Brandenburg among others, observes in a studyof animation feature films in Germany since 1997, one point toremember about the comedies à la Werner and Arschlochis that they may ”have not only refinanced themselves in the

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German-speaking market, but have also generated good profitsfor the producers“; however, their ”specifically German humor“means that these comedies are not great shakes in the exportdepartment.

Top German Animation Features 1997-2001

Title Prod Company Admissions

Kleines Arschloch Senator/TFC 3,071,042

Werner – Volles Rooaaa! Achterbahn/Hahn 2,774,908

Der kleine Eisbaer Cartoon Film/Warner 2,612,679

Kapt’n Blaubaer Senator/TFC 1,371,115

Pippi Langstrumpf Kirch Media/Svensk 1,106,033*

Film (Sweden)

Pettson & Findus TV Loonland/Happy 1,029,554*

Life Animation (Sweden)

Die furchtlosen Vier Munich Animation 800,736

Hilfe! Ich bin ein Fisch Munich Animation/ 696,737*

AFilm (Denmark)/Terra Glyph (Ireland)

Die Story von Monty Monty Film/ 692,111

Spinneratz Warner Bros.

Pippi Langstrumpf in Kirch Media/TFC/ 574,171*

der Suedsee Svensk Film (Sweden)

* international co-productions. Source: FFA/Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg

Diverse Studio LandscapesUnlike France – where the industry is very much based in Paris –Germany’s lack of one main production center is something of aproblem. But the federal structure does have its benefits since, aswith live-action production, the German states vie with eachother to attract animation studios to locate to their region by providing attractive incentives. This is reflected in the seven leading animation studios for the production of features: HahnFilm and Cartoon Film Rothkirch are based in Berlin,TFC Trickompany and Animationsstudio Ludewig inHamburg, Motion Works in Halle, and Trixter Film andMunich Animation Film in Munich.

Added to these players are the production companies active inthe animation sector who do not have their own physical studio,ranging from Senator Filmproduktion and GreenlightMedia through ndF neue deutsche Filmgesellschaft andRTV Family Entertainment to Warner Bros. Film andTV-Loonland.

Not to mention the many small outfits dotted around the countrywho work primarily for television or advertising such as Toons’n’ Tales, Scopas Medien and Studio Film Bilder.

”The German animation film studios also work in part as net-works since, on the one hand, they often don’t have the capacityfor the production of a feature film“, Schmetz explains, ”and, onthe other, there are components like 3D animation which are onlyavailable in certain studios“. Thus, The Little Polar Bearinvolved the cooperation of four German animation studios:Cartoon Film Rothkirch, Motion Works, Animations-fabrik Hamburg, and Animationsstudio Ludewig.

According to Schmetz, around three animation features have beenproduced in Germany each year since 1997, although he arguesthat ”a volume of annually seven to ten German films could bewell managed by the local cinema market and would also give thestudios the possibility to hold on to their valuable creative person-nel and occupy them on a continuous basis. Three films annually,however, are not enough to keep the existing studio capacitiesbusy. All feature film producers are therefore also producers ofTV series at the same time“.

New EntrantsInterestingly, animation has also cast its spell on producer colleagues from the live-action fiction segment.

One of the highest profile ”converts“ to the animation world wasveteran producer Eberhard Junkersdorf who set up his ownanimation studio Munich Animation Film from scratch in1995 to produce an animated version of an updated story of theBremen Town Musicians in The Fearless Four (Die furcht-losen Vier, 1997), distributed by Warner Bros.

Since then, the studio has worked with Thilo Graf Rothkirchon Tobias Totz und sein Loewe (1999); on Help! I’m aFish (2000) with Danish and Irish production partners; and isnow preparing a feature based on the adventures of Jester Till(Till Eulenspiegel) with British and Belgian partners. ”The ani-mation scene didn’t really exist before in Bavaria“, Junkersdorfrecalls. ”We really triggered off a lot and many other companiesthen followed“.

Meanwhile, down at the Bavaria Film-Studios, OdeonFilm is preparing to diversify into animation programmingthrough subsidiary Lunaris Film’s animation film rights to theclassic children’s books by Erich Kaestner. First up is a 13-partseries of Emil and the Detectives (Emil und dieDetektive) together with the Cologne-based animation studioJuergen Egenolf Productions (J.E.P.) using the famousKaestner illustrations by Walter Trier as the basis for the animation.

What’s more, the Leipzig outpost of Berlin producer Alex-ander Ris’ Mediopolis Film – producer of films by FredKelemen and Seyhan Derin – has joined forces with Tony

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Loeser’s Motion Works to develop a 26-part series, Count Mocca, centered on the figure of the colorful inventorand adventurer for the six to eleven age group.

And Berlin is the base for an animation subsidiary launched byHofmann & Voges Entertainment – Punchhole Film– to produce for cinema and TV. The first fruits of this collabora-tion are the animated linking sequences in the Erkan & Stefanheadnut TV show, which will prepare fans for the release of ananimated feature film based on the ”krass krauts“, currently en-titled Erkan & Stefan und das Doenertier.

European DimensionGiven the size of the budgets animation features command – anestimated average of Euro 6.5 million –, it is not surprising thatEuropean co-production has increasingly become the name ofthe game.

”Co-production is a necessity“, declares Stephan Schesch,formerly of Ellipse Deutschland, ”but also an opportunity tocombine stories and talents from different markets. Instead ofbeing narrow-minded, it enables us to make products which aregeared to a global market“.

Someone who would agree with this is German-born RalphChristians, whose company Magma Films is based on thewest coast of Ireland in Galway and has worked with Schesch onthe Loggerheads and Norman Normal series and is nowcollaborating with Trixter Film on the Lilly the Witchseries and the feature Moby Dick – The Legend Returns.

”I think we have created a network here in Europe where peoplecome together with different skills“, Christians explains. ”If youlook at Greenlight, they are very good at marketing and mer-chandising. Our main skill is to create and write stories by in-house writing teams for other studios, and others are very goodat voice recording or post-production“.

This ”European dimension“ to the German animation scene operates in both directions: foreign animation studios come onboard German productions – as in the case, say, of TobiasTotz und sein Loewe and Pettson & Findus.

Indeed, Michael Schmetz’s line up of 20 German animation features planned for production from now until 2004 shows that13 - i.e. 65% - will be international co-productions (this figure was40% between 1997-2001). They include Motion Works’Globi – der gestohlene Schatten with partners fromSwitzerland and Luxembourg; Lenard Krawinkel’s Gayawith a Spanish production partner; and three projects betweenGreenlight Media and OSCAR-winning producer JohnWilliams (Shrek, 2001).

But German studios are also much sought-after partners for pro-ductions from other European territories. As Fredrik Zanderof Stockholm-based Happy Life Animation points out:”Many of our projects have been co-produced with Germanybecause the German funding programs are more flexible with co-production deal structures. It is more difficult to co-produce withFrench or Canadian partners because their quota system forces usto place production in places where we might not think there wasthe best talent“.

A recent case of a German animation studio being involved in aninternational feature was Animationstudio Ludewig inHamburg working on the compositing for Jimmy Murakami’sChristmas Carol – The Movie (2001), featuring the voicesof Kate Winslet and Nicolas Cage.

Show Me the MoneyIn the past five years, German public funds – i.e. the regionaleconomically-oriented bodies and the national GermanFederal Film Board (Filmfoerderungsanstalt/FFA) –have, on average, put up 50%-60% of the production costs forGerman animation features via conditionally repayable loans.

”In many cases, animation can be more successful than live-actionfilms because it can get distribution not only nationally but alsointernationally“, argues FilmFernsehFonds (FFF) Bayernpresident Klaus Schaefer.

Indeed, the regional funds’ intention is also to help support thecreation of a lasting infrastructure for the animation sector, andFFF Bayern’s Euro 7 million worth of investment over the lastfive years in such animation projects as The Fearless Four,Help! I’m a Fish and Pettson & Findus created an economic ”effect“ of Euro 50 million in the region.

Similarly, the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg and its regional fundMedien- und Filmgesellschaft (MFG) have made the ani-mation sector a priority given the concentration of talents comingout of the Film Academy Baden-Wuerttemberg in Ludwigsburgand the presence of companies in the region like Studio FilmBilder which handled the animation sequences in TomTykwer’s Run Lola Run (Lola rennt, 1998).

But not all is hunky dory as producer Thilo Graf Rothkirchexplained in an open letter to the finance ministries of Berlin andBrandenburg this spring, calling on them to make a clear commit-ment to the region’s media industry by increasing the financialresources available to Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg.

”We should not allow well-trained animators and operators tomove away to other regions just because we are on a weak

11Kino 2/2002


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12


Kino 2/2002

footing in the financing of our projects, or whole projects leavethe region“, Rothkirch argued. ”We want to realize our visionsat the place where we live and not in foreign parts“.

According to Eberhard Junkersdorf, more money could begenerated for German animation films (and other genres) on topof the public funds through the introduction of financial incentivesbased on models in other countries such as the UK sale and leaseback scheme, or the tax schemes operating in Ireland,Luxembourg and Canada.

As it is, Germany’s private media funds have already identified animation features and series as a lucrative business with the pro-mise of a long shelf-life and broad exploitation of ancillary rights.Some – such as Berlin Animation Film (BAF), FestivalFilm and Scopas Family Entertainment have specializedsolely in animation.

Others have boarded certain projects with international potentialsuch as MBP (Internationale Medienbeteiligungs-Film- & TV-Produktionsgesellschaft)’s backing of theUK production house Illumination Films’ ChristmasCarol – The Movie and CP Medien’s involvement inJester Till to be produced by Munich Animation with Nik Powell’s Scala Productions and Belgium’s StupidStudio.

And Berlin-based Target Media was recently set up by ThiloGraf Rothkirch’s Cartoon Film and The LittleVampire-producer Comet Film to produce at least 15 animation and live-action features and TV series with WarnerBros. as a distribution partner.

German Animation’s Up-and-Coming Generation During the 1980s, several film and art schools in Germany, particularly in Hamburg, Kassel, Stuttgart and Braunschweig, became centers of animated film experimentation, which havesince served as a wellspring of ideas and development laboratoryfor commercial film productions.

Albrecht Ade, who launched the animation studies course atthe Art Academy in Stuttgart in 1979, has played a pivotal role inthe development of a new generation of animators and of thepublic perception of animation in Germany. Animation was highon the agenda during the founding of the Film Academy inLudwigsburg, where Ade served as artistic director (Dr. ArthurHofer succeeded him in this post in 2000). Ade also provided anational and international forum for the latest trends in animationwith the establishment of the Stuttgart International

Festival of Animated Film which has been held every twoyears since 1982.

The Film Academy in Ludwigsburg has gained the expertise ofJochen Kuhn as professor for film design. Kuhn has taughtwidely in Germany, Great Britain, Austria and Australia and hasreceived numerous awards for his films, such as Der lautloseMakubra, 1980, Die Beichte, 1990, Die Stimme desIgels, Vol. I & Vol. 2, (1994), Just Messing About(Fisimatenten, 2000), and the Neulich series (1998-2002),to name but a few. And in January of 2002, the Film Academylaunched its own Institute for Animation, Visual Effects and Digital Post-Production. The Institute – under the direction ofProfessor Thomas Haegele – is not only responsible for courses such as Storytelling/Artistic Animation, CharacterAnimation and Visual Effects, but also for a development pool for animation series with the focus on content design and technical design.

Moreover, recent developments have also seen the establishmentof an Animation Master Class at the Fernsehakademie Mittel-deutschland (FAM) in Halle in central Germany in cooperationwith the local animation studio Motion Works and MDMMitteldeutsche Medienfoerderung to offer courses onVFX and animation. And here are some of the ”ones to watch“ inthe new generation of animators in Germany:

Susanne Fraenzel teaches film animation at the Art Academy in Stuttgart and makes films illustrating a successful symbiosis of live action and colorful drawings, such as BravoPapa 2040 (1989).

Felix Goennert has been studying at the ”Konrad Wolf“Academy of Film & Television in Potsdam-Babelsberg since 1997and made Bsss in 1999, which was shown in the Export-Union’s”Next Generation“ student film showcase in 2000.

Thomas Meyer-Hermann teaches at the Art Academy inStuttgart and is founder of Studio Film Bilder, which pro-duced Gil Alkabetz’ animated sequences for Tom Tykwer’sinternational hit Run Lola Run.

Andreas Hykade is a director and animator at Studio FilmBilder in Stuttgart and the recipient of numerous awards. His films include: We Lived in the Grass (Wir lebten imGras, 1995) employing a very individual drawing style to explorethe human psyche, and Ring of Fire (2000).

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Vuk Jevremovich studied Architechture in Belgrade beforemoving to Munich in 1991 to study at the Academy of Fine Arts.His films include: Era (1995), The Wind Subsides (1996),Panther (1998), which was shown in Venice, and Diary(Tagebuch, 2000), shown in competition in both Montreal andBiarritz.

Vera Lalyko studied Music and Sound Engineering before takingup Animation at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne in 1996.She graduated with the film Window with a View (Fenstermit Aussicht, 2001), which is being presented in this year’sExport-Union ”Next Generation“ program. She works as a free-lance animator for music clip productions, commercials, TV series,and Internet projects.

The brothers Christoph and Wolfgang Lauensteinbrought home a much-cherished OSCAR for their film Balancein 1989 and have created advertising spots in their Hamburg studio for such companies as Sega, Nike and Coca-Cola.

Daniel Nocke studied Animation and Direction at the FilmAcademy Baden-Wuerttemberg from 1994-1999, graduating withthe film Die Troesterkrise, which won a prize at the Inter-national Festival for Animated Film in Stuttgart and was nominatedfor the First Steps Award in 2000. He has also written screenplaysfor Stefan Krohmer’s (live action) films BarracudaDancing, Ende der Saison and Sie haben Knut.

Ingo Panke studied Sociology and Political Science beforeattending to the ”Konrad Wolf“ Academy of Film & Television inPotsdam-Babelsberg. During his studies he made two cartoons –including the 1999 ”Next Generation“ film Trompe L’Oeil –and an experimental film.

Jan Thuering made his first short – The Battle ofWaterloo – at the age of 10 and studied Visual Communicationat the Niederrhein Academy of Communication from 1995-1997.His animated short Terminal: Paradise (Endstation:Paradies 2000) was shown in the ”Next Generation“ programin 2001.

Thomas Stellmach and Tyron Montgomery are youngfilmmakers teaching at the Academy in Kassel and working inde-pendently. They received an OSCAR in 1996 for Quest, a tragictale of a sand person searching for water in a world of sand.

Chris Stenner has worked as a programmer and 3D artist andhas been studying Animation at the Film Academy Baden-Wuerttemberg since 1998. He co-directed the animation shortMann im Mond (1999) with fellow student Arvid Uibel(1978-2000), and Rocks (Das Rad, 2001), together with

Arvid Uibel and colleague Heidi Wittlinger. Rocksis dedicated to Arvid Uibel.

Kirsten Winter teaches at the Academy for Design andMedia in Hanover and has participated in numerous media artfestivals with such films as Clocks (1995), a powerful synthesis ofsound and painting and winner of the Short Film Award at Montrealin 1995, and Escape (2001), which was shown in competition atMontreal in 2001. She also collaborated with Gerd Gockell onthe documentary Muratti & Sarotti (2000), a documentaryon early German animation using cut-outs, objects, and archivalmaterial.

Heidi Wittlinger has worked in design studios in Stuttgart and Israel and has been studying Animation at the Film AcademyBaden-Wuerttemberg since 1998. In addition to her co-directionon Rocks, her other films include Lockvogel, Auf Herzund Nieren, Ei and Headless.

Martin Blaney

13Kino 2/2002

A N I M A T I O N – M A D E I N G E R M A N Y”B

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14 Kino 2/2002

ANIMATION – MADE IN GERMANY (useful contacts)PRODUCTION COMPANIES & STUDIOS

Abrafaxe Trickfilm AGLindenallee 5 · 14050 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-30 69 27 0 · fax +49-30-30 69 27 29

www.abrafaxe.com

Contact: Klaus D. Schleiter

Animationsfabrik HamburgDonnerstrasse 20 · 22763 Hamburg/Germany

phone +49-40-3 98 41 50 · fax +49-40-34 98 15 35

www.animationsfabrik.de

email: [email protected]

Contact: Joern Radel

ASL – Animationsstudio Ludewig GmbHHamburger Strasse 205 · 22083 Hamburg/Germany

phone +49-40-2 00 01 90 · fax +49-40-20 00 19 19

www.asl-studios.com · email: [email protected]

Contact: Gert Ludewig

Comet FilmOtto-Hahn-Strasse 136 · 40591 Duesseldorf/Germany

phone +49-2 11-75 79 80 · fax +49-2 11-75 79 81

Contact: Gernot Nitschke

Greenlight Media AGGormannstrasse 22 · 10119 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-7 26 20 00 · fax +49-30-7 26 20 02 22

www.greenlightmedia.com


Contact: André Sikojev

H5B5 Media GmbHRosenheimer Strasse 145f · 81671 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-45 25 45 00 · fax +49-89-45 25 45 55

www.h5b5.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Hendrik Hey

Hahn Film AGSchwedter Strasse 36a · 10435 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-4 43 54 90 · fax +49-30-4 43 54 92 53

www.hahnfilm.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Gerhard Hahn

Hylas Trickfilm DresdenMeissner Landstrasse 54 · 01157 Dresden/Germany

phone/fax +49-3 51-4 54 01 37

Contact: Rolf Hofmann

Juergen Egenolf Productions (J.E.P.) Schillerstrasse 6 · 50968 Cologne/Germany

phone +49-2 21-9 34 74 50 · fax +49-2 21-93 47 45 11


Contact: Dorothea Meersmann

Linda-Film Produktion Roemerstrasse 60 · 85609 Aschheim/Germany

phone/fax +49-89-9 03 40 65

Contact: Curt Linda

Lunaris Film GmbH & Co KGKurfuerstenplatz 4 · 80796 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-39 00 26 · fax +49-89-39 55 69


Contact: Peter Zenk

Mediopolis Film- und Fernseh-produktion GmbHBuelowstrasse 66 · 10783 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-2 35 56 00 · fax +49-30-23 55 60 66

www.mediopolis.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Alexander Ris

Motion Works GmbHAn der Waisenhausmauer 11 · 06110 Halle/Germany

phone +49-3 45-20 56 90 · fax +49-3 45-2 05 69 22

www.motionworks-halle.com


Contact: Tony Loeser

Munich Animation Film GmbHRosenheimer Strasse 143d · 81671 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-3 83 88 20 · fax +49-89-38 38 82 22

www.munich-animation.com


Contact: Eberhard Junkersdorf

ndF neue deutsche Filmgesellschaft mbHKanalstrasse 7 · 85774 Unterfoehring/Germany

phone +49-89-95 82 60 · fax +49-89-95 81 60

www.ndf.de · email: [email protected]

NFP animation film GmbHUnter den Eichen 5 · 65195 Wiesbaden/Germany

phone +49-6 11-1 80 83 10 · fax +49-6 11-1 80 83 79

www.nfp.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Stefan Thies

Odeon Film AGBavariafilmplatz 7 · 82031 Geiselgasteig/Germany

phone +49-89-64 95 80 · fax +49-89-64 95 81 03

www.odeonfilm.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Reinhard Kloos

PunchHole GmbH & Co. KGSchoenhauser Allee 8 · 10119 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-44 03 97 40 · fax +49-30-44 03 97 80

www.punch-hole.com · email: [email protected]

Contact: Peter Thaler

Rothkirch Cartoon-FilmBergmannstrasse 68 · 10961 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-6 98 08 40 · fax +49-30-69 80 84 29

www.cartoon-film.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Thilo Graf Rothkirch

RTV Family Entertainment AGRheinstrasse 4c · 55116 Mainz/Germany

phone +49-61 31-97 31 90 · fax +49-61 31-9 73 19 10

www.rtv-ag.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Ulrike Willner

Senator Entertainment AG Kurfuerstendamm 65 · 10707 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-88 09 17 00 · fax +49-630-88 09 17 23

www.senator.de · email: [email protected]

Studio Film BilderOstendstrasse 106 · 70188 Stuttgart/Germany

phone +49-7 11-48 10 27 · fax +49-7 11-4 89 19 25

www.filmbilder.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Thomas Meyer-Hermann

15Kino 2/2002

ANIMATION – MADE IN GERMANY (useful contacts)TFC Trickompany FilmproduktionHohenesch 13 · 22765 Hamburg/Germany

phone +49-40-3 98 81 90 · fax +49-40-3 98 81 92 00


Contact: Michael Schaack

Toons ’N’ Tales Filmproduktion Lerchenstrasse 16c · 22767 Hamburg/Germany

phone +49-40-43 13 34 70 · fax +49-40-43 13 34 75

www.toons-n-tales.com · email: [email protected]

Contact: Sunita Struck

Trixter Film GmbHOberfoehringer Strasse 186 · 81925 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-95 99 55 90 · fax +49-89-95 99 55 99

www.trixter.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Michael Coldewey

TV-Loonland AGMuenchner Strasse 16 · 85774 Unterfoehring/Germany

phone +49-89-20 50 80 · fax +49-89-20 50 81 99

www.tv-loonland.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Peter Voelkle

Warner Bros. Film GmbHJarrestrasse 4 · 22303 Hamburg/Germany

phone +49-40-22 65 00 · fax +49-40-22 65 02 59

www.warnerbros.de

ANIMATION FESTIVALS

Filmfest Dresden – International Festival for Animation & Short FilmsAlaunstrasse 62 · 01099 Dresden/Germany

phone +49-3 51-82 94 70 · fax +49-3 51-8 29 47 19

www.filmfest-dresden.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Robin Mallick, Ines Seifert

Leipzig International Festival for Documentary and Animated Filmc/o DOK - Filmwochen GmbH

Grosse Fleischergasse 11 · 04109 Leipzig/Germany

phone +49-3 41-9 80 39 21 · fax 3 41-9 80 61 41

www.dokfestival-leipzig.de


Contact: Fred Gehler

Stuttgart International Festival ofAnimated Filmc/o Film- und Medienfestival GmbH

Breitscheidstrasse 4 (Bosch Areal)

70174 Stuttgart/Germany

phone +49-7 11-92 54 60 · fax +49-7 11-92 54 61 50

www.itfs.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Albrecht Ade

PRIVATE MEDIA INVESTMENT FUNDS

BAF – Berlin Animation Film GmbHGormannstrasse 22 · 10119 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-7 26 20 04 30 · fax +49-30-7 26 20 04 44

www.baf-film.com · email: [email protected]

Contact: Patricia Schaefer, Markus Bruning

CP MedienSchorndorfer Strasse 42 · 71638 Ludwigsburg/Germany

phone +49-71 41-2 42 01 10 · fax +49-71 41-2 42 01 30

Festival Film GroupBavariafilmplatz 7 · 82031 Gruenwald/Germany

phone +49-89-64 98 11 05 · fax +49-89-64 98 13 05

www.festival-film.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Claudia Tauchen

MBP - Internationale Medien-beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KGNymphemburger Strasse 121 · 80636 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-1 25 55 50 · fax +49-89-12 55 55 55

www.mbp-medien.de · email: [email protected]

Scopas Medien AGWesterbachstrasse 28 · 60489 Frankfurt/Germany

phone +49-69-78 99 20 · fax +49-69-78 99 22 23

www.scopas.de · email: [email protected]

Contact: Thomas Schneider, Sandra Neumann

Target Media Entertainment GmbH & Co.Filmproduktion KGAlmazeile 6g · 13505 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-88 91 33 55 · fax +49-30-88 91 33 56

www.targetmediaentertainment.de


Contact: Karin Stammer

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16 Kino 2/2002


A Silent Country and not ”a blossoming country“. Night Shapes and not ”heroes of the day“.

This is what his films are called. Lack of faith in thenew German light of day transformed into cinema.And now Halbe Treppe: half a staircase.

So he even halves stairs. Where do half staircaseslead? Never to a center, that’s for certain. And defi-nitely more likely down than up. One senses that it isimpossible to stay in places where ”half staircases“appear.

Unless that place is the cinema. Perhaps there are nobetter vantage points for film. After all, his is one ofthe leading names among the not very many of newGerman cinema. Andreas Dresen’s Grill Point

(Halbe Treppe) was the only one of four Germanfilms in competition at the 2002 Berlinale, which,according to most critics, could not be seen as a halfmeasure in any sense. Although it only consists of fourpeople, half-forgotten by life, living in a half-forgotteneastern German town and having various difficultieswith each other. For they were careless enough toremind life of their existence. The directness of Grill

Point countenances no reserve. It shoots us – andwe ourselves are also made up of reserve – into themidst of a maelstrom which must, then, be life itself.

Dresen likes that sort of effect. He had already triedit out in Night Shapes and The Policewoman.All of these films are about the man on the street.There are few other German directors who lend suchimportance to the man on the street.

Cinema as an injection of reality. Driving truth to thepoint where it hurts. Anything less than that, Dresen

believes, and a film is not worth starting on. Some people havebeen alienated by this. One critic wrote in the mid-nineties: ”Intheir first takes, east German films make it obvious that they are

Michael Hammon, Andreas Dresen (photo © WDR)

THE UNBEARABLELIGHTNESS OF FILM

Andreas Dresen was born in Gera, Saxony in 1963. His father was the eminent theater director AdolfDresen. While still at school, he led a drama group, and began making amateur films in 1979. He worked as asound technician at the theater in Schwerin and as an assistant director at the DEFA studios before taking uphis studies at the ”Konrad Wolf“ Academy of Film & Television (HFF/B) in Potsdam-Babelsberg. A memberof the Academy of the Arts Berlin-Brandenburg since 1998, he received the Andrzej Wajda/Philip Morris

Freedom Prize in February of this year. Still active in the theater, his production of Akte Boehme was premieredin December of last year at the Schauspielhaus Leipzig. His most important films include Silent Country

(Stilles Land, 1992, Hessen Film Award, German Critics’ Award), Das andere Leben des Herrn

Kreins (TV, 1994, DAG Television Award in Gold), Changing Skins (Raus aus der Haut, TV, 1997,main prize at the Filmkunstfest Schwerin), Night Shapes (Nachtgestalten, 1998, several prizes including a Silver Bear at Berlin for Best Actor and the German Film Critics’ Award), The Policewoman

(Die Polizistin, 2000, several prizes including the Adolf Grimme Award in Gold and the German Camera

Award) and Grill Point (Halbe Treppe, 2001, Silver Bear and Special Jury Award at the 2002 Berlinale).Andreas Dresen lives in Potsdam.

17Kino 2/2002


cultural products of the old type, with basic conflicts, with preten-sions and a message“. The critic did not bother to conceal a cer-tain dismay at such cultural fundamentalism. And it’s true, whenthe German comedy volcano was already in the midst of eruptingten years ago, Dresen was very careful not to let himself betouched by either its lava or its rain of ash, consistently demandingthe return of the socially critical film. Sounds like organized gloom.Films which offer us nothing to laugh about, about people whohave nothing to laugh about? But Dresen corrected this. Weightymaterial simply has to learn to fly! Perhaps it is the tremendouslightness of his films which repeatedly renders us speechless. Andindeed, why do people dress up laughter in extra ”laughter films“?That is trivial. Andreas Dresen has not yet made a singlecomedy, and yet his films are amusing and grotesque all in one.

He was not necessarily destined for success. Andreas Dresen

belongs to a generation in the East which could easily have goneunder during the change from east to west. On the one hand, hewas still young – twenty-seven years old at the end of the GermanDemocratic Republic (GDR) – but the period which had shapedhim was irrevocably over. It was a development under the aus-pices of the DEFA. The DEFA, the feature film studio of the GDR,stood for ”cultural products of the old type“, for content, messageand pretensions. As yet without his own DEFA films, in 1990 thisquasi-DEFA director found himself in a new anti-DEFA reality. Anidiotic beginning, when you think about it.

But he had already noticed something. His film academy inPotsdam had sent its students out into the streets. They were to

observe the fall of the GDR with the camera, and Dresen didjust this. He made a few very fine, short ”fall-of-the-GDR-films“and then a wonderful, longer one (Silent Country), and in theprocess he became aware of something remarkable: naturally,decline and fall are always a bit sad in some way – this lies in thenature of decline as a metaphysical fact – but above all, they canalso be terribly funny. Dresen has never forgotten this. The factthat true metaphysics lie in the profane and that in reality they arefunny. The fact that from the outside, the best tragedies appearfundamentally ”untragic“. And that the most successful comedieshave to be tragedies anyway. Andreas Dresen makes this kindof film - Andreas-Dresen-films. An Andreas-Dresen-film comesabout when skilled DEFA technique and the weight of truth meetup with the imperative of becoming lighter. Shake it off ! Whycameras on rails when you can carry them on your shoulders?Why floodlights when it is light outside anyway? One is aware ofthe techniques in order to know what can be done without.Generally speaking, ”becoming lighter“ in this way is a sign ofmaturity. This is when the social worker’s view begins to danceand is drawn with a magical certainty into what sociologists havedecided to call ”social reality“.

In the case of Grill Point, Dresen’s attention was finally drawnto the screenplay. Isn’t a screenplay far too weighty? And soAndreas Dresen abandoned the screenplay, too.

Kerstin Decker writes for the Tagesspiegel,

die tageszeitung and Die Zeit, among others


One simple conviction forms the basis for all of Elfi Mikesch’sfilms: ”I believe in life, in the energy and intensity of a life that breaks out of protected spheres, striving towards the unknown.“Neither her experimental short films, nor her documentaries andfeature films are inventions with which to visualize abstract ideasor to stage routine narratives. They are images and creations oflife, focusing on real people. Her films are journeys of discoveryinto the secret heart of what is human; they are full of poetry, it istrue, but at the same time they are permeated by an intense ex-perience of reality.

Her first documentary film Ich denke oft an Hawaii alreadydemonstrated the direction Mikesch’s film work was to take.

Imagination, a willingness to take risks and a desire for freedomare the decisive landmarks in both Mikesch’s life and her films.All the people featured in her work, whether they are presentedin a documentary manner or brought to the screen as fictionalcharacters, are ”people of opportunity“. In Marocain (TV,1989), Eva Lehmann leaves her northern German home and enters the risk of a new life in Marrakesh. Mind the Gap is adocumentary telling the life story of Thorsten Ricardo Engelholz,who emerges from a dark, handicapped childhood into a life ofcreativity. The Markus Family is about the energy of a person who can scarcely see, but who is able to devise a life forhimself as an artist.

”I’M INTERESTEDIN PEOPLE WHOCROSS OVERBOUNDARIES“

18 Kino 2/2002


It is no coincidence that Mikesch’s films are often concernedwith artists. For on the basis of her own destiny, it is possible toshow in an exemplary way how significant a role in life is played byimagination and reverie. ”And this reverie is also playful“,Mikesch adds: ”Our soul plays with all those ideas that it is notpermitted to play with during the day. That is why I do the samewith my films.“ But these playful games are not entertainment withwhich to divert our attention away from life. They determine lifeitself, whether in the shape of memories when facing death as in

Was soll’n wir denn machen ohne den Tod? (1980) orin the shape of scenarios as in the feature film Seduction: The

Cruel Woman, where masochistic reveries are staged as aform of life and artistic action.

Elfi Mikesch loves documentary film. ”I love this way of work-ing, approaching other people and working together with them,this mutual play with all our possibilities.“ She becomes involvedwith people and their situations, in a reciprocal process of give and

take in which something new may always be discovered,both before and behind the camera. This joy in discoveryderives its energy from a precise viewpoint; one whichalso takes its time. Often "silent" images are the ones characteristic of Mikesch’s style. By contrast to theflood of images in the media – over-stimulating our per-ception and threatening to cripple it –, she works withcamera angles and editing techniques which facilitateattentive contemplation. Intensity and precision are theideals of her cinematic aesthetics.

Her camera work for other directors radiates the sameconcentration. It does not make any essential differenceto Mikesch whether she is working as a director herselfor wielding the camera for others, as long as there isproductive harmony. In this respect, too, rich interplaywith characters prepared to take on risks is central to her work. ”I can learn by working together with others. I am stimulated to develop my own conceptions andideas. It is a fruitful communicative process.“ But it canonly be successful if there is that energy which crossesover boundaries, an energy from which Mikesch derivesher strength.

Elfi Mikesch spoke to Manfred Geier, writer for the

Sueddeutsche Zeitung, among others, and professor

for German Literature and Language at the

University of Hanover

Elfi

Mik

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Elfi Mikesch was born on 31 May 1940 in Judenburg/Austria. After leavingschool, she trained as a photographer. She has lived in Berlin since 1965 and worksas a photographer, camerawoman and director. In 1968, she published her firstGerman photo novel under the pseudonym Oh Muvie. She received a German Film

Award in 1978 for her first long documentary film Ich denke oft an Hawaii,and again in 1979 for her dynamic, cinematic photo series in black and whiteExecution: A Study of Mary concerning the life and death of Mary Stuart.Besides documentary films about people with the courage to risk a life crossingover boundaries – most recently Mind the Gap (Verrueckt bleiben, ver-

liebt bleiben, 1996) and The Markus Family (2000) –, she has made several short films, including Das Fruehstueck der Hyaene (1983) andSoldaten Soldaten (1993). Her first feature film Macumba was realized in1982. During 1985 she made Seduction: The Cruel Woman in collabor-ation with Monika Treut. Elfi Mikesch has worked as a camerawoman togetherwith various directors, nationally and internationally, including Rosa von Praunheim(The Einstein of Sex - Dr. M. Hirschfeld, 1999), Werner Schroeter (Malina, 1991,and Poussières d’Amour, 1996), Monika Treut (Die Jungfrauenmaschine, 1988), PeterWoditsch (Hey Stranger, 1994) and Teresa Villaverde (A idade maior, 1991) to namebut a few.

• Laser Subtitling on Film • Video Subtitling in Broadcast Quality • DVD Subtitling with specially developed fonts, such as DVD Script HardyTM • Subtitling for all Computer Programmes (or other disc-based systems)

• Translation to and from all Languages • Final Check and In-House Editing of all Subtitles and Translations • Voice-overs• Digital Editing in PAL and NTSC • Standard Conversions • 3D Graphics in PAL and NTSC • Telecine

• Video Transfer into all Standard Formats • Inspection of Broadcast Material • Audio and Video for the Internet and Multimedia

…and many other services!

NEED WE SAY MORE?

FILM UND VIDEO UNTERTITELUNG GERHARD LEHMANN AGWETZLARER STR. 30 . D-14482 POTSDAM-BABELSBERG . TEL: +49 331 704 74-0 . FAX: +49 331 704 74-99

EMAIL: [email protected]

Film und VideoUntertitelung Gerhard Lehmann AG

20 Kino 2/2002

World Sales Portrait CINEPOOL

CINEPOOL’SDREAM TEAM”Going to the movies means, for me, going to a magical and won-derful place,“ says Cathy Rohnke, head of CINEPOOL. ”Itmeans visiting my dreams. The cinema is where my dreams, goodand bad, come alive on the big screen and I can share them withothers. You can happily call me a movie maniac! If I were down tomy last dime, I’d still spend it on a ticket!“

Rohnke, whose CV includes music, dance and theater, studied atMunich’s Ludwig-Maximilian-University and the city’s film school.At the same time, she says, “I did everything that’s possible to doin the film scene – carrying cables, director’s assistant-ing, what-ever.“

After working in New York and San Francisco, she returned homeand opened a sponsorship company, ”meeting many people withgood ideas and no money and bringing them together with peoplewho could realize them.“ Which is how she came to her next job;banking! For the next six years, she headed the HypoVereinsbank’smarketing communications department.

”Whenever somebody asked,“ she says, ”I’d say it was everythingbright which flickered! I was involved with multimedia and interac-tivity, and together with Bavaria Film Interactive, I built thefirst business-TV association in Germany.“

But Rohnke just couldn’t leave the cinema alone, so ”alongsidethe bank I took on a teaching position at Leipzig University inDramaturgy and Script Development. And last year I told myselfI had to think seriously about where my emphasis is. I decided it was with the cinema. I met up with TELEPOOL, CINE-

POOL’s owners, and since January 2002 I’ve been the newhead.“

”There is not such a thing as a typical CINEPOOL film.Important for us is less the film’s nationality and more its direction.We sell to the world. It’s not set in stone that it has to beGerman-language. We also have titles from Robert Altman,Chen Kaige, Andrzej Wajda and Krzysztof Zanussi

in our portfolio.“

For a woman who proudly boasts, ”I go to the cinema to watcheverything!“, and who numbers Fargo, The Full Monty,Night of the Hunter and Touch of Evil among her favorites, it is the cinemagoer who counts.

”For me, and that goes for CINEPOOL, too, the film has to be entertaining. People pay money to see it and they expectsomething for it. They want a performance and the film has todeliver one.“

CINEPOOL is a company keen, says Rohnke, ”to work withmovies that travel world-wide. There is a new generation offilmmakers in Europe waiting to be discovered. Usually we take on movies on a rough cut basis. But there are exceptions, such asthe new Doris Doerrie film, Nackt (Naked), where westepped in after reading the wonderful script.“

Like many, she sees ”the new media providing new possibilities ofviewing films, new ways of delivering them. But it doesn’t meanthat the Internet is the end of the cinema. Quite the opposite; itwill help increase the audience, especially as a marketing tool.However, I prefer going to a cinema to devour films and popcorn.I like the idea of being able to put together my own film evening.But then I want to watch that on my large-screen TV in my livingroom, not on the PC.“

Established in 1989 as TELEPOOL’s theatrical department TELEPOOL’s shareholders

German public broadcasters Bayerischer Rundfunk, SWR Holding GmbH, MitteldeutscherRundfunk and Swiss Television Offices in Munich, Zurich, Los Angeles Head of

Theatrical Sales CINEPOOL Dr. Cathy Rohnke Additional contact WolframSkowronnek Main fields of activity world-wide distribution of feature films Regular

attendance of the following film markets Berlin, Cannes, MIFED Number of

titles on offer 75 Percentage of German titles on offer 90% Buyers include

Alliance Atlantis, Artificial Eye, Best Film, Columbia Tristar, Fine Line Features, GagaCommunications, Mikado, Musidora, Orler, Pandora Most well-known titles currently

on offer Anansi, Berlin Symphony, Help, I’m a Boy!, NOGO, The White

Sound Best-selling titles currently on sale Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door,Enlightenment Guaranteed, Now or Never, Gloomy Sunday

CINEPOOL · A Dept. of Telepool Europaeisches

Fernsehprogrammkontor GmbH

Sonnenstrasse 21 · 80331 Munich/Germany · phone +49-89-55 87 60 · fax +49-89-55 87 62 29www.telepool.de · email: [email protected], [email protected]

21Kino 2/2002

World Sales Portrait CINEPOOLD

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CINEPOOL’s current Cannes catalogue covers a wide range,from the renowned German documentary maker Thomas

Schadt’s Berlin Symphony (Berlin – Sinfonie einer

Grossstadt cf. p.44) – a remake of the Walther Ruttmann

1920s masterpiece – to Anansi (cf. p.42), a heartbreaking storyof three African refugees, which features music by reggae starShaggy, The White Sound (Das Weisse Rauschen), afilm about the tragedy of a young schizophrenic (starring Daniel

Bruehl), and the family fantasy film Help, I’m a Boy! (Hilfe,

Ich bin ein Junge!) round up the portfolio.

”We’ve also acquired a wonderful Austrian film, NOGO, fromDor Film,“ says Rohnke. ”NOGO is about three couples, the stories told parallel, à la Tarantino, and takes place at apetrol station. The first couple are Meret Becker and Oliver

Korritke, the second Jasmin Tabatabai and Juergen

Vogel and the third Mavie Hoerbiger and Michael

Ostrowski. They’re all actors you’ve seen elsewhere but not asgood as in this film. It’s exciting and explosive, in the true meaningof the word.“

If this isn’t the stuff of dreams, what is?

Simon Kingsley spoke to Cathy Rohnke

22 Kino 2/2002

Producers’ Portrait MTM Medien & Television Muenchen

Established in 1993 by producers Gloria Burkert, Andreas Bareiss and Peter Herrmann, MTM produces forthe majority of German broadcasters (ProSieben, Westdeutscher Rundfunk, Bayerischer Rundfunk, MitteldeutscherRundfunk and ZDF) as well as for the cinema. The company scored an international success with the co-production ofRomuald Karmakar’s The Deathmaker (Der Totmacher), which was the German entry in the 1997 race for the OSCAR for Best Foreign Language Film. Produced in 1995, the film received three German Film Awards and wasawarded the Bavarian Film Award, the Hesse Film Prize, as well as the Coppa Volta at the Venice Film Festival. MTM’s production of The Bubi Scholz Story (Die Bubi Scholz Story, 1998) for ARD was another success, receivingthe German Camera Prize, the Bavarian Television Award as well as the German Television Award. The company has also enjoyed fruitful collaborations over the years with directors Dominik Graf and Friedemann Fromm in the field ofTV movies. Among MTM’s other credits are Jan Schuette’s Fat World (Fette Welt, 1997) and Roland Suso

Richter’s A Handful of Grass (Eine Handvoll Gras, 1999). In 2001, the company – which also has an outpost,MTM West Television und Film GmbH, in North Rhine-Westphalia – produced three features: Caroline

Link’s Nowhere in Africa (Nirgendwo in Afrika), Dominik Graf’s Berlinale 2001 competition entry A Map

of the Heart (Der Felsen), and Urs Egger’s Epstein’s Night (Epsteins Nacht).

MTM Medien & Television Muenchen GmbH · Siegfriedstrasse 8 · 80803 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-3 83 97 20 · fax +49-89-38 39 72 30 · www.mtm-medien.de · email: [email protected]

CREATING A QUALITY BRAND”When we decided to come together, the first idea was just toproduce good films“, recalls Andreas Bareiss who joined for-ces with fellow producers Gloria Burkert and Peter

Herrmann in December 1993 to set up the production com-pany MTM Medien & Television Muenchen.

At that point in the early 1990s, it would have been too much ofa risk to have focused primarily on films for the cinema. ”Instead,we said that we would make good television on a high-quality narrative level in the field of 90-minute TV movies“, Bareiss

continues.

This strategy certainly seems to have paid off as the company’sreputation in the industry was made, in particular, through its collaborations with Dominik Graf on such productions asFrau Bu lacht (1995), Der Skorpion (1997) and Deine

besten Jahre (1998), and with Friedemann Fromm onPerfect Mind (1996), Spiel um Dein Leben (1997), andZum Sterben schoen (1999).

”These films resulted from a common understanding of the filmmedium and film language“, Bareiss explains, ”about how Iapproach a narrative in a film and which stories I want to tell“.

Most of MTM’s television work has been done with the publicbroadcasters and, as with certain directors, the company has alsobuilt up a bond of trust with commissioning editors ”because theyshould also share what we think and not just be the ones who dothe financing“.

But how does the company work in practice with three strongproducer personalities under one roof?

”I think the quality of MTM is that we have three extremely different characters and we don’t present competition for each

other“, Bareiss says. ”The things which each one wants to produce come about from their own very special take on the stories and that then leads to the collaboration with the directors“.

Looking back at their first ten years of activity, he admits that itwould seem ”that Peter has done the larger projects like The

Bubi Scholz Story, Nowhere in Africa, and the projectswith Guenter Rohrbach – A Handful of Grass and Fat World – , while I am more the one for melodramas andromantic comedies, and Gloria has stayed with the drama and thecrime thriller. But that has just turned out that way.“

”In fact, we are like three small individual production platforms“,Bareiss suggests, pointing out that before embarking on a pro-ject, all three look to see ”whether it fits our corporate identity.We resisted for years from doing certain projects because they did not conform to our brand. When we set the company up in1993, we said that we would define ourselves through our brandname ’MTM’ and not through our own names. The idea is thatthe brand should be worth something, one should be able to trustthe whole, not just the individual“.

In addition, MTM is not a ’here today, gone tomorrow outfit’making the fast, easy money. ”We are looking to the long term“Bareiss declares. ”We have not said that we want to be profitable in five years, but are aiming instead to do this in 10years. The kinds of films we are making have a very long lead-intime, realization in the medium term, and then exploitation in the long term“.

”For example, we optioned the rights for Nowhere in Africa

in 1995 and the film was released in the cinemas in 2001, and TVand video revenues will follow. All this takes time – which perhapscontradicts the Zeitgeist – but we want to create a value chain be-cause we know that one can also show our films in ten years’ time“.

23Kino 2/2002

Producers’ Portrait MTM Medien & Television Muenchen

After having a regular output each year of TV movies, it wasnevertheless quite a step for the company to then embark ontackling three features – Epstein’s Night, A Map of the

Heart, and Nowhere in Africa – more or less at the sametime last year.

For Bareiss, though, it was a logical step in the company’s devel-opment after its involvement in countless TV movies which, on theone hand, had scored with both critics and audiences and, on theother, were not that far away from many German feature films asfar as their production values were concerned.

”We thought that we might possibly succeed in being able to pro-duce popular feature films with the same demands on qualitywhich we had made for the TV movies“, Bareiss explains.”The idea was to create a brand for the cinema and make itunmistakably clear with three films in one swoop where we seeour future“, he adds.

The first of the trio to open in the cinemas - Caroline Link’sStephanie Zweig-adaptation Nowhere in Africa, starringJuliane Koehler and Merab Ninidze – has developed intosomething of a sleeper success for distributor Constantin

Film. Launched on 27 December 2001 with 229 prints, the filmstill had the same number circulating through German cinemasover two months later and passed the one million admissionsmark at the beginning of March 2002.

As Bareiss points out, Link’s film is one of those films likeChocolat or The English Patient which takes a while tofind its predominantly female audience. But find it it does. Theaudiences for such upmarket titles tend to be spread over severalweeks because a cinema visit for them is a real event which has tobe specially arranged – with the booking of a babysitter and so on.

”It’s not important for me to get 11 million [admissions] justonce“, Bareiss jests in allusion to last year’s box-office hitManitou’s Shoe (Der Schuh des Manitu). ”I’d like that as well, of course! But I want to produce ten films in the next tenyears which each are seen by a million. I am more for stability thanfor speculation about a particular success“.

Meanwhile, in the immediate future, MTM has projects in development which see it working with partners outside of theGerman-speaking area and with newcomer filmmakers.

The co-production with France’s MACT Productions onNina Grosse’s coming-of-age story Olgas Sommer (cf. p.34)”is a very organic development“, according to Bareiss. ”Parts ofthe story are set in a southern country like Spain or France.Moreover, the director studied in France and is very francophile.And the German-French Film Academy and the mini-treaty in theco-production agreement were also supporting factors whichmade it easier for our French partner to come onboard“.

For a second project, MTM will serve as the junior partner on aAustrian-Hungarian-German co-production (Dallas) to be set inTransylvania and directed by Robert Pejo. ”It is a centralEuropean story with a cinematic language that comes from thecenter of Europe“, Bareiss says and points out that MTM

would not get involved in co-productions just for the sake of it”but only when a film says something we think will be of interestto our audience in Germany“.

As far as working with newcomer directors, he admits that MTM has not done much in this area although the three producers are always keeping their eyes and ears open to knowwhat new talents are coming out of the film academies.

A project now in preparation is with Kai Pieck – Ein Leben

lang kurze Hosen tragen about the child murderer JuergenBartsch – which will be made within the WDR/Filmstiftung

NRW ”Six Pack“ initiative. And Bareiss is working with theEnglish-born screenwriter Nick Baker-Monteys on a comedy with the working title 42 about a psychoanalyst who ismistakenly diagnosed with a brain tumor and suspects that his patients might not be so crazy after all …

Martin Blaney spoke to Andreas Bareiss

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sive statistical and informational catalogue. The services aredivided into seven categories: profile of the FFA, film subsidylaw and other regulations, press services, funding depart-ments, market data, publications, as well as important links toinstitutions and organizations in the German and internationalfilm industries. Whether you’re in London, Paris or Rome –just one click is all you need: www.ffa.de.

New Faces at the Export-Union

The position of the Export-Union’s representative for theUSA/East Coast and Canada has been divided up into twoseparate areas of work, given the central role the two regionsplay both in the festival and production/distribution scenes. Inthe future, two people will be responsible for looking after theregion.

With immediate effect, the representative for USA/EastCoast is the film agent Oliver Mahrdt. The New Yorker ofGerman descent has been working in the international filmbusiness since 1994 and is the sole owner of the HannsWolters Agency, one of the oldest talent agencies in NewYork.

The newly created post of representative for Canada hasbeen taken by the German scholar and media marketingexpert Martina Neumann. She has also been working forsome time in the film and media industry - as a producer forProSieben and the head of marketing for the e-business com-pany Proxicom Germany, among other things.

The USA/East Coast and Canada had been looked after bythe Canadian-Austrian film expert Brigitte Hubmann untilthe end of 2001.

At the Munich headquarters of the Export-Union, the projectmanager Julia Basler has started her maternity leave; shehas been succeeded by Stephanie Weiss, who has beenworking for the Export-Union as a PR assistant since 2000 andwill now be responsible for the organization of the fourFestivals of German Cinema in Europe. The new PR assistantis Cornelia Klimkeit, who was previously a member ofthe organization team for the Rencontres Internationales

Paris/Berlin Festival.

Contact details for all Export-Union employees and foreign representatives can be found at:www.german-cinema.de under ”About Us“.

Kino n e w s

24

Film Conference in Cologne

The Filmstiftung NRW invites European producers to aninternational film conference within the framework of theMedia Forum North Rhine-Westphalia from 18 - 20June 2002. For three days, filmmakers and representativesfrom the film industry will meet to make new contacts,exchange ideas and discuss new trends.

While the co-production meeting will provide an opportunityto pitch new projects and find partners for international co-productions, the discussion rounds will be dedicated to thefuture of German film. Topics will include the various strate-gies of larger and smaller distributors, the complicated busi-ness relationship between bankers and film producers, as wellas the difficult situation of marketing German films abroad. A further point of focus will be the prospects of the expand-ing East European market. For further information, pleasecontact:

Filmstiftung NRW, phone +49-2 11-93 05 00 oremail: [email protected]

Extraordinary Cinema Year

in Germany

The run at the German box offices carries on and the filmindustry continues to announce new records - that is the conclusion of the German Federal Film Board’s (FFA) official analysis of the year 2001. For the first time in ten years, cinema attendance in Germany increased by 16.7%, apercentage plus far greater than that in France, England or theUnited States. A total of 177.9 million cinemagoers were registered; statistically seen, that’s 2.2 cinema visits per capita.With a turnover of Euro 987.2 million, the box offices scoreda plus of over 20 percent.

And German productions experienced a similar increase ofinterest. For the first time in years and with more than 10.5million admissions, a German film, Manitou’s Shoe (Der

Schuh des Manitu), topped the annual hit list. Eight otherlocal films, including four children’s films, drew in audiences ofover one million viewers.

Complete details of the analysis and statistics can be down-loaded from the FFA’s new website at www.ffa.de. Therecently re-launched website is more user friendly and offers asearch function to navigate the user through the FFA’s exten-

Kino 2/2002

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Kino n e w s

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The city also plays an important role in Pandora Film’sGerman-French co-production Leben toetet mich

(Vivre me tue). Jean-Pierre Sinapi’s film, based on thenovel of the same name by Paul Smail, tells the story oftwo North African immigrant children coming to terms withtheir lives in Germany and France in different ways. Thedocumentary Sanary – Letzte Station vor dem

Vergessen from Bertina Henrich (a co-production from Le Mer du Son Cinéma and Filmtank Hamburg)describes the town Sanary-sur-Mer as a vanishing point and the”last tip of Europe“. Between 1933 and 1941, the small beachtown on the Mediterranean coast became a large colony ofGerman writers, artists and intellectuals fleeing from the Nazi regime.

FFA Industry Tigers 2002:

Over Euro 21 Million in

Reference Funding

For about 100 pro-ducers and distribu-tors, the trip toBerlin at the end ofMarch 2002 was wellworth it: the Film-

foerderungsan-

stalt (FFA) awarded over Euro21 million (Euro 3.7million more thanthe previous year) to the mostsuccessful films of

the cinema boom year 2001. The Industry Tiger 2002

awards were based on the number of tickets sold per film.And the winners were: the producers MMC Independent,Kinowelt Filmproduktion and Olga-Film, as well asthe distributors Constantin Film Verleih, Senator

Film Verleih and Kinowelt Film Verleih.

FFA president Rolf Baehr was particularly happy that child-ren’s films and documentaries were also represented at thisyear’s awards presentation. The reference funding was dividedup among features (58.56%), children’s films (39.02%) anddocumentaries (2.42%).

Three German Competition

Entries in Nyon

No less than twelve German films and German-internationalco-productions were shown at the 8th Festival Visions

du Réel (22 - 28 April 2002) in the Swiss town of Nyon, of which three German and three German-internationalworks were screened in the festival’s two competition sections.

The international competition featured: A Bookshelf on

Top of the Sky by Claudia Heuermann, a portrait ofthe New York composer and saxophonist John Zorn, the filmdiary Wie ich ein Hoehlenmaler wurde by Jan

Location Bavaria at Home

and Abroad

This spring, Universal Studios, Los Angeles, for the firsttime will provide the setting for a presentation of Bavarianknow-how in film technique and location qualities. Organizedby the State Ministry of Economy, Transportation andTechnologies in cooperation with Bavaria Film Inter-

national and the Munich Chamber of Commerce, the high-profile film and video expo CineGear 2002 will be theforum for Bavarian production service companies and theFilm Commission Bavaria, headed by Anja Metzger.From 31 May to 1 June, anyone interested in shooting inBavaria can receive information about the latest developmentsin local film production, equipment, locations and film funding.

In April and May, the Film Commission Bavaria alsoparticipated in the world’s most important AFCI Locations

Trade Show in Santa Monica and was present in theGerman Pavilion at Cannes’ Marché International du Film(MIF). Back home in Bavaria, a new service will be of use toanyone in need of historical buildings for a film project:through a mediator, the Film Commission Bavaria hasgained access to private castles all over the state and is nowable to offer them to film productions. Further informationunder: www.location-bayern.com.

France in Hamburg

Three new German-French co-productions, all supported bythe FilmFoerderung Hamburg, are well underway inHamburg and the south of France. Dream, Dream,

Dream (cf. p. 46), directed by Anne Alix, is the first feature-length film to be accompanied by the German-Frenchmaster class at the Film Academy Baden-Wuerttem-

berg in Ludwigsburg. The film, a co-production betweenEuripide Productions, Integral Film, Wide Eyes,Diana Film and T & C Film, was shot in part and editedand mixed in its entirety in Hamburg. In addition to the positive experience with the various film services in thearea, Alix also found a musician for the film score. ”We arealways very happy when foreign producers find Hamburg to be an interesting location for their productions as well as post-production“, says Eva Hubert, managing director of theFilmFoerderung Hamburg.

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Kino n e w s

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Peters, and Volker Koepp’s new film Uckermarck. Inaddition, the German-international co-productionBrodwey.Chemoye Morye by Vitali Manski

(Russia/Germany/Czech Republic) was shown.

Two German-international co-productions were presented aspart of the Regards Neufs, the festival’s competitive section fordebuts: Ima by Caterina Klusemann (Germany/USA)and Kazi Ni Kiku by Ayako Mogi (Germany/Japan).

Other German and German-international co-production filmsat the festival included: Hwa-Shan District, Taipei byBernhard Schreiner, Die eiserne Maria byIngeborg Jacobs and Hartmut Seifert, Phoenix aus

der Asche by Simone Fuerbringer (Switzerland/Germany), Thomas Pynchon – A Journey into the

Mind of P. by Donatello and Fosco Dubini

(Germany/Switzerland), as well as Das Haus/1984 andVolkspolizei/1985 by Thomas Heise.

Founded in 1969, the documentary film festival Visions du Réel in Nyon is one of the most important of its kind inEurope. It is primarily dedicated to films ”which, through aconscious formal and aesthetic choice, impart depictions ofpast and present realities as well as their personal and imbuedinterpretation“ (festival catalogue).

Mitteldeutsche Medien-

foerderung’s Impressive

Program

Over the last years the Mitteldeutsche Medien-

foerderung (MDM) has sent out a wide range of impulseswhich contributed to the dynamic development of structuresin the media industry in Thuringia, Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt.Alongside strengthening the performance of central Germancompanies in the film, television and media industries, MDM

pursues in the medium-term the following aims: increasing the”regional effects“ in the area, the continuation of the settle-ment policy and the strengthening of networking within theindustry, as well as the establishment of a practice-orientedrange of training and qualification programs. As a result, citiesin central Germany have recently hosted such well-knownEuropean seminars as Cartoon Creativity, Discovery Campus,EAVE, Pymalion and Sagas.

Since its foundation in 1998, MDM has supported more than 250 projects with more than Euro 40 million. Unique landscapes, remarkable building structures, as well as placesand motives of cultural interest make central Germany animpressive film location. MDM offers wide-range support inthe areas of material and project development, productionsupport, distribution and sales, as well as screenings and pre-sentation. Increasingly, the aspects of further training and mar-ket-orientated film marketing are taken into consideration inthe overall support scheme. One important criteria for sup-port is a lasting regional effect in the states of Saxony-Anhalt,Thuringia and Saxony. This year MDM is supporting a numberof historical projects (Luther, Freiherr von Trenck),road movies (including a German-Finnish-Latvian co-produc-tion under the Mika Kaurismaeki’s direction) and manyother interesting projects. One of the highlights of the 2002support year will be Peter Greenaway’s trilogy of 120-minute films.

Faster, Easier, Closer: Location

Search Engine for Berlin and

Brandenburg with New Looks

and Functions

Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg’s location office, theBerlin Brandenburg Film Commission (bbfc), islaunching its new website, www.bbfc.de, with many newfeatures. Via some 600 locations with over 6,800 photographs,moviemakers from all over the world can take a closer look at Germany’s capital region and get straight through to the”Gate to Germany“. The Berlin Brandenburg Film

Commission is a producer’s first stop.

The huge database HELP, which was first introduced at theBerlin Film Festival two years ago, functions as an electronicdirectory to give producers all the information they need onlocations, shooting permissions and the appropriate contacts.It now holds more than 2,200 addresses to give the user anidea of ”who’s who“ in film in Berlin and Brandenburg.

Scriptwriting Camp Freiburg

A script development training for young writers and scripttalents organized by the Filmfoerderung Baden-

Wuerttemberg (MFG), the Hessian film fund, the Goethe Institute Freiburg, TaunusFilm GmbH Wiesbaden andZFP will take place in Freiburg from 28 May to 2 June 2002and in Wiesbaden from 2 - 7 September 2002. The new concept will feature: Scriptwriting for Documentary Features

Kino 2/2002

“Ben

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Kino n e w s

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(Gregors groesste Erfindung), which was nominatedthis year for an OSCAR in the category Best Short Film-LiveAction.

Following the presentation in Cannes, which is also supportedby the six major regional film funds, ”Next Generation

2002“ will be shown at all Festivals of German Cinema organized by the Export-Union in key cities of the inter-national film industry, including Rome, Madrid, Paris, London,Los Angeles, Warsaw, Sydney, Melbourne and Hong Kong.

4th Location Tour Southwest

From 27 to 28 June 2002, the MFG film fund kindly invitesfilmmakers to join this year’s location tour. The two-day discovery of shooting-locations in Baden-Wuerttemberg, providing a large variety of contrasting motifs, will start out inFreiburg, the beautiful university town close to the French andSwiss borders, and leads into the heart of the Southern BlackForest. For further information please contact:

MFG Filmfoerdung Baden-Wuerttemberg

Uschi Freynick

Breitscheidstrasse 4 · 70174 Stuttgart/Germany

phone +49-7 11-90 71 54 08

fax +49-7 11-90 71 54 50

www.mfg.de/film · email: [email protected]

by Pepe Danquart, who took home an OSCAR

in 1994 for his widely-acclaimed short Black Rider

(Schwarzfahrer, 1993) and a German Film Award for BestDirection for the feature Heimspiel (2000). For furtherinformation please contact:

MFG Filmfoerdung Baden-Wuerttemberg

Karin Frey

Breitscheidstrasse 4 · 70174 Stuttgart/Germany

phone +49-7 11-90 71 54 04

fax +49-7 11-90 71 54 50

www.mfg.de/film · email: [email protected]

NEXT GENERATION for the

5th Time in Cannes

The Export-Union once again presents a selection of shortfilms by students of German films schools under the banner”Next Generation“ during the Cannes Film Festival.

Eight new films from six German film and art academies makeup this year’s ”Next Generation“ lineup which will have itsworld premiere in Cannes on Sunday, 19 May 2002 at

20:00 h in the Cinema Star 1. The members of the inde-pendent expert jury for this year’s annual selection were:Heinz Badewitz (Hof Film Days), Astrid Kuehl

(Short Film Agency Hamburg) and Thomas

Blieninger (Blickpunkt Film).

”Next Generation 2002“ proudly presents: Hochzeits-

tag by Tanja Brzakovic and Benny X by Florian

Baxmeyer (both from the Hamburger Filmwerkstatt for FilmStudies of the University of Hamburg); Am See by Ulrike

von Ribbeck and Red Gourmet Pellzik by Andreas

Samland (both from the German Film & Television Academy(dffb) Berlin); Fenster mit Aussicht by Vera Lalyko

(Academy of Media Arts (KHM) Cologne); Morgenstund

by David Emmenlauer (Academy of Television & Film inMunich); Das Rad by Chris Stenner, Arvid Uibel, andHeidi Wittlinger (Film Academy Baden-Wuerttemberg inLudwigsburg); and Undercover by Susanne Budden-

berg (”Konrad Wolf“ Academy of Film & Television inPotsdam-Babelsberg).

The program will also feature a special presentation ofJohannes Kiefer’s Gregor’s Greatest Invention

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Third Festival of German

Cinema in Rome

The third annual Festival of German Cinema in Rome

(11 - 15 April 2002) was met with great response by audiencesand the media alike. Five directors and two actors were per-sonally on hand to present their films to sold-out screenings.The festival opened with Andreas Dresen’s Grill Point

(Halbe Treppe), who, together with lead actor Axel

Prahl, introduced the film.

Maria Speth and Benjamin Quabeck were also inRome to present and discuss their films The Days

Between (In den Tag hinein) and No Regrets

(Nichts Bereuen).

Three other films which have already found Italian distributorsand will soon be released in Italy were shown as ”avant-premieres“: The Experiment (Das Experiment) byOliver Hirschbiegel; the documentary Black Box BRD

by Andres Veiel, who was also present for a Q&A sessionafter the film, and Sandra Nettelbeck’s Bella Martha,presented by lead actor Sergio Castellito.

The program also included: Esther Gronenborn’s alas-

ka.de, Christian Petzold’s two films The State I Am

In (Die Innere Sicherheit) and Something to

Remind Me (Toter Mann), a midnight presentation ofWim Wender’s Ode to Cologne (Viel Passiert –

Der BAP Film), Fritz Lang’s silent classic Metropolis

with live musical accompaniment, and the short film programNext Generation 2001. Within the framework of the”Next Generation“ presentation, Oliver Seiter’s film The

Pilot was named Best Short Film by the Italian magazine andInternet website 35mm.it.

The event was supported by the Federal GovernmentCommissioner for Cultural Affairs and the Media, the GermanFederal Film Board (FFA) and the six regional film funds, incooperation with the Goethe-Institue Inter Nationesand the German Embassy in Rome. The festival was also spon-sored in part by Bavaria Film International, Transit Film, theFriedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau Foundation, UICC, 35mm.it, RadioCittà Futura, Scuola Nazionale di Cinema and ErdingerWeissbrau.

German Films Win at Creteil

and Mar del Plata

Sandra Nettelbeck’s Bella Martha was awarded theJury’s Grand Prix for the Best Feature Film at the 24th

Festival International Films de Femmes in

Creteil, which is regarded as one of the most importantinternational meeting places for women filmmakers and as aspringboard for new directors.

All three German-international competition entries wereamong the prize winners at the 17th Festival Inter-

national de Cine de Mar del Plata (7 - 16 March2002). The international jury at Mar del Plata awarded theGerman-international co-production Taking Sides

(Germany/United Kingdom/France) by István Szabó with the Silver Ombú for Best Direction. Another Silver Ombú waspresented to the Swedish actor Stellan Skarsgard in the category of Best Actor for his role in the film, while cinema-tographer Lajos Koltai received the prize for Best Cinema-tography from the Association of Cinematographers (ADFJury) and the Kodak Award.

The Silver Ombú for Best Actress went to Kirsten Dunst

for her role in the German-international competition entryThe Cat’s Meow by Peter Bogdanovich (Germany/United Kingdom), while one of the jury’s two special mentions was presented to the German-internationalcompetition entry Annas Sommer (Anna’s Summer)by Jeanine Meerapfel (Germany/Spain/Greece).Recognized by the FIAPF, the Festival International de

Cine de Mar del Plata is one of the current twelve so-called ”A-Festivals“ and thus one of the most importantfilm events worldwide.

Kino 2/2002

www.german-cinema.de

with

more than 100 news itemsmore than 200 festival portraitsmore than 500 German films

more than 1000 other useful things to know about German Cinema

Export-Union des Deutschen Films GmbH · Sonnenstrasse 21 · 80331 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-5 99 78 70 · fax +49-89-59 97 87 30 · email: [email protected]

Das fliegendeKlassenzimmer

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Original Title Feature Film Cinema Genre DramaProduction Company Neue Bioskop Film, Munich in co-pro-duction with TV-60 Filmproduktion, Munich, BR, Munich With backing from Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg,FilmFernsehFonds Bayern Producers Eberhard Junkersdorf,Dietmar Guentsche, Bernd Burgemeister Director OskarRoehler Screenplay Oskar Roehler Director of Photog-

raphy Hagen Bogdanski Editor Uli Schoen Music by MartinTodsharow Production Design Birgit Kniep-Gentis Principal

Cast André Hennicke, Marie Baeumer, Vadim Glowna, Hilde vanMieghem, Wolfgang Joop Format 35 mm, color, cs, DolbyDigital Shooting Language German Shooting in Berlinfrom 9 April to end of May 2002

Contact:

Neue Bioskop Film GmbH · Dietmar Guentsche

Rosenheimer Strasse 143d · 81671 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-4 09 09 20 · fax +49-89-40 90 92 20


Production is currently underway in Berlin on Oskar Roehler’slatest feature Der alte Affe Angst, starring André

Hennicke (Something to Remind Me/Toter Mann,2001), Marie Baeumer (Ode to Cologne/Viel Passiert

– Der BAP Film, 2000/2001) and Vadim Glowna (No

Place to Go/Die Unberuehrbare, 2000).

As with Roehler’s No Place to Go, which was shown inCannes’ Directors’ Fortnight sidebar two years ago and won countless prizes in Germany and abroad, the new film also borrows autobiographical elements from Roehler’s life and thatof his family.

While Roehler’s mother, the writer Gisela Elsner, providedthe inspiration for the figure played by Hannelore Elsner inNo Place to Go, one strand in Der alte Affe Angst withthe successful film director Robert (Hennicke) getting in touchwith his father Klaus (Glowna) after a gap of five years only tolearn that he is suffering from prostate cancer, was based onRoehler’s own experience of being reunited with his fathershortly before his death.

”It is not exactly a continuation of No Place to Go, althoughthere are some elements there“, Roehler says. “This film is closer to life, it is set in the present and will be narrated in a morerealistic way“.

”The parallel story between the couple Robert and Marie(Baeumer) came about from my observation of a lot of situa-tions and long-term relationships where one always had the feelingthat men have difficulties committing themselves sexually to onepartner“, Roehler explains, adding that ”there is a unconditionalnature to this couple’s love and they are bound to one anotherby fate, but the male partner cannot hold out indefinitely“.

”For once, it will really be a quiet film for me. I want to have arelatively quiet and straightforward camera; there will be noblack-and-white, no stylization and everything will be unobtrusive“,he continues.

Der alte Affe Angst marks the second collaboration betweenRoehler and producers Junkersdorf and Guentsche – theyhad previously worked together on the RTL TV movie Latin

Lover (1999) which also starred Marie Baeumer – andit is the first project under the roof of Junkersdorf’s new com-pany Neue Bioskop Film.

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Original Title Das fliegende Klassenzimmer Type ofProject Feature Film Cinema Genre Family ProductionCompanies Bavaria Filmverleih und Produktion, Munich,Lunaris, Munich, in cooperation with ZDF, Mainz With backingfrom Mitteldeutsche Medienfoerderung, FilmFernsehFondsBayern, Filmfoerderungsanstalt (FFA) Producers Uschi Reich,Peter Zenk Director Tomy Wigand Screenplay HenriettePiper, Hermine Kunka, based on the novel of the same name byErich Kaestner Director of Photography Peter von HallerEditor Christian Nauheimer Music by Niki Reiser, BiberGullatz (songs), Moritz Freise Principal Cast Ulrich Noethen,Sebastian Koch, Piet Klocke, Anja Kling, Hauke Diekamp, TeresaVilsmaier Format 35 mm, color Shooting LanguageGerman Shooting in Munich and Leipzig and surroundings fromFebruary to April 2002 German Distributor Constantin FilmVerleih GmbH, Munich

PR Contact: Just Publicity · Bianca FeilkasErhardtstrasse 8 · 80469 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-20 20 82 60 · fax +49-89-20 20 82 89email: [email protected]

Kino 2/2002

World Sales:Bavaria Film InternationalDept. of Bavaria Media GmbH · Thorsten SchaumannBavariafilmplatz 8 · 82031 Geiselgasteig/Germanyphone +49-89-64 99 26 86 · fax +49-89-64 99 37 20www.bavaria-film-international.de email: [email protected]

Production cranks up for 11 weeks at the beginning of June onVeit Helmer’s second full-length feature Gate to Heaven(Tor zum Himmel) at locations in Frankfurt’s international airport.

This project, which had been gestating for the last seven years,sees Helmer collaborating with the Serbian screenwriterGordon Mihic, whose screenplays including EmirKusturica’s award-winning Time of the Gypsies andBlack Cat, White Cat.

”Gate To Heaven is a love story set at an airport, a film aboutluggage handlers and cleaning women who dream of becomingstewardesses“, explains Helmer. ”It will be shot in English be-cause people from all over the world will appear in the film andthey will speak with an accent, but that is intended“.

Helmer and Mihic researched together ”behind the scenes“ at the airport in Frankfurt, away from the check-in counters anddeparture lounges, with Mihic writing the screenplay in Serbiansince he can speak neither English nor German. Helmer thenwrote the last draft of the script with the support of theéQuinoxe script workshop and also participated in otherEuropean initiatives such as Moonstone and EAVE to honeand fine-tune the screenplay. ”I was interested in the international response and to see how the project was accepted“, he recalls.

Although the project has been a long time in preparation – with abreak for the production of Tuvalu (1999) –, Helmer says thatthe film’s story was ”always topical and is so more than ever. Thefilm title has many meanings: on one level, it is means the dreamof flying, of coming to Europe and Germany. But, sometimes, thecharacters in the film are up on the roof cleaning and look downon the passengers in the departure lounge - then heaven is belowthem!“

As was the case with Tuvalu, casting for his new film was also amarathon task with the director meeting actors in places as farapart as Los Angeles, London, Tashkent, Bombay and Moscow tofind the right people for his acting ensemble. The lineup includesKusturica-star Miki Manojlovic and Germany’s Udo Kieras well as the ”Bollywood“ actress Masumi Makhija, andValera Nikolaev (U-Turn).

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Producer Peter Zenk is quite a specialist in adapting the child-ren’s classics of Erich Kaestner for the cinema after havingalso produced Joseph Vilsmaier’s Charlie & Louise (Dasdoppelte Lottchen, 1993), Caroline Link’s Annaluiseand Anton (Puenkchten und Anton, 1999), andFranziska Buch’s Emil and the Detectives (Emil unddie Detektive, 2001).

But the latest adaptation – Das fliegende Klassenzimmer –posed a few challenges for producers and screenwriters alike as itdidn't have ”a continuous, exciting storyline like in Emil and theDetectives“, as producer Uschi Reich points out.

The story centers on young Jonathan who has already flown outof eight boarding schools and thinks it will be only a matter oftime before he is sent packing from his new school at theThomaskirche in Leipzig. But the headmaster takes him under hiswing and the boys in his dormitory accept him into their gang. Allkinds of adventures are about to happen ...

Casting the adult roles came together quite easily with such lead-ing German actors as Ulrich Noethen (The Slurb/DasSams, 2001) in the role of the headmaster and SebastianKoch (The Tunnel/Der Tunnel, 2001) as the mysteriousfigure of the ’non-smoker’. But finding the right 10 to 12-year-oldsfor the children’s parts proved much harder. ”We definitely didn’twant to cast the parts with children who had already appeared inthe last Kaestner films“, Zenk recalls. ”And the demands wereextremely high because we are dealing here with big lead roles“.

As a consequence, almost a thousand children passed through thecasting sessions before the producers decided on a number offilm debutants such as 12-year-old Hauke Diekamp for thepart of Jonathan, alongside established child actors like TeresaVilsmaier and Constantin Gastmann.

The Euro 5 million production of Das fliegende Klassen-zimmer marks director Tomy Wigand’s second outing into feature films after his award-winning debut Soccer Rules!(Fussball ist unser Leben), starring Uwe Ochsenknecht,from 2000.

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Original Title Gate to Heaven German Title Tor zumHimmel Type of Project Feature Film Cinema Genre LoveStory Production Company Veit Helmer Filmproduktion,Berlin, in cooperation with ZDF, Mainz, ARTE, StrasbourgWith backing from Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg, Film-foerderungsanstalt (FFA) Producer Ulf Israel Director VeitHelmer Screenplay Veit Helmer, Gordon Mihic Director ofPhotography Joachim Jung Production DesignerAlexander Manasse Principal Cast Valera Nikolaev, MasumiMakhija, Miki Manojlovic, Udo Kier, Michael Chynamurindi, Sotigui Koyate Format 35 mm, color, cs Shooting LanguageEnglish Shooting at Frankfurt airport from 11 June - 24 August2002 German Distributor Prokino Filmverleih GmbH,Munich

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Das Jesus Video

horrors of the concentration camp, but what about the townwhich has become synonymous with the crimes?“ HelloDachau!, the veteran film, television and advertising cameramanFischer’s directorial debut, is ”a fascinating, sympathetic, tragically funny and most topical film about Germans, Germanyand the way they are dealing with their loathsome past.“

His guides in this tourist-video-with-a-twist are a group of charis-matic townspeople, taking him through their ”own personalDachau“. We meet former prisoners, ex-politicians, the DonQuixote of Dachau, the son of a former concentration-campguard, his father and the landlord of a strange oompah-pub. All ofthem are united by living in Germany’s most (in)famous town.

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Original Title Das Jesus Video English Title Jesus VideoType of Project Mini-Series Genre Thriller Production

Companies Ratpack Filmproduktion, Munich, GFP Medienfonds,Berlin, in cooperation with F.A.M.E., Munich, ProSieben, Munich,KirchMedia, Munich Executive Producers Christian Becker,Anita Schneider Director Sebastian Niemann Screenplay

Martin Ritzenhoff, based on the novel of the same name byAndreas Eschbach Director of Photography Gerhard SchirloPrincipal Cast Matthias Koerberlin, Naike Rivelli, ManouLubowski, Heinrich Giskes, Hans Diehl Format 35 mm, color,1:1.85 Shooting Language German Shooting in Casablancaand Ouarzazate/Morocco, from 26 February to 14 May 2002

PR Contact:

KirchMedia GmbH · Program Press & PR

Silvia Fernandez

phone +49-89-99 56 23 80 · fax +49-89-99 56 26 40

www.kirchmedia.de


World Sales:

Beta Film GmbH

Robert-Buerkle-Strasse 2 · 85737 Ismaning/Germany

phone +49-89-99 56 27 44 · fax +49-89-99 56 27 03

www.betacinema.com

Sebastian Niemann’s fast-paced adventure thriller JesusVideo, based on Andreas Eschbach’s international best-sellerof the same name, is a first on several counts.

To begin with, it is the first production by Christian Beckerand Anita Schneider’s new outfit Ratpack Filmpro-duktion; the first project to be backed by the media investmentfund German Film Productions (GFP); ProSieben’s first in-house two-parter and also screenwriter MartinRitzenhoff’s first foray into the thriller genre from comedy.

Niemann, who had previously worked with Becker on themystery TV movie Das Biikenbrennen – Der Fluch desMeeres (1999) and the English-language feature 7 Days ToLive (2000), became curious after reading the hardback edition’sblurb.

A year or so later, producer Becker came to him with the offerto direct an adaptation for television and Niemann didn’t hesi-tate in accepting.

Original Title Gruesse aus Dachau! English Title HelloDachau! Type of Project Feature Film Cinema with TV versionGenre Documentary Production Company Egoli TossellFilm, Berlin, in cooperation with BR, Munich, SWR, StuttgartWith backing from FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, FilmboardBerlin-Brandenburg Producers Jens Meurer, Dr. ClaudiaGladziejewski (BR) Director Bernd Fischer Screenplay BerndFischer Directors of Photography Knut Schmitz, BerndFischer Editor Inge Scheider Music by Haindling FormatDigital Video to 35 mm blow-up, 1:1.85, color, 90 min (TV version 52 min) Shooting Language German Shooting inDachau from October 2001 to August 2002 GermanDistributor Salzgeber & Co Medien GmbH, Berlin

World Sales: d.net.sales · Heino DeckertPeterssteinweg 13 · 04107 Leipzig/Germanyphone +49-3 41-2 15 66 38 · fax +49-3 41-2 15 66 39www.d-net-sales.de · email [email protected]

It’s not easy being German! Especially if you come from an infa-mous small town in Bavaria, known throughout the world as thesite of the first Nazi concentration camp. And while Dachau dreams of being nothing more than as average as anywhere else in Germany, that is impossible.

Sixty years after World War II, the town remains trapped in aneternal Nazi time loop. Dachau. It’s a name the residents can’tshake off. It’s on the check and credit cards issued by the localbank, it’s written on their birth certificates and, worse still, thedreaded DAH car registration means they carry it with them inthe open wherever they go.

While there is no magic solution for disconnecting Dachau’s namefrom its past, it doesn’t stop the good citizens from trying. In2001, for example, they represented themselves at Berlin’sInternational Tourism Fair, the world’s largest, praising Dachau’sAnnual Beetroot Festival. And they are currently pressuringLufthansa to finally name one of their aircraft after Dachau; otherGerman towns have long since received the honor.

In fact, there is no end to the convulsions that the people ofDachau put themselves through to deal with their legacy. And inthat way, they are the most German of Germans!

”I’m a storyteller,“ says Bernd Fischer (who spent his teenageyears growing up in Dachau). ”Everyone knows the name and the

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Set in Hamburg’s immigrant district of Altona, home to the worldfamous red light district, the Reeperbahn, Yueksel Yavuz’sDer Laufbursche tells the unusual story of the friendship between two young men.

Baran (Cagdas Bozkurt) is a Kurd whose relatives have helpedhim to come to Germany after the death of his parents. Raised ina home, his asylum application was rejected just shy of his six-teenth birthday. No stranger to hard work, he survives by runningerrands (the best translation of Der Laufbursche is actuallythe American term ”gofer“, as in the boy who goes and fetchesthings) for a Turkish fast-food restaurant.

His errands take him from the finest apartments to the lowest clip joints; confronting him with the district’s many realities.Occasionally he meets up with a Bosnian woman who works in acafe or a homeless man who ”lives“ on a park bench. There’s evena Turkish girl who is keen on him. But to all of them, Baranremains a closed book.

It is not until he encounters the seventeen-year old African,Chernor (Leroy Delmar), that his life gains impetus. Chernor isalso an illegal and stateless immigrant. They are drawn together.But while Chernor tries to finance his future, emigration toAustralia, by dealing drugs, Baran’s past catches up with him.

He keeps encountering an old Kurdish man and one day learns theman was responsible for his parents’ death. Baran wants to avengethem but doesn’t know how.

During an argument between Kurdish radicals at a party, Barancomes into possession of a gun. But when he confronts the oldman he is unable to act. Shortly afterwards, the worst happens:Baran and Chernor are stopped by the police. Baran escapes butChernor is arrested. He has already lost enough people in his life,he can’t stand to lose another, one to whom he feels so close.Baran retrieves his gun and heads for the police station to free hisfriend.

Kurdish-born Yavuz came to Germany in 1980 when he was six-teen. A keen stills photographer, he started experimenting withfilm in 1990, going on to make several documentaries.

His 1998 feature film April Children (Aprilkinder), a por-trait of a Kurdish family whose three children struggle to carve outa niche for themselves between the old and new worlds, won theAudience Award at Saarbruecken in 1999.

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”I liked the idea of two parts because you then have the chance tobe broader in your storytelling and for the whole story to beexpanded“, Niemann explains, ”It was an interesting challenge -and a completely new experience for me - to tell a story overthree hours“.

At the center of the plot, Matthias Koerberlin (who appear-ed in the Berlinale competition film Amen (2002) by Costa-Gavras this year), plays the young man Steffen helping out at aGerman archeological excavation in Israel when he finds a 2,000-year-old skeleton holding the instructions for a video camera madein 2003. Although his theory of a time-traveler who made a videoof Jesus is ridiculed by everyone, soon he is being pursued by theGerman embassy and a secret Vatican order, among others, whoare all very keen to find the camera and video …

Budgeted at Euro 4.45 million, the production also featuresOrnella Muti’s daughter Naike Rivelli as Steffen’s feisty loveinterest Sharon, who helps him out of many a tight spot, and wasshot on location at Ouarzazate – partly using the sets from TheBible series – and Casablanca in Morocco.

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Original Title Der Laufbursche (working title) English Title

Baran’s Way (working title) Type of Project Feature FilmCinema Genre Coming-of-Age Story, Drama Production

Company Cotta Media Entertainment, Berlin, Peter StockhausFilmproduktion, Hamburg, in co-production with ZDF, MainzWith backing from Filmfoerderung Hamburg, FilmboardBerlin-Brandenburg, BKM Producers Ralph E. Cotta, PeterStockhaus Commissioning Editor Claudia Tronnier (ZDF)Director Yueksel Yavuz Screenplay Yueksel Yavuz Director

of Photography Patrick Orth Principal Cast CagdasBozkurt, Leroy Delmar, Nazmi Kirik, Necmettin Cobanoglu,Susanna Rozkosny, Sunay Girisken Format 35 mm, 1:1.85, color,90 min Shooting Language German, Turkish, Kurdish (partlysubtitled) Shooting in Hamburg from February to April 2002German Distributor Pegasos Filmverleih, Cologne

World Sales:

Cotta Media Entertainment GmbH · Ralph E. Cotta

Suarezstrasse 43 · 14057 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-8 91 66 11 · fax +49-30-30 82 43 39


Nach Haus in die Fremde

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Kino 2/2002

Original Title Nach Haus in die Fremde (working title)Type of Project TV Movie Genre TragicomedyProduction Company Colonia Media, Cologne for WDR,Cologne Producer Sonja Goslicki Director Andreas KleinertScreenplay Karl-Heinz Kaefer Director of PhotographyJohann Feindt Editor Gisela Zick Music by Andreas HogePrincipal Cast Goetz George, Klaus J. Behrendt, UlrikeKrumbiegel, Serguy Moya, Christine Schorn Format Super 16mm to video transfer, 16:9, color, 90 min Shooting LanguageGerman Shooting in Cologne and surroundings in February and March 2002

World Sales:

Bavaria Media Television · Carlos Hertel

Bavariafilmplatz 8 · 82031 Geiselgasteig/Germany

phone +49-89-64 99 22 36 · fax +49-89-64 99 22 40


A young family has just moved into its new home. The renova-tions still haven’t been finished as the telephone rings one night:Grandfather has been knocked down by a car.

Richard (Goetz George) is only slightly hurt, but it’s obviousthe old man’s senile dementia, or Alzheimer’s Disease, is gettingworse and he is no longer able to take care of himself.

Richard moves in and, to begin with, they all find humor in themany slight mishaps. At first, they are convinced they can help himdeal with the situation. Oliver prints computer labels for the doors so grandfather can find his way around the house. Jochenincreases health insurance payments for his father while Anja givesup her part-time job. But it soon becomes clear to them that theirdecision has serious implications for all their lives.

The one flicker of hope is Karin, Richard’s long-time lover, whosepresence causes him to become his old self and act normally. AsRichard’s illness progresses, the family finds itself deeper and deeper in crisis. When the old man accidentally starts a fire, that isthe final straw for Anja. She moves out, leaving the three menalone. What will Jochen do? Will the family survive?

Goetz George, a nationally-known star of film and television, isalso one of the few German actors to have achieved international

recognition, with films such as the fake-Hitler-diaries comedySchtonk! (director Helmut Dietl, 1992) and TheDeathmaker (Der Totmacher, director RomualdKarmakar, 1995).

Producer Sonja Goslicki has worked closely with Georgesince 1996 on the re-launched police series Schimanksi (after thedetective of the same name), also for broadcaster WDR. Amongthe many honors she has received are the Golden Camera, theGerman Television Award, the Bavarian Television Award and a Golden Gong.

Colonia Media is a subsidiary of Bavaria Film and speciali-zes in TV movies (such as the famous ”Scene of Crime“, or Tatort,films), drama series and documentaries for Germany’s commercialand public broadcasters. In 2000, Christian Granderath join-ed the company. His hit feature production credits include thecomedy Maybe, Maybe Not (Der bewegte Mann) directed by Soenke Wortmann in 1994, as well as the dramasThe Deathmaker, and Andreas Dresen´s The Police-woman (Die Polizistin, 2000).

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Original Title Olgas Sommer (working title) English TitleOlga’s Summer Type of Project Feature Film CinemaGenre Coming-of-Age Story Production Company MTMWest Television & Film, Cologne, in co-production with MACTProductions, Paris, in cooperation with WDR, Cologne Withbacking from Filmstiftung NRW, Filmfoerderungsanstalt(FFA)/CNC co-production treaty Producer Peter HerrmannCommissioning Editor Andrea Hanke (WDR) DirectorNina Grosse Screenplay Nina Grosse Production DesignIngrid Buron Format 35 mm, color, Dolby SR ShootingLanguage German/French Shooting in Germany and Francefrom August 2002

Contact: MTM West Television & Film GmbHPeter HerrmannRichard-Wagner-Strasse 13-1750674 Cologne/Germanyphone +49-2 21-9 49 72 10 · fax +49-2 21-94 97 21 18email: [email protected]


Shooting is set to begin this August on the latest feature bywriter-director Nina Grosse, Olga’s Summer, which alsomarks the first foray by German producer MTM into Europeanco-productions through its Cologne-based outpost MTM West.

”Having a German-French co-production was a very organic development“, explains MTM’s Andreas Bareiss. ”Parts ofthe story are set in a southern country which could be Spain orFrance, and Nina Grosse studied in France and is very franco-phile. We also didn’t want to cast some of the characters withactors from Germany because we had the feeling that they wouldn’t feel French“.

screen adaptation of her historical novel Pope Joan which has beena bestseller hit in Germany.

Set in 9th century Europe, Pope Joan tells the fascinating andextraordinary story of Johanna von Ingelheim who disguised herself as a man and sat on the papal throne for two years asPope John Anglicus. (This episode in history was apparently general knowledge until the 17th century before Johanna’s existence was removed from the Vatican’s manuscripts).

”I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have make this movie and I have every faith in Volker and Michael, who really understand theweight of the book and Joan the woman", Cross adds.

”I had promised myself no more literary masterpieces“ admitsSchloendorff who has made literary adaptations something ofa speciality in his directorial career with versions of books by Grass, Proust, Musil, and Frisch. ”But this is real storytelling. Itstarts with a strong character, about how a gifted child had a thirstfor knowledge, and my first aim is to portray the passion of themain character rather than show a wide fresco of the time“.

Producer Norbert Sauer recalls that it was really difficult toget the film rights to Cross’ novel: three years ago, an option hadbeen taken by New Line, but then 18 months later, he learnedthat they were free again and took the plunge. While a final figurehas yet to be fixed for the budget, Sauer is perfectly aware thatPope Joan will be ”big budget, more than triple average, but wehave talked to international financial partners and distributors andthe impression is that everyone is convinced that it would be asuccess“.

Following the motto of ”don’t aim for America and fail at home“,Sauer says that they ”have a European film in mind for theEuropean market", but also with appeal for the USA. ”If it has a strong European identity, it will be more successful“, Sauerconcludes.

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Norbert Sauer, Volker Schloendorff, Donna Cross, Michael Hirst

In addition, the decision to team up with a French partner –Antoine de Clermont-Tonnerre of MACT Produc-tions – was made easier by the existence of the co-productionmini-treaty (signed at the Cannes Film Festival last year by min-isters Tasca and Nida-Ruemelin) and the German-French Film Academy.

Grosse’s coming-of-age story revolves around the 16-year-oldOlga who has the following philosophy of life: ”Things happen just as you want them to if you firmly believe inthem and do the following:1. Take everything you can get straightaway because it will no1. longer be there tomorrow. 2. Giving up is boring.3. So is being scared, unless it is being scared to death.4. Never stay any longer than necessary in one place. That4. particularly applies to the place where your family is staying.5. As far as love is concerned, only wild men can be taken into5. consideration. 6. Adventures are sacred.7. Betrayal can be atoned for by death."

As Grosse explains, ”this feeling of being alive determines thestory’s dramaturgy. The principle of realism is temporarily can-celled; what is now in force are the laws of the fairytale, of one’sown images and desires, the laws of the welcome coincidence.Olga in Wonderland“.

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Original Title Die Paepstin English Title Pope JoanType of Project Feature Film Cinema Genre DramaProduction Company UFA Film & TV Produktion, Potsdam Producer Norbert Sauer Director Volker SchloendorffScreenplay Michael Hirst, based on the novel of the samename by Donna Woolfork Cross Format 35 mm, color Shooting Language English Shooting in Europe fromSummer 2003

PR Contact: UFA Film & TV Produktion GmbH · Kristian MuellerDianastrasse 21 · 14482 Potsdam-Babelsberg/Germanyphone +49-3 31-7 06 03 78 · fax +49-3 31-7 06 03 76www.ufa.de · email: [email protected]

”This is my dream team“, enthuses US authoress DonnaWoolfolk Cross about the plans of OSCAR-winning Germandirector Volker Schloendorff, UK screenwriter MichaelHirst (Elizabeth) and producer Norbert Sauer for a big-

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Grimm fairytales are turned completely topsy turvey as witches flyaround on Harley Davidsons, Rumpelstilzchen proves to be anideal single parent father, and poor Snow White gets up to somewild adventures.

At the center of the story is a love triangle between Ella (whosevoice is spoken by Buffy the Vampire Slayer-star SarahMichelle Gellar), her ideal prince and an unknown true lovewho turns out to be Rick, the palace dish-washer (FreddiePrinze Jr.) – and, of course, a fairytale story would not be com-plete without an evil mother-in-law (Sigourney Weaver) anda magician (George Carlin).

The voices were recorded at the beginning of March in LosAngeles, and the actual classic 2D animation work was begunshortly afterwards by 300-400 animators at Berlin-based HahnFilm, with production on the Euro 14.3 million project to last for around 16 months.

SimsalaGrimm – The Movie (which will have the additionaltitle of Happily (N)ever After in the USA) is the first of aplanned long-term collaboration between Greenlight and JohnWilliams’s Vanguard Films, the OSCAR-winning producer oflast year’s animation hit Shrek, to produce internationallymarketable animation features for the whole family.

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Original Title Die Suenderin Type of Project Feature FilmCinema Genre Psycho-Thriller Production Company HagerMoss Film, Munich With backing from FilmFoerderungHamburg, FilmFernsehFonds Bayern Producers Kirsten Hager,Eric Moss Director Sherry Hormann Screenplay BerndSchwamm, Kit Hopkins Director of Photography HannoLentz Editor Eva Schnare Format 35 mm, 1:1.85, color, 110min Shooting Language German Shooting in Hamburgfrom September to October 2002

Contact:Hager Moss Film GmbH · Kerstin Hager, Eric MossRambergstrasse 5 · 80799 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-2 06 08 00 · fax +49-89-20 60 80 10www.hager-moss.de · email: [email protected]

Her fate was sealed years ago. Now it’s caught up with her!As Cora Bender prepares for a swimming trip with her husbandand young son, she’s really planning her own death by drowning.But her planned ’accident’ is interrupted when she is called back to shore by her child, who is hungry.

She peels him an apple and is then further disturbed by a couplewho have started necking. Cora stands up, walks over to themand stabs the man repeatedly in the throat, killing him.

At first, the police, in the form of Detective Rudolph Grovian, areinterested only in the facts, but run up against a wall of silence andforgotten motives. But as Cora’s memory returns, she begins toremember the person who sealed her fate, her sister Magdalena.

As Cora’s obsessions and her repressed past overwhelm her, it isGrovian who also finds himself forced to stand on the edge of theabyss, looking into the bottomless depths below.

Die Suenderin (the title translates ”The Sinner“) is the latestfilm from German-American Sherry Hormann, and tells the

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Die Suenderin

SimsalaGrimm –The MovieOriginal Title SimsalaGrimm – The Movie Type of ProjectFeature Film Cinema Genre Animation ProductionCompany BAF Berlin Animation Film, Berlin, Hahn Film, BerlinExecutive Producer Greenlight Media, Berlin ProducersStefan Beiten, André Sikojev, Nikolaus Weil, John H. WilliamsDirector Gerhard Hahn Screenplay Rob Moreland Musicby Alexander Janko Voices of Sarah Michelle Gellar, FreddiePrinze Jr., Sigourney Weaver, George Carlin Format 35 mm,color, 1: 1.85, Dolby SR Shooting Language EnglishShooting at Hahn Film Studios from March 2002

Contact:Greenlight Media AGGormannstrasse 22 · 10119 Berlin/Germanyphone +49-30-7 26 20 00 · fax +49-30-7 26 20 02 22www.greenlightmedia.comemail: [email protected]

World Sales:Greenlight International B.V.Lorentzweg 46 B1221 EH Hilversum/The Netherlandsphone +31-3 56-42 06 77 · fax +31-3 56-42 06 88www.greenlightmedia.com email: [email protected]

Over the last three years, television screens in some 130 countriesaround the world have been graced by the highly successful 26half-hour TV animated series SimsalaGrimm, based on theclassic fairy tales of Germany’s Brothers Grimm.

Now, producers Greenlight Media are going one step forwardand building on the series’ popularity with the making of a featureanimation film inspired by the Grimm stories and targeted at aninternational family audience.

Scripted by Rob Moreland, SimsalaGrimm – The Movieis set in the fairytale land of Simsala and shows what happenswhen the balance of good and evil is brought out of kilter. The

Kino 2/2002

Gerhard Hahn, John Williams, Stefan Beiten, Nikolaus Weil

standing leads to a rift which tears both them and their worldapart.

Twenty years later, Lukas is still terrified of being abandoned. Hesurvives by forming loose relationships which don’t threaten him.Then one day he meets Lena who turns his feelings upside downand awakens his inner child, the one still searching for uncondi-tional friendship.

While there is never a guarantee of security, there forms a bondof trust, and through Lena, Lukas again makes contact withClemens. After years of silence, they are finally able to exorcisetheir ghosts in an explosion of emotion.

”The characters in this film aren’t driven by outside events,“ sayswriter-director Andreas Struck, ”but by their internal experi-ences and expectations. Just as Lukas’ physical handicap mirrors his emotional handicap after being abandoned, so I intend to visualize the internal processes.“

Born in Cologne in 1965, Struck studied Comparative Literaturein Bonn and Berlin before embarking on a career in theatricaldirection. His film credits include Edward II (1991) andWittgenstein (1993, personal assistant to Derek Jarmanon both films) as well as director’s assistant and script supervisionfor Sandra Nettelbeck’s Loose Ends (Unbestaendigund kuehl, TV, 1995), Christian Petzold’s Cuba Libre(TV, 1996) and Maria Teresa Camoglio’s Bandagisten-glueck (1997).

As well as contributing to the magazines Filmfaust and TheaterHeute, since 1993 he has been part of the Panorama team at theBerlin Film Festival and since 1997 he has coordinated the activi-ties of the European Film Promotion in Cannes and Pusan/SouthKorea.

Sugar Orange sees Struck renewing his partnership withdirector of photography Andreas Doub, editor PhilippStahl and composer Erlandas. Together, they all worked onStruck’s debut film, Chill Out (1999), which has played at festivals around the world, including Berlin, Edinburgh,Gothenburg, Toronto, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Palm Springs,San Francisco, Los Angeles, Montreal, Hong Kong and Sydney.

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story of a journey into the unknown, into the very secrets of thehuman soul.

”The figures are bound within a dramatic corset,“ says Hor-mann. ”I want to show breaks and feelings beyond the normal.The spectator should not be able to work out what awaits him or her. There is no more intelligent way to be entertained.“

In fact, Hager Moss Film’s first-ever feature was Hormann’sSilent Shadows (Leise Schatten, 1992) which was awardedthe Bavarian Film Award and won three German Film Awards. Theirnext collaboration, Women Are Simply Wonderful(Frauen sind was Wunderbares, 1993) won the BavarianFilm Award for newcomer producers. Hormann’s other filmswith Hager Moss include the features Doubting Thomas(Irren ist maennlich, 1995) and Widows (Erst die Ehe,dann das Vergnuegen, 1997). She is also the director of thefeature drama, Private Lies (2000).

Hager Moss Film also produces commercials. The two-trackapproach pays rich dividends, as Eric Moss explains: ”Directorsworking in advertising have moved over into features and, at thesame time, we have worked with film directors on commercialsbecause this gives them a chance to try out new things and workwith more precision. It’s very good training and pays the rent!“

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Original Title Sugar Orange Type of Project Feature FilmCinema Genre Drama Production Company Jost HeringFilmproduktion, Berlin With backing from Filmstiftung NRWProducer Jost Hering Director Andreas Struck ScreenplayAndreas Struck Director of Photography Andreas DoubEditor Philipp Stahl Music by Erlandas Principal Cast LucasGregorowicz, Ellen ten Damme Format 35 mm, color, 1:1.66Shooting Language German Shooting in Cologne and thestate of Brandenburg in Spring 2003

Contact:

Jost Hering Filmproduktion · Jost Hering

Winterfeldtstrasse 31 · 10781 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-21 75 68 56 · fax +49-30-21 75 68 58

www.josthering.de · email: [email protected]

Lukas is Sugar, Clemens is Orange. Together, they are two ten-year-old boys who are inseparable. More than just playmates, theyshare a unique bond which seems predestined to last a lifetime.Until, that is, powerful emotions come to the fore and a misunder-

Sugar Orange

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World Sales: Canal+ Images International · Dominique BrunetEspace Lumière, 5-13 Boulevard de la République · Boulogne-Billancourt Cedex 92/Francephone +33-1-71 75 88 51 · fax +33-1-71 75 87 02

Liebelei

Genre Drama, History, Literature CategoryFeature Film Cinema Year of Production1932/1933 Director Max Ophuels ScreenplayHans Wilhelm, Curt Alexander, Max Ophuels,based on the play by Arthur Schnitzler Directorof Photography Franz Planer Editor FriedelBuckow Music by Theo Mackeben ProductionDesign Gabriel Pellon Producer ChristophMuelleneisen Production Company Elite-Tonfilm-Produktion, Berlin Principal Cast PaulHoerbiger, Magda Schneider, Luise Ullrich, GustafGruendgens, Olga Tschechowa, Willy Eichberger,Wolfgang Liebeneiner, Werner Finck, Paul OttoLength 87 min, 2,378 m Format 35 mm, b&w,1:1.37 Original Version German SubtitledVersion French Sound Technology MonoGerman Distributor Filmkundliches Archiv,Cologne

Max Ophuels was born in 1902 in Saarbruecken and died in 1957 in Hamburg. He began his career as anactor and director for the theater before he became anassistant director and dialogue director at the UfaStudios in 1930. After a series of comedies, he directedThe Bartered Bride (Die verkaufte Braut,1932), one of the first sound film versions of an opera.In 1933, he emigrated to France, followed by time spentfrom 1941-1949 in the United States. A selection ofhis films includes: Dann schon lieber Lebertran(1930), Die lachenden Erben (1931), Die ver-liebte Firma (1931), Liebelei (1932/1933),Letter from an Unknown Woman (Briefeiner Unbekannten, 1948), Caught (Gefangen,1949), The Reckless Moment (Schweigegeldfuer Liebesbriefe, 1949), La ronde (DerReigen, 1950), Lola Montez (1955), and manymore.

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Turn-of-the-century Vienna. Lieutenant Fritz Lobheimer is having a secret affair with the BaronessEggersdorf, but wants to end the relationship because he is constantly afraid of being found out.However, the Baroness wants to hear nothing of it. In the meantime, the Baroness’ husband becomes suspicious and returns home early one day. Fritz is able to sneak out unnoticed, but theBaron finds a strange key - the key that Fritz gave the Baroness to his apartment. Suddenly theBaron appears one night during a party at Fritz’ apartment - using the key he found, thus revealingFritz as his wife’s secret lover. Fritz must then face death when his code of honor compels him to aduel with the Baron.

39Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Transit Film GmbH · Loy W. Arnold, Mark Gruenthal (* no. 23 Spur der Steine was already presented

Dachauer Strasse 35 · 80335 Munich/Germany within the framework of the former series

phone +49-89-5 99 88 50 · fax +49-89-59 98 85 20 ”German Classic Movies“ in KINO 2/1999)


Wintergartenprogramm

Genre History Category DocumentaryCinema Year of Production 1895Director Max Skladanowsky ScreenplayMax Skladanowsky Directors of Photog-raphy Max Skladanowsky, Wilhelm FenzProduction Company Skladanowsky Film,Berlin Principal Cast the Ploetz-Larella child-ren, the Milton brothers, Mr. Delaware, PaulPetra Sandow, Emil and Max Skladanowsky, theGrunato family, the Tscherpanoff brothers,Mademoiselle Ancion, Mr. Greiner Length 7 min, 159 m Format 35 mm, b&w, 1:1.37Original Version silent with German inter-titles German Distributor Transit FilmGmbH, Munich

Max Skladanowsky was born in 1863 and died in 1939 inBerlin. A film pioneer, he experimented in photography togetherwith his father Carl and brother Emil, and in 1892, constructed acamera that could capture moving images. In 1885, he introducedthe Bioscop double projector, followed by another new cameraand a single projector in 1896. He started his own business,Berliner Camerawerk, and later the production and distributioncompany Projektion fuer Alle in 1897, hoping to successfully com-mercialize his early cinematic inventions, but the growing competi-tion from the rapidly developing film industry led to the ruin of hissmall company. However, his unsurpassed significance as inventorof Germany's first film camera and projector and his historical contributions to the entire film industry remain. His films include:Wintergartenprogramm (1895), Nicht mehr allein(1896), Am Bollwerk in Stettin (1897), Eine Fliegenjagdoder Die Rache der Frau Schultze (1913), Die moderne Jungfrau von Orleans (1914), and DieErfindung der Kinematographie im Jahre 1895 inBerlin (1927), among others.

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On 1 November 1895, the brothers Max and Emil Skladanowsky presented their pioneer filmwork and legendary Bioscop program in Berlin's Wintergarten Theater. With live musical accompa-niment, the compilation program included short film sequences with famous artists of the time:Italienischer Bauerntanz, Komisches Reck, Der Jongleur, Das boxende Kaenguruh,Kamarinskaja, Die Serpentintaenzerin, Akrobatisches Potpourri, Ringkampf, andApotheose, with the Skladanowsky brothers bowing to their audience.

40 Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Les Films du Jeudi - Les Films de la Pléiade · Laurence Braunberger3, rue Hautefeuille · 75006 Paris/Francephone +33-1-40 46 97 98 · fax +33-1-40 46 89 88email: [email protected]

Lola Montez

Genre Biopic, Drama, History CategoryFeature Film Cinema Year of Production 1955Director Max Ophuels Screenplay MaxOphuels, Jacques Natanson, Annette Wademant,Franz Geiger Director of PhotographyChristian Matras Editors Madeleine Gug, Adolph Schlyssleder Music by Georges AuricProduction Design Jean d'Eaubonne, WillySchatz Producers André Haguet, Alfred Zappelli,Emil E. Reinegger Production CompanyGamma Film, Paris, Florida Films, Paris, GammaFilm, Munich, Oska-Film, Munch, Union-Film,Munich Principal Cast Martine Carol, PeterUstinov, Anton Wohlbrueck, Henri Guisol, LiseDelamare, Oskar Werner, Will Quadflieg Length114 min, 3,093 m Format 35 mm, color, csOriginal Version English/German/FrenchSound Technology 4-Channel Magnetic TrackGerman Distributor Metropolitan, Munich

Max Ophuels was born in 1902 in Saarbruecken and died in 1957 in Hamburg. He began his career as anactor and director for the theater before he became anassistant director and dialogue director at the UfaStudios in 1930. After a series of comedies, he directedThe Bartered Bride (Die verkaufte Braut,1932), one of the first sound film versions of an opera.In 1933, he emigrated to France, followed by time spentfrom 1941-1949 in the United States. A selection ofhis films includes: Dann schon lieber Lebertran(1930), Die lachenden Erben (1931), Die ver-liebte Firma (1931), Liebelei (1932/1933),Letter from an Unknown Woman (Briefeiner Unbekannten, 1948), Caught (Gefangen,1949), The Reckless Moment (Schweigegeldfuer Liebesbriefe, 1949), La ronde (DerReigen, 1950), Lola Montez (1955), and manymore.

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Based on the novel La vie extraordinaire de Lola Montèz by Cécil Saint-Laurent, Lola Montez tellsthe tragic story of the once notorious courtesan, but now ill and tired Lola Montez, who works inthe circus as the "attraction of the year" answering questions from the audience. When asked abouther love life, she is reminded of her past, which is performed in short sequences in the circus ring:childhood and early marriage, farewell from Franz Liszt, and successful career. The more respectedher lovers are, the higher she ascends on the trapeze. She reaches the highest point when she tellsthe story of her relationship to the Bavarian king, Ludwig I. But after being banished from theking's court by revolting citizens, her downfall soon follows after a brief affair with a student.

One of the most celebrated examples of both Technicolor and CinemaScope, the German versionof Lola Montez was fully restored in 2002 by the Filmmuseum Munich.

41Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Transit Film GmbH · Loy W. Arnold, Mark Gruenthal (*no. 26 Faust. Eine deutsche Volkssage, no. 27 Heimat I.

Dachauer Strasse 35 · 80335 Munich/Germany Eine Chronik in 11 Teilen, and no. 28 Deutschland im Herbst

phone +49-89-5 99 88 50 · fax +49-89-59 98 85 20 were already presented within the framework of the former

email: [email protected] series "German Classic Movies" in KINO 1/1999,

KINO 2/2000 and KINO 4/1999 respectively)

Madame DubarryPASS ION

Genre Drama, History Category Feature FilmCinema Year of Production 1919Director Ernst Lubitsch Screenplay FredOrbing, Hanns Kraely Directors of Photog-raphy Theodor Sparkuhl, Fritz Arno WagnerMusic by Alexander Schirmann (1919), HansJoensson (1976) Production Design KurtRichter, Karl Machus Producer Paul DavidsonProduction Company Projektions-AG Union(PAGU), Berlin Rights Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Foundation, Wiesbaden Principal Cast PolaNegri, Emil Jannings, Reinhold Schuenzel, HarryLiedtke, Eduard von Winterstein, Karl Platen, Paul Biensfeldt, Magnus Stifter Length 92 min,2,492 m Format 35 mm, b&w, 1:1.37 OriginalVersion silent with German intertitlesIntertitled Version English GermanDistributor Transit Film GmbH, Munich

Ernst Lubitsch was born in 1892 in Berlin and died in 1947 inHollywood. After studying Acting, he appeared as a comedian inhis first film roles. He had his directorial debut with the filmBlindekuh in 1914. His first comedy Die Austern-prinzessin (1919) was followed closely by MadameDubarry (1919), which was a great audience success. In 1922,he emigrated to the United States where he became one of theleading directors of Hollywood. Once in Hollywood, he devel-oped his frivolous style known as the ”Lubitsch touch“. In 1933, he became an American citizen and took over production atParamount. His other films include: I Don't Want to Be aMan (Ich moechte kein Mann sein, 1918), Carmen(1918), Anna Boleyn (1920), Sumurun (1920), TheFlame (Die Flamme, 1922), The Marriage Circle (DieEhe im Kreis, 1924), Lady Windermere's Fan (1925),Trouble in Paradise (Aerger im Paradies (1932), theHitler satire To Be or Not to Be (Sein oder Nichtsein(1942), and many, many more.

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In a deal to save her lover Count Dubarry from financial ruin, the Parisian milliner JeanneVaubernier (alias Madame Dubarry) becomes the influential wife of the reigning French king, LouisXV. However much to the dismay of the king's advisor Choiseul, who had planned for his own sisterto marry the king. Choiseul thus starts a campaign to turn the people against the monarch and hisnew wife, and Jeanne soon becomes a symbol for the extravagance of the much-hated aristocracy.When the king dies, Jeanne is ousted by the angry masses and sent to the stakes.

World Sales: CINEPOOL · A Dept. of Telepool Europaeisches Fernsehprogrammkontor GmbHDr. Cathy Rohnke, Wolfram SkowronnekSonnenstrasse 21 · 80331 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-55 87 60 · fax +49-89-55 87 62 29www.telepool.de · email: [email protected], [email protected]

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From Ghana to a deserted coast – from Morocco to Spain – out of desperate need, a group of WestAfricans dare the perilous journey to Germany. But their path to the promised land of satellite dishes anda better life is strewn with obstacles.

In West Africa, the name ”Anansi“ means spider – a well-loved trickster. This ancient mythical characterrepresents the survival strategies of a people who secure a future for themselves in spite of the most repulsive conditions.

The main character – Zaza – is played by George Quaye, Ghana’s much adored womanizer in the weeklysoap Taxi. His friend Sir Francis – the wise cracker – is played by Maynard Eziashi, who earned a SilverBear at Berlin in 1992 for Mister Johnson and also starred in the film Ace Ventura. Reggae superstar Shaggysupported the project from the beginning and contributed the title song Why Me Lord. Roman Bunka’svivid soundtrack carries the spirit of this road movie – oscillating between laughter and tears. Anansi is anodyssey full of wonders and sacrifices, African mystic and a love that surpasses all borders.

42 Kino 2/2002

Genre Drama Category Feature Film Cinema Year of Pro-duction 2001/2002 Director Fritz Baumann Screenplay FritzBaumann Director of Photography Arturo Smith EditorChristian Lonk Music by Roman Bunka Production DesignCarsten Lippstock Producers Alena & Herbert Rimbach Pro-duction Company AVISTA FILM, Munich, in co-production withBrainpool TV, Cologne, Calypso Filmproduktion, Cologne, in coopera-tion with ARTE, Strasbourg, BR, Munich Principal Cast GeorgeQuaye, Jimmy Akingbola, Naomie Harris, Maynard Eziashi, DannySapani Casting Daniela Tolkien, Munich, Sam Jones, London Length80 min, 2,188 m Format 35 mm, color, 1:1.85 Original VersionEnglish Dubbed Version German Sound Technology DolbySRD With backing from FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, BKM,Filmbuero NW, FilmFoerderung Hamburg, MFG Baden-Wuerttemberg,Kuratorium junger deutscher Film, Filmfoerderungsanstalt (FFA),MEDIA German Distributor Pegasos Film, Frankfurt

Fritz Baumann was born in 1950 in Brannenburg.From 1973-1977, he studied at the Academy ofTelevision & Film (HFF/M) in Munich. Since 1976, he hasbeen working as an independent producer, director,recording supervisor and film editor. His films include:Mord (1974), Die Pensionierung (1975), DieBegegnungen (1976), co-direction on Let’s NotTalk About It (1978) and Dein Kopf ist einschlafendes Auto (TV, 1981) with Werner Penzel,So frei wie der Loewe (1984), D’jubel Wies’n(documentary, 1985), Woman (documentary, 1989),The Journey of the Lion (Die Reise desLoewen, 1993) – winner of the Silver Plaque at Chicagoin 1993 and the New York Times Film Critics’ Award in1994, Eisen (TV, 1996), six documentary episodes ofBonn packt (TV, 1999) and Anansi (2001/2002),among others.

AT CAN N E S


World Sales: Media Luna Entertainment GmbH & Co. KG · Ida MartinsHochstadenstrasse 1-3 · 50674 Cologne/Germanyphone +49-2 21-1 39 22 22 · fax +49-2 21-1 39 22 24www.medialuna-entertainment.de · email: [email protected]

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Anna Kastelano is packing up the home that had belonged to her family on a Greek island and isconsidering putting it up for sale. However, in these familiar surroundings, she is revisited by memories of her own past and that of her Sephardic-Jewish family. Anna has not yet got over thedeath of her husband Max. She spends the summer on the island, which has become her secondhome, trying to come to terms with her solitude.

For the first time, she opens the old family chest. Memories and ghosts rise up, with whom shecooks, dances and picks figs. She finds old telegrams relating to the fate of her grandmother Anna.She also discovers the diary of another Anna, her father's first love.

But the present also makes itself felt. Anna meets Nikola and the feelings she experiences inter-mingle with her mourning and the moving discoveries about her family. Anna is searching for a paththrough the labyrinth of her history and ultimately decides to assume her place in it. Life goes on.

43Kino 2/2002

Genre Drama, Family Category Feature Film Cinema Year of Pro-duction 2001 Director Jeanine Meerapfel Screenplay Jeanine MeerapfelDirector of Photography Andreas Sinanos Editor Bernd EuscherMusic by Flores Floridis Production Design Alexander SchererProducer Dagmar Jacobsen Production Company Integral Film, Berlin,in co-production with Malena Films, Berlin, FS Production, Athens, El Iman,Madrid, in cooperation with WDR, Cologne, ARTE, Strasbourg, ERT, Athens,Canal+ España, Madrid Principal Cast Angela Molina, Herbert Knaup,Dimitris Katalifos, Rosana Pastor Length 107 min, 3,080 m Format 35 mm,color, 1:1.85 Original Version German/English/Greek/Spanish SubtitledVersions English, German, Spanish Sound Technology Dolby SRInternational Festival Screenings Montreal 2001, Chicago 2001,Washington Jewish Film Festival 2001, Thessaloniki 2001, Hof 2001, Luenen2001, Berlin 2002 (German Cinema), Mar del Plata 2002 (in competition)With backing from Filmstiftung NRW, BKM, Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg, Greek Film Center, Ministerio de Educación (Spain), EurimagesGerman Distributor Basis-Film Verleih, Berlin

Jeanine Meerapfel was born in 1943 in BuenosAires/Argentina. Born to parents who fled Germanyduring the Nazi regime, she has consistently engaged themes involving identity, politics and emigration into herfilms. Her first feature, Malou (1981), won the FIPRESCIAward at Cannes and the Gold Hugo at Chicago. She hasdirected numerous features and documentaries, several ofwhich, including La Amiga (1989) and Amigomío(1995), have received awards in Spain, Cuba andGermany. She has lived in Germany since 1964, where shebecame a professor at the Academy of Media ArtsCologne (KHM) in 1990. Her films include: the collectivesocial drama Zwickel auf Bizyckel (1968), In theCountry of My Parents (1981), Melek Leaves(1985), Days to Remember (1987), Desembarcos– When Memory Speaks (1989), La Amiga, andAnna´s Summer (2001), among others.

AT CAN N E S


World Sales: CINEPOOL · A Dept. of Telepool Europaeisches Fernsehprogrammkontor GmbH Dr. Cathy Rohnke, Wolfram SkowronnekSonnenstrasse 21 · 80331 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-55 87 60 · fax +49-89-55 87 62 29www.telepool.de · email: [email protected], [email protected]

Berlin – Sinfonie einer GrossstadtB E RLI N SYM PHONY

Scen

e fr

om ”

Berli

n Sy

mph

ony“

(ph

oto

© T

hom

as S

chad

t)

”I think most people who feel a rush of excitement watching my Berlin film don’t know where it’s coming from. If I managed to give people a sense of that excitement, of allowing them to experience the city of Berlin, then Iachieved what I set out to do and proved that I was right all along.“

(Walther Ruttmann)

In 1927, Walther Ruttmann shot his majestic documentary Berlin. Symphony of a City. In September ofthat same year, this milestone of the silent film era was premiered at Berlin’s Tauentzien Palast with aspecially composed live soundtrack.

Seventy-five years later, Berlin is in the midst of a uniquely vibrant and exciting transition. Ten yearsafter the fall of the Berlin Wall, the re-energized drive of history is bringing forth a new city. People fromall over the world and from all walks of life are coming together to form a new metropolis, one reminis-cent in many ways of 1920s Berlin.

While retaining some of the original’s basic dramatic principles and characteristics – organizing everyshot in the film according to a symphonic structure, depicting one day in the life of the city using severalmain themes, and shooting on black-and-white 35 mm film – this remake also strives to establish itsown cohesive pictorial language and narrative structure.

Genre History Category Documentary CinemaYear of Production 2001/2002 DirectorThomas Schadt Screenplay Thomas SchadtDirector of Photography Thomas SchadtEditor Thomas Wellmann Music by HelmutOehring, Iris ter Schiphorst Producers NicoHofmann, Thomas Schadt ProductionCompanies teamWorx, Berlin, Odyssee-Film,Berlin Length 82 min, 2,300 m Format 35 mm,b&w, 1:1.66 Sound Technology Dolby SRWith backing from Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg, MFG Baden-Wuerttemberg, BKMGerman Distributor ottfilm GmbH, Berlin

Thomas Schadt was born in 1957 in Nuremberg. During his Photography studies, heworked as a film projectionist, photography assistant and theater photographer, followedby studies at the German Film & Television Academy (dffb) in Berlin from 1980-1983. He then founded his own film production company, Odyssee-Film, and has been workingsince as a freelance documentary filmmaker, photographer and cinematographer. Since1991, he has been teaching at various film academies, including the dffb and the FilmAcademy Baden-Wuerttemberg in Ludwigsburg. His films include: his graduation filmWas hab i in Hawaii verloren (1982), Unterwegs nach immer undueberall – Eine Deutschlandreise (1985/1986), Der Autobahnkrieg (1991)- winner of the Adolf Grimme Award, Grenzgaenge – Die Deutschen auf derSuche nach einer Identitaet (1993) and Augenzeugen – Die FotografenHoepker, Lebeck, Moses und Scheler (1998) together with Reiner Holzemer,Der Kandidat – Gerhard Schroeder im Wahlkampf ’98 (1998) – winner ofthe German Television Award for Best Documentary in 1999, Hans im Glueck –Deutsche Banker an der Wall Street (1999), My Way – James Last(2001), Berlin Symphony (2001/2002), and many, many more.

AT CAN N E S


44 Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Equinox Film GmbH & Co · Sabine MantheyGohliser Strasse 6 · 04105 Leipzig/Germanyphone +49-3 41-5 66 56 90 · fax +49-3 41-5 66 56 99www.equinoxfilm.de · email: [email protected]

Die DatscheHOM E TRUTH S

Mic

hael

Kin

d, C

athe

rine

Flem

min

g (p

hoto

© E

quin

ox F

ilm)

An East German married couple, Elke and Arnold, are attacked in theirweekend cottage by two robbers, Asche and Big. It quickly becomesclear however, that there's nothing in the cottage worth stealing. Arnoldand Elke become the helpless victims of the crooks’ aggression. But then,unforeseen circumstances fuse attacker and victim together in a tragi-comic union that explodes just as quickly as it came together.

Genre Drama Category Feature Film Cinema Year ofProduction 2001 Director Carsten FiebelerScreenplay Carsten Fiebeler, Ulv Jakobsen Director ofPhotography Erik Krambeck Editor ChristianNauheimer Music by Tarwater Production DesignSteffen Gnade Producers Sabine Manthey, BernhardKoellisch Production Company Equinox Film, Leipzig, inco-production with Koppfilm, Berlin, in cooperation withMDR, Leipzig Principal Cast Catherine Flemming, MichaelKind, Uwe Kockisch, Nils Nellessen Casting Drews CastingLength 86 min, 2,353 m Format 24p-HD Blow-up 35 mm, color, cs Original Version German SubtitledVersion English Sound Technology Dolby SR Withbacking from Mitteldeutsche Medienfoerderung

Carsten Fiebeler studied Directing atthe ”Konrad Wolff“ Academy of Television& Film in Babelsberg. His graduation filmRevanche was awarded the Panther Prizeat the Filmfest Munich in 1999. His shortfilm Strassensperre won the PanoramaShort Film Award at Berlin in 1998. In addi-tion to various commercials and short films,has also directed the TV movie Himm-lische Helden (2001) and HomeTruths (2001).

45Kino 2/2002

World Sales: please contactIntegral Film GmbHBleibtreustrasse 10/11 · 10623 Berlin/Germanyphone +49-30-88 55 15 86 · fax +49-30-88 55 28 46www.integralfilm.de · email: [email protected]

Dream, Dream, Dream

Fran

co B

elvi

so, K

ati O

utin

en, M

anue

l Bla

nc (

phot

o ©

Inte

gral

Film

)

Joachim and Franco are standing on a cliff in Norway at midnight, watching the sun set. Butinstead of disappearing behind the horizon, the sun rises again. Both men have reached theirdestination, and now it is time to return back home again. But they have a long road ahead ofthem, over 3,000 kilometers, and not much in common. There is tension in the air, but theywill have to put up with each other for a while.

Joachim is a young, somewhat stiff scientist who is on a journey to fulfill his deceased father’sdream. During the journey, he learns a lot about himself and his much-hated but also much-respected father. Franco, on the other hand, is a fiery-tempered Italian who hates nothingmore than "good advice", particularly when it has to do with his status as a father. So the ”badson“ and the ”bad father“ make their way through thick and thin. The trip back to Hamburggives them the chance to find themselves and to become good friends.

Genre Road Movie Category Feature Film Cinema Yearof Production 2001/2002 Director Anne Alix Screen-play Anne Alix Director of Photography Pascale GranelEditor Marie-Laure Desideri Music by Hinrich Dagefoer,Frank Wulff-Raven, Stefan Wulff Production Design DawnCarman Staub Producers Dagmar Jacobsen, Frédéric Sichler,Marc Ruscart, Helmut Dietl, Tuomas Sallinen, Marcel HoehnProduction Company Integral Film, Berlin, in co-produc-tion with Euripide Productions, Paris, Diana Film, Munich, WideEye Productions, Helsinki, T & C Film, Zurich, in associationwith ARTE, Strasbourg Principal Cast Manuel Blanc, FrancoBelviso, Kati Outinen, Marina Kobakhidze, Harry Baer, HeinzLieven Length 93 min, 2,544 m Format 16 mm Blow-up35 mm, color, 1:1.66 Original Version French/English/Finnish/German Subtitled Versions French, GermanSound Technology Dolby Stereo With backing fromFilmFoerderung Hamburg, Le Centre National de laCinématographie

Anne Alix was born in 1963 in Paris,where she studied History and Film.Also working freelance as a film editor,her films include: the shorts Il ya (1988), La Boutique (1996) andParadise (1999), as well as numerousdocumentaries for television, includingL’Usine: mémoires croisées(1993), Il cantastorie (1995),Hopital Silence? (1996), Mémoirevive (1997), and Dream, Dream,Dream (2001/2002), her feature debut.

46 Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Otto International Academy · Juergen BockWandsbeker Strasse 3-7 · 22172 Hamburg/Germanyphone +49-40-64 61 70 52 · fax +49-40-64 61 80 58www.gold-cuts.com · email: [email protected]

Gold Cuts – eine poetischeReise durch die GegensaetzeGOLD C UTS – A POETIC TRAI L TH ROUG H CONTRADICTION

Scen

es fr

om ”

Gol

d C

uts

– A

Poe

tic T

rail

Thr

ough

Con

trad

ictio

n“

Is art more than the genius, inspiration and total dedication of one individual? In an age of networkedinformation, can art and the world be enriched through symbiotic networks?

In reaction to the ever increasing individualization of society, a new artistic direction is manifested –network art. Not the individual, but rather a well-honed collective forms the creative focal point.Gold Cuts – A Poetic Trail Through Contradiction takes the viewer on an imaginary journeythrough the spaces and crevices of spiritual city landscapes in contemporary Berlin.

Through the professional support of a local artist and an award-winning editor, sixteen internationalmanagers have mastered the difficult task of bringing together unspoiled enthusiasm and technical finesse. Gold Cuts – A Poetic Trail Through Contradiction describes the gold from which thethreads of everyday life are spun.

Genre Art Category (Semi-)Fictional DocumentaryYear of Production 2002 Directors Team Gold Cutsunder the artistic direction of Ernst Handl Screenplay ErnstHandl, Bernd Wildenmann Director of Photography HansRombach Editor Petra Jurowski Music by Marcelo RoyoProducer Juergen Bock Production Company OttoInternational Academy, Hamburg Length 55 min, 1,571 mFormat Digital Video Blow-up 35 mm, color, 1:1.66Original Version German Subtitled Version FrenchSound Technology Stereo German Distributor OttoInternational Academy, Hamburg

Ernst Handl studied at the Academyof Fine Arts in Vienna from 1970-1975.After spending a year on the Greek islandof Crete, he moved to Berlin in 1980,where he became a founding member ofvarious art galleries and cultural centers.He has initiated many art symposia andevents, including the Snake Charming pro-ject for the Expo 2000 in Hanover andthe Guggenheim Museum in New York in2001. Gold Cuts – A Poetic TrailThrough Contradiction (2002)marks his film debut.

47Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Columbia Pictures Inc. · Sal Ladestro10202 W. Washington Boulevard · Culver City, California 90232/USAphone +1-3 10-2 44 20 73 · fax +1-3 10-2 44 18 01www.spe.sony.com · email: [email protected]

Grosse Maedchen weinen nichtB IG G I RLS DON'T C RY

Ann

a M

aria

Mue

he, K

arol

ine

Her

furt

h (p

hoto

© G

abrie

lle M

eros

)

What does it mean to be seventeen and to have a best friend? It means you spend almost every waking moment with each other, talk all day and night about your favorite topics (love, boys, and sex) and you sharefears, desires, joys and pain.

Kati is seventeen. Her relationships never turn out as she hopes for – many affairs, but not really a true boy-friend, and her parents are trying to get a grip on things on the home front, but just cannot seem to manage.

Steffi, Kati's best friend, seems to have the perfect life. She's pretty, has a sweet boyfriend and an open andfunctional relationship to her parents – or so it seems.

But Kati and Steffi's friendship is put to the test. Kati witnesses her friend's life fall apart, as Steffi finds out bychance that her father is having an affair. In their despair, the two girls try to find out more about this womanand happen to then meet her daughter, Tessa. Steffi focuses all her hate on Tessa, and Kati has to decide how far her loyalties will take her. The situation gets out of control, but big girls don't cry …

Genre Coming-of-Age Story, Drama Category Feature Film CinemaYear of Production 2002 Director Maria von Heland Screen-play Maria von Heland Director of Photography Roman OsinEditor Jessica Congdon Music by Niclas Frisk, Andreas MattssonProduction Design Ulrika Andersson Producers Andrea Willson,Judy Tossell Production Company Deutsche Columbia PicturesFilmproduktion, Berlin, in co-production with Egoli Tossell Film, BerlinPrincipal Cast Anna Maria Muehe, Karoline Herfurth, Josefine Domes,David Winter, Tillbert Strahl-Schaefer, Stefan Kurt, Nina Petri, GabrielaMaria Schmiede, Matthias Brandt Casting Nessie Nesslauer SpecialEffects Adolf Wojtinek/VFX: TVT Berlin, Manfred Buettner/CinesiteLondon Length 87 min, 2,486 m Format 35 mm, color, 1:1.85 Original Version German Subtitled Version English SoundTechnology Dolby Digital, SDDS With backing fromFilmfoerderungsanstalt (FFA), Filmboard Berlin-BrandenburgGerman Distributor Columbia Tristar Film GmbH, Berlin

Maria von Heland was born in Stockholm in1965. She studied Journalism in Sweden, Acting inParis and Directing at the California Institute ofthe Arts, during which time she attended classesas an exchange student at the ”Konrad Wolf“Academy of Film & Television (HFF/B) inPotsdam-Babelsberg. Her films include: theaward-winning shorts Die Staerkere (1994),Chainsmoker (1997) and Real Men EatMeat (1998), her first feature film Recycled(1999) and Big Girls Don’t Cry (2002).

48 Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Beta Film GmbH · Dirk SchuerhoffRobert-Buerkle-Strasse 2 · 85737 Ismaning/Germanyphone +49-89-99 56 21 34 · fax +49-89-99 56 27 03www.betacinema.com · email: [email protected]

Herz im KopfH EART OVE R H EAD

Tom

Sch

illin

g, A

licja

Bac

hled

a-C

urus

(ph

oto

© C

laus

sen

+ W

oebk

e Fi

lmpr

oduk

tion)

When his mother died, Jakob was unable to cope with his life. He quit school and moved to Berlin tolive with his father. But things didn’t work out, and now, a year later, he packs his bags and returnshome to the Frankfurt suburbs to live with his older sister Petra. Although planning on only passingthrough, Jakob soon realizes he’ll have to help her out. Petra is pregnant, her boyfriend has just left herand she can barely make ends meet for herself and her eight-year-old son. Just after his return home,Jakob meets Wanda, a Polish au-pair girl living there. The more he sees her, the more he falls in lovewith her. Wanda is attracted to him too, but she’s hesitant to give in to his attentions. She’s responsiblefor the household of the Gebhard family and takes care of their two kids – but the Gebhards aren’t too pleased to have Jakob hanging around. And Wanda’s friends don’t really like him either. If love is towin, they must both follow their hearts …

Genre Drama, Comedy Category Feature Film Cinema Year of Production 2001 Director Michael GutmannScreenplay Michael Gutmann, Hans-Christian SchmidDirectors of Photography Klaus Eichhammer, PascalHoffmann Editor Monika Abspacher Music by RainerMichel Production Design Ingrid Henn, Marion AnnaSchlauss Producers Jakob Claussen, Thomas WoebkeProduction Company Claussen + WoebkeFilmproduktion, Munich Principal Cast Tom Schilling,Alicja Bachleda-Curus, Anna von Berg, MatthiasSchweighoefer, Sebastian Kroehnert Casting Anja DihrbergLength 89 min, 2,656 m Format 35 mm, color, 1:1.85Original Version German Subtitled Version EnglishSound Technology Dolby SR International FestivalScreenings Hof 2001 With backing fromFilmfoerderungsanstalt (FFA), FilmFernsehFonds Bayern,Filmstiftung NRW German Distributor Constantin FilmVerleih GmbH, Munich

Michael Gutmann was born in Frankfurt in 1956.After studying Art and German at the University ofFrankfurt, he transferred to the Academy of Television& Film (HFF/M) in Munich. He has worked as a screen-writer and comic artist as well as a lecturer at the filmschools in Ludwigsburg, Munich and Cologne. He haswritten and directed a number of episodes for TVseries such as Das Nest, Ein Fall fuer zwei and Tatort andco-authored a number of films directed and co-writ-ten by Hans-Christian Schmid, including It’s a JungleOut There (Nach fuenf im Urwald, 1995), 23 (1998),and Crazy (2000). His films as director and screen-writer include: Von Zeit zu Zeit (short, 1990),How I Got Rhythm (short, 1993), RoheOstern (1995), Nur fuer eine Nacht (TV,1996), Black Ice (Glatteis, TV, 1998) and Heartover Head (Herz im Kopf, 2001).

AT CAN N E S


49Kino 2/2002

World Sales: ottfilm GmbH · Claudia PoepselKurfuerstendamm 175/176 · 10707 Berlin/Germanyphone +49-30-88 71 88 80 · fax +49-30-8 87 18 88 99www.ottfilm.de · email: [email protected]

Nichts BereuenNO REG RETS

Dan

iel B

rueh

l, Je

ssic

a Sc

hwar

z (p

hoto

© o

ttfil

m)

Daniel is 19-years-old and finally has his high school days behind him. After a wonderful summervacation, he is back in town and ready for life to start happening.

Things start out alright, but all his shots seem to backfire. His father organized a boring communityservice job for him at the church, and his reunion with the love of his life, Luca, was a disaster.Luca is fascinating, breathtaking, exciting, and … way out of his league! But virgin Daniel has chosenher as his partner for his first sexual encounter. Although he made the decision four years ago,Luca still knows nothing about it. She just sees Daniel as a good friend. But things can’t go on likethis, so Daniel decides to change his life dramatically. He changes jobs, an act he considers mucheasier than changing the love of his life. Or maybe not. He then meets Anna, a social worker, andfor the first time he realizes that there are indeed alternatives to Luca. And all of the followingsmall and not-so-small catastrophes help him to realize that life is what happens between it all. Andthat is why there is nothing to regret.

Genre Coming-of-Age Story Category Feature Film Cinema Year ofProduction 2000 Director Benjamin Quabeck Screenplay HendrikHoelzemann Director of Photography David Schultz Editor TobiasHaas Music by Lee Buddah Production Design Miriam Moeller,Markus Wollersheim Producers Stephanie Wagner, Michael SchaeferProduction Company Film Academy Baden-Wuerttemberg, Ludwigs-burg, in cooperation with WDR, Cologne, ARRI Film & TV, MunichPrincipal Cast Daniel Bruehl, Jessica Schwarz, Denis Moschitto, Marie-Lou Sellem, Josef Heynert, Sonja Rogusch Special Effects ARRI Digital,Angela Reedwisch, Claudia Fuchs Length 103 min, 2,680 m FormatSuper 16 mm Blow-up 35 mm, color, 1:1.85 Original VersionGerman Subtitled Version English, Italian Sound TechnologyDolby Digital International Festival Screenings Munich 2001,Berlin 2002 (German Cinema) International Awards Hypo BankYoung Director’s Award 2001, Best First Feature Society of German FilmCritics 2002 With backing from Filmbuero NW, MFG Baden-Wuerttemberg, FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, Filmfoerderungsanstalt (FFA)German Distributor ottfilm GmbH, Berlin

Benjamin Quabeck studied Directing at the Film Academy Baden-Wuerttemberg from 1996-2000. He alsoworks freelance as a film editor. His filmsinclude the prize-winning shorts: Wind(1996), Weird Wire (1996), DieWenigsten wissen das (1997),Hoehlenangst (1998), ErtraenkteAngst (1998), Grafenzeit (1998),4000 Teile (1999), and his graduationfilm and feature film debut No Regrets(2000).

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50 Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Trigger Happy Productions GmbH · Eva Maier-SchoenungSwinemuender Strasse 121 · 10435 Berlin/Germanyphone +49-30-2 84 89 70 · fax +49-30-28 48 97 55www.triggerhappyproductions.com · email: [email protected]

Poem – ”Ich setzte den Fuss in die Luft, und sie trug“

POE M

Scen

e fr

om ”

Poem

“ (Ic

h k

ann D

ir d

ie W

elt

nic

ht

zu F

ues

sen leg

enby

Hei

ner

Mue

ller)

Poems have the power to uplift. They deal with a certain sense of magical enthusi-asm and truth. Poem is a film that lets the viewer experience this power.

A collection of twenty-one poems from German-speaking authors are performedand recited, taking us on a trip through life: its precious experiences and possibilities,expressions of love and friendship, the suffering of change, and the fear of aging,disease, loneliness and death.

Genre Literature Category Feature Film CinemaYear of Production 2002 Director Ralf SchmerbergScreenplay Antonia Keinz, Ralf Schmerberg Directors ofPhotography Neelesha Barthel, Ana Davila, DanielGottschalk, Ali Goezkaya, Darius Khondji, Franz Lustig, JoMolitoris, Joerg Schmidt Reitwein, Ralf Schmerberg, RobbyMueller, Nicola Pecorini Editor Rick Waller ProductionDesign Peter Weber Art Department Producers RalfSchmerberg, Eva Maier-Schoenung Production CompanyTrigger Happy Productions, Berlin, in co-production with radi-cal.media, New York Principal Cast Meret Becker, DavidBennent, Carmen Birk, Anna Boettcher, Klaus Maria Brandauer,John & Larry Gassmann, Christoph Asmus Gerber, ChiringGurong, Marcia Haydée, Sham Lama Tulkur, Luise Rainer, RosaCoco Schinagl, Herman van Veen, Juergen Vogel Casting AnaDavila Casting Length 95 min, 2,608 m Format 35 mm,Digital Video, 16 mm, Super 16 mm Blow-up 35 mm, color,1:1.85 Original Version German Subtitled VersionsEnglish, French Sound Technology Dolby Digital

Ralf Schmerberg was born 1965 in Stuttgart andstudied Photography. He has received numerousawards for his photographic work since 1989, inclu-ding distinctions from the ADC Germany as well as aKodak Newcomer’s Prize, and he has exhibited inFrankfurt, Munich, Stuttgart and Hamburg. He madehis feature directorial debut in 1995 with the poeticdocumentary Hommage à Noir which was pre-sented with a Certificate of Merit at the 1996 ChicagoInternational Film Festival and two Gold Medals at theNew York Film Festival in 1997 and was nominatedfor the UNESCO Award. His other works include:video clips for groups such as Die Fantastischen Vier,Die Toten Hosen, and Chaka Khan, various advertise-ments for companies like Nike, Afri Cola andMastercard, among others, and the feature filmPoem (2002).

51Kino 2/2002

World Sales: please contactKruemel Film GmbH · Henry NielebockFasanenstrasse 13 · 10623 Berlin/Germanyphone +49-30-3 13 08 43 · fax +49-30-3 12 90 11www.kruemelfilm.com · email: [email protected]

Ein Produzent hat Seele oder er hat keine

Volk

er S

chlo

endo

rff,

Hor

st W

endl

andt

(ph

oto

© W

olfg

ang

Jahn

ke)

In January 2002, the director Volker Schloendorff and the producer Horst Wendlandt had an interesting con-versation, which was filmed by the cameraman Andreas Hoefer. Horst Wendlandt, who has received over 38Golden Screen Awards for his films, talks about his film work since the 1960s. The dialogue between the ”oldand young filmmakers“ provides a fascinating spectrum of German cinema of the recent past. Their conversa-tion is complemented with numerous excerpts from some of Wendlandt’s most well-known films.

Volker Schloendorff’s proclamation of the necessary development of ”conservative film“ to Autorenfilm iscountered by Horst Wendlandt, impressive examples of his success, as well as clips from films by Loriot,Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Ingmar Bergmann, Otto, Edgar Wallace and Karl May.

Genre Biopic Category DocumentaryCinema Year of Production 2002Director Volker Schloendorff Director ofPhotography Andreas Hoefer Editors PeterPrzygodda, Oliver Weiss Producers SusanNielebock, Henry Nielebock ProductionCompany Kruemel Film, Berlin PrincipalCast Horst Wendlandt, Volker SchloendorffLength 75 min Format DigiBeta, colorOriginal Version German SubtitledVersion French

Volker Schloendorff was born in Wiesbaden in 1939. Hemade his debut as a film director in 1965 with You Are a Man,My Boy (Der junge Toerless) which won the German FilmAward in 1966 and the Max-Ophuels Award. In 1979, his adaptationof Guenter Grass’ The Tin Drum (Die Blechtrommel)was the first film by a German director to be awarded a GoldenPalm in Cannes. A year later, it was the first German film to beawarded an OSCAR. His other films include: the filming ofHeinrich Boell’s The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum(Die verlorene Ehre der Katharina Blum, 1975),Germany in Autumn (Deutschland im Herbst, 1976,together with Stefan Aust, Alexander Kluge, et al), Circle ofDeceit (1980/1981), Swann in Love (Un amour deSwann, 1984), Death of a Salesman (TV, 1985), AGathering of Old Men (TV, 1987), The Handmaid’sTale (1990), Voyager (Homo Faber, 1991), The Ogre(Der Unhold, 1996), The Legends of Rita (Die Stillenach dem Schuss, 1999), Ein Produzent hat Seeleoder er hat keine (2002), and many, many more.

52 Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Celluloid Dreams · Hengameh Panahi2, rue Turgot · 75009 Paris/Francephone +33-1-49 70 03 70 · fax +33-1-49 70 03 71www.celluloid-dreams.com · email: [email protected]

Russian ArkSc

ene

from

”R

ussi

an A

rk“

(pho

to ©

Ego

li To

ssel

l Film

/ H

erm

itage

Brid

ge S

tudi

o)An extraordinary journey through time and Russian history. The Marquis de Custine, an 18th century French diplomat with a love/hate relationship to Russia finds himself on a time trip through St. Petersburg’s fabled WinterPalace – from the times of Peter the Great to the present day. With him, an invisible Russian filmmaker, who isconfused about Russia’s position in Europe.

Together they encounter life at the Imperial Palace as it was in different ages. From little backstage love affairs inCatherine the Great’s personal theater to the last Grand Royal Ball of 1913. From Peter’s humiliation of his coarse18th century countrymen to the Nazi’s bloody siege of Leningrad during World War II. It’s as if the Hermitage is avessel, retaining the Russian soul until a better day, when that country once again knows where it belongs.

Russian Ark is a truly unique film – the ”absolute auteur movie“. Alexander Sokurov tells his story in one uninter-rupted steadicam sequence, which was only recorded once. There is no editing, the film unfolds in pure real time.The filmmaker’s vision – featuring more than 2,000 actors and extras – was realized entirely ”in the camera“.

Russian Ark was recorded straight to hard disk in the High Definition format, for digital and for 35 mm projec-tion, featuring a live performance by the Mariinsky Theater Orchestra under Valery Gergiev.

53Kino 2/2002

Genre Art, History Category Feature Film Cinema Year ofProduction 2002 Director Alexander Sokurov ScreenplayAlexander Sokurov, Anatoli Nikiforov Director of PhotographyTilman Buettner Imaging Sergey Ivanov Music by Sergey YetushenkoProduction Design Alexander Sokurov Producers AndreyDeryabin, Jens Meurer, Karsten Stoeter Production CompaniesHermitage Bridge Studio, St. Petersburg, Egoli Tossell Film, Berlin, in co-production with Kopp Film, Berlin, Fora Film, Moscow Principal CastSergey Dreiden, Maria Kuznetsova, Leonid Mozgovoi, Prof. MichailPiotrovsky Length 96 min 2,627 m Format 35 mm, color, 1:1.85Original Version Russian Subtitled Versions English, FrenchSound Technology Dolby SR International FestivalScreenings Cannes 2002 (in competition) With backing fromMitteldeutsche Medienfoerderung, Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg, BKM,Filmbuero NW, FilmFoerderung Hamburg, Filmfoerderung Sachsen-Anhalt,Kultusministerium der Russischen Foederation German DistributorDelphi Filmverleih GmbH, Berlin

Alexander Sokurov was born in Russia in 1951. Hestudied History and trained until 1979 as a director at theMoscow Film School VGIK. His graduation film TheLonely Voice of Man (1987) was neither officiallyaccepted by the school, nor given the right to be shown –as was the case with all of his films until the democraticreforms in the mid to late 80s –-, but did win a BronzeLeopard at Locarno. In 2000, he founded the studio Beregfor non-commercial feature and documentary films.Sokurov has made numerous prize-winning feature filmsand documentaries, including: Painful Indifference(1987), Days of Eclipse (1988), Elegy of Russia(documentary, 1992), Mother And Son (1996),Moloch (1999), Taurus (2001) and Russian Ark(2002), among others.

AT CAN N E S

I N COM PETITION

World Sales: please contactANTAEUS Medienvertrieb GmbH · Alexander GehrkeSteinstrasse 62 · 14482 Potsdam-Babelsberg/Germanyphone +49-3 31-74 00 00 50 · fax +49-3 31-74 00 00 53email: [email protected]

SternzeichenZODIAC S IG N

Barn

aby

Met

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AN

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Alexander Becker, caring father of two children,loving husband and ambitious lawyer, is offered the deal of a lifetime: if he wins a high-caliber lawsuit for his firm, he will be on his way to a top career in Canada.

But then he receives a phone call from the clinicwhere he put his mentally handicapped brotherFabian after the early death of their mother manyyears ago. Apparently important renovations at the clinic make it necessary to find temporaryaccommodations for Fabian for four weeks.Although completely against the idea of his brother coming to live with him, Alexander finally gives in.

Unwillingly, Fabian becomes a catalyst for all theunsettled conflicts in his new environment. WithFabian, the suppressed memories of Alexander’schildhood, the reminder of their mutual roots andtheir painful separation come to fore. Things start tohappen very fast, and slowly but surely Alexanderbegins to understand where he really belongs.

Genre Drama, Family Category Feature FilmCinema Year of Production 2002 DirectorPeter Patzak Screenplay Stefan Kolditz Directorof Photography Andreas Koefer Editor MichouHutter Music by Martin Todsharow ProductionDesign Ric Schachtebeck Producer AlexanderGehrke Production Company ANTAEUSBabelsberg, Potsdam, in co-production withScala-Film, Halle, in association with MDR, LeipzigPrincipal Cast Barnaby Metschurat, HeikkoDeutschmann, Karin Giegerich, Vadim Glowna,Juergen Hentsch Casting Simone Baer SpecialEffects Exozet, Motionworks Length 97 min,2,650 m Format 35 mm, color, 1:1.85 OriginalVersion German Subtitled Version EnglishSound Technology Dolby Digital Withbacking from Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg,Mitteldeutsche Medienfoerderung

Peter Patzak was born in Vienna in 1945 andstudied Psychology and Art History. A painter andconceptual artist, he lived in New York from1968-1970, where he also worked for a TV station,making numerous 16 mm and video films beforereturning to Vienna. He is best known as the writerand director of the cult television series Kottanermittelt (1976-1983). A selection of his otherfilms includes: Kassbach (1978), TheUppercrust (Den Tuechtigen gehoert die Welt, 1981), Wahnfried – Richard undCosima (1988), Killing Blue (1988), DerJoker (1988), Shanghai Hotel (1995),Promised Land (2000) and Zodiac Sign(2002), among others.

54 Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Peppermint GmbH · Michael KnoblochRauchstrasse 9-11 · 81679 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-9 82 47 08 30 · fax +49-89-9 82 47 08 11www.seepeppermint.com · www.ziegler-film.com · email: [email protected]

Suche impotenten Mann fuers Leben

I N S EARC H OF AN I M POTE NT MAN

Tim

Will

iam

s, K

atrin

Wei

sser

(ph

oto

© Z

IEG

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FIL

M G

mbH

/ C

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G)

Carmen, a successful girl in her late twenties, has had enough. Her boyfriend is cheating on her, and at work herclients seem to believe that sex should be offered as one of the company services.

She and her best friend Laura, who has just discovered that she is pregnant, decide that where there is sex, thereare lies; the two seem inseparable. After many tears and even more bottles of wine, Carmen comes up with what she believes is the perfect solution to her problems with men. She puts an ad on the Internet asking tomeet a sensitive, intelligent man with a good sense of humor … but he must be impotent.

What follows is a hilarious, touching story of love and misunderstanding, laughter and tears, Viagra and three pairsof underpants, and an enjoyable roller coaster of a relationship in this joyous romantic comedy for our times.

Genre Romantic Comedy Category Feature Film CinemaYear of Production 2000/2001 Director John HendersonScreenplay John Henderson, Sharon v. Wietersheim, basedon the novel by Gaby Hauptmann Director of Photog-raphy Jo Heim Editor Mathias Meyer Music by RichardHarvey, Daryl Griffith, Paul Reeves Production DesignMatthias Kammermeier Executive Producer WolfgangHantke Produced by Regina Ziegler ProductionCompany Ziegler Film, Berlin, in co-production with DegetoFilm, Frankfurt Principal Cast Katrin Weisser, Tim Williams,Sandra Leonhard, Gabriel Walsh Casting Casting Chiarello(GER), Susan Shopmaker (USA) Length 92 min, 2,530 mFormat 35 mm, color, 1:1.85 Original Version EnglishDubbed Version German Sound Technology DolbySRD With backing from Filmstiftung NRW, Film-foerderungsanstalt (FFA) German Distributor Senator FilmVerleih GmbH, Berlin

John Henderson is active as both awriter and director for television and thecinema. A selection of his films includes:The Borrowers (TV, 1992), TheLast Englishman (TV, 1994), LochNess (1995), Bring Me the Headof Mavis Davis (1996/1997),Hospital (TV, 1997), Jack and theBeanstalk (TV, 1998), AliceThrough the Looking Glass (TV,1998), Leprechauns (1999), Sigurd(2000), Los dos bros (TV, 2000), OgoPogo (2000/2001), In Search of anImpotent Man (2000/2001) andmany more.

AT CAN N E S


55Kino 2/2002

World Sales: Road Sales USA · Jon Kramer, Annouchka Lesoeur3599 Cahuenga Boulevard, West 3rd Floor90068 Los Angeles, California/USAphone +1-3 23-8 78 04 04 · fax +1-3 23-8 78 04 86email: [email protected]

Ten Minutes Older

”Ten

Tho

usan

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ars

Old

er“

– W

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epis

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Ten Minutes Older is a film unique in the history of cinema about the most universal of all subjects: time.

Each of the distinguished directors has been given exactly ten minutes on the screen for theirvision. With complete creative freedom, the directors bring their own unique interpretation of’time’ to the screen. Using the technology of film in innovative, provocative ways, Ten MinutesOlder takes in all human experience: birth, death, love, sex, the drama of the moment, historyand ancient myth; and a great variety of locations from the deserts of India to the streets of NewYork. Combined together in a feature film, their individual work gains new meaning and presentsan intriguing and exciting experience for all cinemagoers.

56 Kino 2/2002

Genre Art, Experimental Category Feature FilmCinema Year of Production 2002 DirectorsAki Kaurismaeki, Víctor Erice, Werner Herzog, JimJarmusch, Wim Wenders, Spike Lee, Chen Kaige, et alMusic composed by Paul Englishby, performed byHugh Masekela Producers Ulrich Felsberg, NicolasMcClintock, Nigel Thomas Production CompanyRoad Movies, Berlin, in co-production with MatadorPictures, London, Odyssey Films, London Length132 min, 3,612 m Format 35 mm, color and b&w,1:1.85 Original Version Chinese/English/Finnish/Spanish Subtitled Versions English, FrenchSound Technology Dolby SRD InternationalFestival Screenings Cannes 2002 (Un CertainRegard)

Since the early 80s, Ulrich Felsberg has produced and co-producedmore than 50 films. His feature credits include eight films directed byWim Wenders, including The Million Dollar Hotel (Silver Bear,Berlin 2000) and Buena Vista Social Club, for which he receivedthe European Film Award in 1999. In 2000, Felsberg was nominated foran OSCAR for Buena Vista Social Club. He has also producedMichaelangelo Antonioni’s and Wim Wenders’ Beyond theClouds (1995), as well as six Ken Loach films, including Land ofFreedom, winner of the European Film Award in 1995. He has work-ed with such directors as Tomás Gutiérrez Alea, Stephen Frears,Gerardo Herrero, Robert Lepage, Paul McGuigan, Pat Murphy, ManuelGómez Pereira, Carlos Saura, Julien Temple, and Juanma Bajo Ulloa.Felsberg’s most recent projects include Ken Loach’s Sweet Sixteen,and Gurinder Chadha’s Bend It Like Beckham. Ulrich Felsberg is a member of the board of The European Film Academy and a member of the board of the Ateliers du Cinema Européen (ACE) aswell as a member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts(BAFTA). He is also a board member of the German producers’ association Film 20.

AT CAN N E S

U N C E RTAI N REGARD

World Sales: please contactGeisberg Studios Eike Besuden Filmproduktion GmbH · Eike BesudenFriesenstrasse 87 · 28203 Bremen/Germanyphone +49-4 21-79 01 00 · fax +49-4 21-7 90 10 20www.verruecktnachparis.de · www.geisbergstudios.de · email: [email protected]

Verrueckt nach ParisC RAZY ABOUT PARI S

Fran

k G

rabs

ki, P

aula

Kle

ine,

Wol

fgan

g G

oett

sch

(pho

to ©

Dia

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icht

er)

Hilde, Philip and Karl all live in a home for disabled people in Bremen. Hilde helps out in the kitchen, whilePhilip and Karl make children’s toys in a supervised workshop. Enno, their supervisor, goes about his job,keeping an ironic distance between himself and the proceedings. One day, Hilde, Philip and Karl decide topeel off on their own. Equipped with some luggage, Hilde’s savings and a bundle of toy ducks, they get ona train bound for Cologne. Their very own little excursion!

Upon arrival in Cologne, they start selling their wooden ducks in front of the cathedral, which gets them introuble with a gang of youths. A charitable organization at the railway station takes the trio in and informsthe home of their whereabouts. But the runaways manage to slip away unnoticed yet again. They miss theirtrain back to Bremen – making them all the more determined to embark on a proper journey. By now,Enno is on his way to Cologne to retrieve the truants. Meanwhile, Hilde has booked tickets for them all onthe night train to Paris. Enno misses the runaways by a hair’s breadth; he leaps into a taxi and drives offafter the train, but doesn’t manage to catch up with them until the train stops at Liège. He finally discoversthe trio on the train – but it won’t stop again until it reaches Paris …

Genre Comedy, Drama Category Feature Film Cinema Yearof Production 2002 Directors Eike Besuden, Pago BalkeScreenplay Eike Besuden, Pago Balke Director of Photog-raphy Piotr Lenar Editor Margot Neubert-Maric Music byKarsten Gundermann Production Design Heike LauerProducer Eike Besuden Production Company GeisbergStudios, Bremen, in cooperation with NDR, Hamburg, RadioBremen, ARTE, Strasbourg Principal Cast Paula Kleine,Wolfgang Goettsch, Frank Grabski, Dominique Horwitz, CorinnaHarfouch, Martin Luettge Casting Tina Boeckenhauer Length90 min, 2,462 m Format 16 mm Blow-up 35 mm, color,1:1.66 Original Version German Subtitled Version EnglishSound Technology Dolby Digital International FestivalScreenings Berlin 2002 (Perspective German Cinema) Withbacking from Filmfoerderung Niedersachsen, FilmFoerderungHamburg, Filmfoerderung Bremen, Kuratorium junger deutscherFilm German Distributor Neue Visionen FilmverleihSoergel/Frehse GbR, Berlin

Pago Balke was born in 1954. After studying Art andGermanic Studies, he founded an alternative school for the edu-cationally handicapped. In 1987, he began a career as a cabaretartist and singer. From 1987-1998, he worked as an actor anddirector at the Blaumeier Atelier in Bremen and has been actingat the Bremen Theater since 1998. Crazy About Parismarks his feature film debut.Eike Besuden was born in 1948. After taking a teachingdegree to become a grammar school teacher, he taught forseven years. During that time, he also began working freelancefor Radio Bremen and has been directing documentaries since1989. A selection of his television films includes: Dannbin ich eben weg, na und? (1989), Endje van’d Welt(1992), Zurueck nach Rom (1994), Irre menschlich(1995), Wenn der Teufel in die Kirche kommt …(1996), Der vergessene Krieg (1997), Gruene Lady, du laechelst mich an! (1999) and Warten auf einneues Leben (2000), among others. Crazy About Parisis his feature film debut.

57Kino 2/2002

World Sales: please contactKai Kuennemann Filmproduktion · Kai KuennemannMaybachstrasse 111 · 50670 Cologne/Germanyphone +49-2 21-9 12 90 25 · fax +49-2 21-9 12 90 35www.westend-derfilm.de · email: [email protected]

Westend

Mar

kus

Mis

chko

wsk

i, K

ai M

aria

Ste

inku

ehle

r (p

hoto

© A

nna

C. W

agne

r)

The friends Mike and Alfred are unemployed. They spend their empty days drinking beer at a road-side snack bar. Half-hearted attempts to find work have not got them anywhere. One day, they takeup the proposal of a regular drinking partner, Rasto, to take over a derelict motorway kiosk, but itsoon becomes apparent that Rasto doesn’t have his business in order. Shady business relations usecriminal techniques to pressure him to pay his debts. In spite of the long odds, Mike and Alfredmanage to turn the kiosk into a goldmine, but that can’t save Rasto. When Alfred falls in love with asupermarket check-out girl and neglects his work, while Mike turns into a workaholic, disaster cannotbe avoided. The turbulence of working life puts the friendship of the former jobless Mike and Alfredto the test. It isn’t that easy to get what everyone already seems to have: work, money, recognitionand the right woman at your side.

Genre Comedy, Tragicomedy Category Feature FilmCinema Year of Production 2001 Directors MarkusMischkowski, Kai Maria Steinkuehler Screenplay MarkusMischkowski Director of Photography Klaus PeterSchmidt Editor Christine Dériaz Music by TheHaifaboys Production Design Anja Kuehnle, IldikoMohos Producer Kai Kuennemann ProductionCompany Kai Kuennemann Filmproduktion, ColognePrincipal Cast Jens Claassen, Katharina Schmaltz, MarkusMischkowski, Kai Maria Steinkuehler, Ralf Richter, KatyKarrenbauer Length 89 min, 2,440 m Format Super 16 mm Blow-up 35 mm, b&w, 1:1.66 OriginalVersion German Subtitled Version EnglishSound Technology Dolby SR InternationalFestival Screenings Hof 2001, Ophuels-FestivalSaarbruecken 2002, Rotterdam 2002 With backingfrom Filmbuero NW, Kuratorium junger deutscher Film

Markus Mischkowski was born in 1966 inCologne and studied Linguistics in Berlin. Since 1990,he has been scripting, producing and directing filmstogether with Kai Maria Steinkuehler, who was born in 1967 in Cologne and studied Egyptianand African Studies from 1986-1989. Their filmsinclude: the shorts Einsam und allein (1990),Suizid (1991), Struktur B muss sterben(1993), Von der Aesthetik des Ab-schleppens (1993), Die Ordnung der Dinge(1994), Uncle Ben’s Film (1995), Was tun(1998), Wolga (2001) and the feature filmWestend (2001).

58 Kino 2/2002

Export-Union des Deutschen Films GmbH · Sonnenstrasse 21 · 80331 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-5 99 78 70 · fax +49-89-59 97 87 30 · email: [email protected]

www.german-cinema.demore than 100 news itemsmore than 200 festival portraitsmore than 500 German films


Beauftragter der Bundesregierung fürAngelegenheiten der Kultur und der MedienReferat K 36, Graurheindorfer Strasse 198, 53117 Bonn/Germanyphone +49-18 88-6 81 36 43, fax +49-18 88-6 81 38 53email: [email protected]

Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg GmbHAugust-Bebel-Strasse 26-53, 14482 Potsdam-Babelsberg/Germanyphone +49-3 31-7 43 87-0, fax +49-3 31-7 43 87-99www.filmboard.deemail: [email protected]

FilmFernsehFonds Bayern GmbH Sonnenstrasse 21, 80331 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-5 44 60 20, fax +49-89-54 46 02 21 www.fff-bayern.deemail: [email protected]

FilmFoerderung Hamburg GmbHFriedensallee 14–16, 22765 Hamburg/Germanyphone +49-40-3 98 37-0, fax +49-40-3 98 37-10www.ffhh.deemail: [email protected]

Filmstiftung NRW GmbHKaistrasse 14, 40221 Duesseldorf/Germanyphone +49-2 11-93 05 00, fax +49-2 11-93 05 05www.filmstiftung.deemail: [email protected]

Medien- und FilmgesellschaftBaden-Wuerttemberg mbHFilmfoerderungBreitscheidstrasse 4, 70174 Stuttgart/Germanyphone +49-7 11-90 71 54 00, fax +49-7 11-90 71 54 50www.mfg.de/filmemail: [email protected]

Mitteldeutsche Medienfoerderung GmbHHainstrasse 17-19, 04109 Leipzig/Germanyphone +49-3 41-26 98 70, fax +49-3 41-2 69 87 65www.mdm-foerderung.deemail: [email protected]

Verband Deutscher Spielfilmproduzenten e.V./ Association of German Feature Film Producers

please contact Franz SeitzBeichstrasse 8, 80802 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-39 11 23, fax +49-89-33 74 32

Arbeitsgemeinschaft Neuer Deutscher Spielfilmproduzenten/ Association of New Feature Film Producers

please contact Margarete Evers Agnesstrasse 14, 80798 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-2 71 74 30, fax +49-89-2 71 97 28 email: [email protected]

Verband Deutscher Filmexporteure e.V./Association of German Film Exporters

please contact Lothar WedelTegernseer Landstrasse 75, 81539 Munich/Germany

phone +49- 89-6 42 49 70, fax +49-89-6 92 09 10www.vdfe.de, email: [email protected]

FilmfoerderungsanstaltGroße Praesidentenstrasse 9, 10178 Berlin/Germany

phone +49-30-27 57 70, fax +49-30-27 57 71 11www.ffa.de, email: [email protected]

Export-Union of German CinemaShareholders and Supporters

60 Kino 2/2002

Foto: Roman Polanski shooting “The Pianist”, a Studio Babelsberg Co-Production

"Sixteen sound stages, lab on-site, state-of-the-art sound post. 250,000 costumes, 1 million props. Experienced film craftsmen – carpenters, set painters, metal workers, tailors ...90 years of filmmaking in one of the most exciting neighbourhoods of today.

Welcome to Berlin, welcome to STUDIO BABELSBERG.We appreciate your business." Gabriela Bacher

CEO Studio Babelsberg Motion Pictures

ART DEPARTMENT

Scenic design, planning, calculation, construction – we take aproject from rough sketch through construction.

WARDROBE

The costume department contains an assortment of over 250,000costumes, uniforms and accessories from every conceivable era.

MAKE-UP/HAIR

The make up department has one of the most extensive collectionsof wigs and hairpieces in Europe.

SOUND DESIGN

Studio F for feature films, from the most modern digital mixingstudio in Europe, to edit suites, digital audio suites, soundlibraryand screening theatres.

FILM LAB

Daily processing of colour or b/w negative in 16, 35 and Super35mm. Dailies in film or video.

PROPS

Two large warehouses of 80,700 sq ft provide a collection of over a million items. Special effects/weapons. We cooperate with theinternationally acclaimed special effects specialist Nefzer under the roof of the Nefzer Babelsberg.

SOUND STAGES

From the legendary 43.000 sq ft “Marlene Dietrich Stage” to fullyequipped 4,500 sq ft television studios with adjoining productionoffices, wardrobe, make-up and dressing rooms.

BACK LOT

The working facades of more than 26 buildings spread over a totalarea of 75,300 sq ft create an European city atmosphere typical“Berlin Street”, that was used in productions like “The Pianist” and “Joe and Max”.

PRODUCTION SERVICE

Our team supports the realisation of your project from pre-production to delivery.

August-Bebel-Straße 26–53 D-14482 Potsdam Tel: + 49(0)331-721-30 01 Fax: + 49(0)331-721 -25 25 [email protected] A Vivendi Universal company.

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ARRI Media Worldsalesplease contact Antonio Exacoustos jun.

Tuerkenstrasse 8980799 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-38 09 12 88fax +49-89-38 09 16 19www.arri-mediaworldsales.deemail: [email protected]

Atlas International Film GmbHplease contact

Dieter Menz, Stefan Menz, Christl Blum

Rumfordstrasse 29-3180469 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-21 09 75-0fax +49-89-22 43 32www.atlasfilm.comemail: [email protected]

Bavaria Film InternationalDept. of Bavaria Media GmbHplease contact Thorsten Schaumann

Bavariafilmplatz 882031 Geiselgasteig/Germanyphone +49-89-64 99 26 86fax +49-89-64 99 37 20www.bavaria-film-international.deemail: [email protected]

Beta Film GmbHplease contact Dirk Schuerhoff

Robert-Buerkle-Strasse 285737 Ismaning/Germanyphone +49-89-99 56 - 21 34fax +49-89-99 56 - 27 03www.betacinema.comemail: [email protected]

cine aktuell Filmgesellschaft mbHplease contact Ralf Faust, Axel Schaarschmidt

Werdenfelsstrasse 8181377 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-7 41 34 30fax +49-89-74 13 43 16www.cine-aktuell.deemail: [email protected]

Cine-International FilmvertriebGmbH & Co. KGplease contact Lilli Tyc-Holm, Susanne Groh

Leopoldstrasse 1880802 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-39 10 25fax +49-89-33 10 89www.cine-international.deemail: [email protected]

CINEPOOL – Dept. of TelepoolEuropaeisches Fernsehprogramm-kontor GmbHplease contact Dr. Cathy Rohnke,

Wolfram Skowronnek

Sonnenstrasse 2180331 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-55 87 60fax +49-89-55 87 62 29www.telepool.deemail: [email protected],[email protected]

DWFDieter Wahl Filmplease contact Dieter Wahl

Postfach 71 10 2681460 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-53 27 21fax +49-89-53 12 97email: [email protected]

Exportfilm Bischoff & Co. GmbHplease contact Jochem Strate,

Philip Evenkamp

Isabellastrasse 2080798 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-2 72 93 60fax +49-89-27 29 36 36email: [email protected]

german united distributors Programmvertrieb GmbHplease contact Silke Spahr

Richartzstrasse 6-8a50667 Cologne/Germanyphone +49-2 21-92 06 90fax +49-2 21-9 20 69 69 email: [email protected]

Kinowelt Medien AGKinowelt World SalesA Division of KinoweltLizenzverwertungs GmbHplease contact Jochen Hesse,

Stelios Ziannis

Infanteriestrasse 19/Bldg. 680797 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-30 79 66fax +49-89-3 07 96 70 67www.kinoweltworldsales.comemail: [email protected]

Media Luna Entertainment GmbH & Co.KGplease contact Ida Martins

Hochstadenstrasse 1-350674 Cologne/Germanyphone +49-2 21-1 39 22 22fax +49-2 21-1 39 22 24www.medialuna-entertainment.deemail: [email protected]

Progress Film-Verleih GmbHplease contact Christel Jansen

Burgstrasse 2710178 Berlin/Germanyphone +49-30-24 00 32 25fax +49-30-24 00 32 22www.progress-film.deemail: [email protected]

Road Sales GmbH Mediadistributionplease contact Frank Graf

Clausewitzstrasse 410629 Berlin/Germanyphone +49-30-8 80 48 60fax +49-30-88 04 86 11www.road-movies.deemail: [email protected]

RRS Entertainment Gesellschaftfuer Filmlizenzen GmbHplease contact Robert Rajber

Sternwartstrasse 281679 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-2 11 16 60fax +49-89-21 11 66 11email: [email protected]

Transit Film GmbHplease contact Loy W. Arnold, Mark Gruenthal

Dachauer Strasse 3580335 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-59 98 85-0fax +49-89-59 98 85-20email: [email protected]

Uni Media InternationalFilmvertriebsgesellschaft mbHplease contact Irene Vogt

Bayerstrasse 1580335 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-59 58 46fax +49-89-5 50 17 01email: [email protected]

Waldleitner Media GmbHplease contact Michael Waldleitner,

Angela Waldleitner

Muenchhausenstrasse 2981247 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-55 53 41fax +49-89-59 45 10email: [email protected]

62

F i l m E x p o r t e r sMembers of the Association of German Film Exporters

please contact Lothar Wedel · Tegernseer Landstrasse 75 · 81539 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-6 42 49 70 · fax +49-89-6 92 09 10 · www.vdfe.de · email: [email protected]

Kino 2/2002

Beichstrasse 8, D - 80802 Muenchen, GermanyPhone: (89) 391 425 Fax: (89) 340 1291

The Export-Union of German Cinema is the national information

and advisory center for the export of German films. It was estab-

lished in 1954 as the ”umbrella“ association for the Association of

German Feature Film Producers, the Association of New German

Feature Film Producers and the Association of German Film

Exporters, and operates today in the legal form of a limited company.

Shareholders in the limited company are the Association of

German Feature Film Producers, the Association of New German

Feature Film Producers, the Association of German Film Exporters

and the German Federal Film Board (FFA).

The members of the board of the Export-Union of

German Cinema are: Jochem Strate (chairman), Rolf Baehr,

Antonio Exacoustos Jr. and Michael Weber.

The Export-Union itself has nine permanent staff:

• Christian Dorsch, managing director

• Susanne Reinker, PR manager

• Stephanie Weiss, project manager

• Angela Hawkins, publications editor

• Andrea Rings, assistant to the managing director

• Cornelia Klimkeit, PR assistant

• Nicole Kaufmann, project coordinator

• Petra Bader, office manager

• Ernst Schrottenloher, accounts

In addition, the Export-Union shares foreign representatives

in nine countries with the German Federal Film Board (FFA).

(cf. page 66)

The Export-Union’s budget of presently approx. Euro 3.1

million (including projects, administration, foreign representatives)

comes from the export levies, monies from the office of the Federal

Government Commissioner for Cultural Affairs and the Media and

the FFA. In addition, the six main economic film funds

(Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg, FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, FilmFoer-

derung Hamburg, Filmstiftung NRW, Medien- and Filmgesellschaft

Baden-Wuerttemberg and Mitteldeutsche Medienfoerderung) have

made a financial contribution, currently amounting to Euro 0.25

million, towards the work of the Export-Union. In 1997, the Export-

Union and five large economic film funds founded an advisory

committee whose goal is the ”concentration of efforts for the

promotion of German film abroad“ (constitution).

The Export-Union is a founding member of the ”European Film

Promotion“, an amalgamation of twenty national film-PR

agencies (UNIFRANCE, Swiss Films, Italia Cinema, Holland Film,

among others) with similar responsibilities to those of the Export-

Union. The organization, with its headquarters in Hamburg, aims to

develop and realize joint projects for the presentation of European

films on an international level.

EXPORT-UNION’S RANGE OF ACTIVITIES:

Close cooperation with the major international film

festivals, e.g. Berlin, Cannes, Venice, Montreal, Toronto,

San Sebastian, Tokyo, New York, Locarno, Karlovy Vary;

Organization of umbrella stands for German sales companies

and producers at international TV and film markets, e.g.

MIP-TV, MIPCOM, NATPE, AFM;

Staging of festivals of German Cinema in key cities of the

international film industry (2002: London, Los Angeles,

Madrid, Melbourne, Moscow, New York, Paris, Rome,

Sydney, Warsaw);

Providing advice and information for representatives of

the international press and buyers from the fields of

cinema, video, TV;

Providing advice and information for German filmmakers and

press on international festivals, conditions of participation

and German films being shown, e.g. publication of a

comprehensive guide to international film festivals as well as

a German film festival guide;

Publication of informational literature on the current

German cinema: KINO-Magazine and KINO-Yearbook;

An Internet website (http://www.german-cinema.de)

offering information about new German films, a film

archive, as well as information and links to German and

international film festivals;

Organization of the selection procedure for the German

entry for the OSCAR for Best Foreign Language Film.

The focus of the work: feature films, documentaries with

theatrical potential and shorts that have been invited to the main

sections of major festivals.

The Export-Union of German Cinema – A Profile

Export-Union des Deutschen Films GmbH · Sonnenstrasse 21 · 80331 Munich/Germanyphone +49-89-5 99 78 70 · fax +49-89-59 97 87 30 · email: [email protected]

www.german-cinema.demore than 100 news itemsmore than 200 festival portraitsmore than 500 German films


Argentina

Dipl. Ing. Gustav WilhelmiLavalle 1928 · 1º PisoC1051ABD Buenos Airesphone +54-11-49 52 15 37phone + fax +54-11-49 51 19 10email: [email protected]

Canada

Martina Neumann5206 Casgrain · Montreal, QuebecH2T 1W9 · Canadaphone/fax +1-5 14-2 76 56 04 email: [email protected]

China & South East Asia

Lukas SchwarzacherFlat F, 18/F, Tonnochy Tower A272 Jaffe RoadWanchaiHong Kong SAR, Chinaphone +8 52-97 30 55 75fax +1-2 40-255-7160email: [email protected]

France

Cristina Hoffman33, rue L. Gaillet94250 Gentilly/Francephone/fax +33-1-49 8644 18email: [email protected]

Italy

Alessia RatzenbergerAngeli Movie Servicevia Aureliana, 5300187 Rome/Italyphone +39-06-4 82 80 18fax +39-06-4 82 80 19email: [email protected]

Japan

Tomosuke SuzukiNippon Cine TV CorporationSuite 123, Gaien House2-2-39 Jingumae, Shibuya-KuTokyo, Japanphone +81-3-34 05 09 16fax +81-3-34 79-08 69email: [email protected]

Spain

Stefan SchmitzAvalon Productions S.L.C/ Duque de Rivas, 2-2°D28012 Madrid/Spainphone +34-91-3 66 43 64fax +34-91-3 65 93 01email: [email protected]

United Kingdom

Iris KehrTop Floor113-117 Charing Cross RoadLondon WC2H ODT/United Kingdomphone +44-20-74 37 20 47fax +44-20-74 39 29 47email: [email protected]

USA/East Coast

Oliver Mahrdtc/o Hanns Wolters International Inc.10 W 37th Street, Floor 3,New York, NY 10018/USAphone +1-2 12-7 14-01 00fax +1-2 12-6 43-14 12email: [email protected]

USA/West Coast

Corina DanckwertsCapture Film, Inc.2400 W. Silverlake DriveLos Angeles, CA 90039/USAphone +1-3 23-6 68-01 12fax +1-3 23-6 68-08 53email: [email protected]

F o r e i g n R e p r e s e n t a t i v e s

published by:

Export-Union des

Deutschen Films GmbH

Sonnenstrasse 21

80331 Munich/Germany

phone +49-89-5 99 78 70

fax +49-89-59 97 87 30

www.german-cinema.de


ISSN 0948-2547

Credits are not contractual for any

of the films mentioned in this publication.

© Export-Union des Deutschen Films

All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or

transmission of this publication may be made

without written permission.

Editors

Production Reports

Contributors for this issue

Translations

Design Group

Art Direction

Printing Office

Financed by

Angela Hawkins, Susanne Reinker

Martin Blaney, Simon Kingsley

Martin Blaney, Kerstin Decker, Manfred Geier, Simon Kingsley

Lucinda Rennison

triptychon · agentur für design und kulturkommunikation, Munich/Germany

Werner Schauer

ESTA Druck, Obermuehlstrasse 90, 82398 Polling/Germany

the office of the Federal GovernmentCommissioner for Cultural Affairs and the Media.

Printed on ecological, unchlorinated paper.

I m p r i n t

66 Kino 2/2002

German Film Award

… and the nominees are:B E S T P I C T U R E

Bella Marthaby Sandra Nettelbeck

Halbe Treppe by Andreas Dresen

Heavenby Tom Tykwer

Nirgendwo in Afrikaby Caroline Link

Wie Feuer und Flammeby Connie Walther

D O C U M E N T A R Y F E A T U R E

Black Box BRDby Andres Veiel

A Woman and a Half-Hildegard Knef

by Clarissa Ruge

B E S T C H I L D R E N S ’ F I L M

Hilfe! ich bin ein Fischby Stefan Fjeldmark, Michael Hegner

Das Samsby Ben Verbong

D I R E C T I N G

Andreas Dresenfor Halbe Treppe

Dominik Graffor Der Felsen

Caroline Linkfor Nirgendwo in Afrika

B E S T L E A D I N G A C T R E S S

Karoline Eichhornin Der Felsen

Martina Gedeckin Bella Martha

Juliane Koehlerin Nirgendwo in Afrika

B E S T L E A D I N G A C T O R

Daniel Bruehlin Nichts Bereuen, Das Weisse Rauschen

and Vaya Con Dios

Ulrich Noethenin Das Sams

Antonio Wannekin Der Felsen and Wie Feuer und Flamme

B E S T S U P P O R T I N G A C T R E S S

Annabelle Lachattein Das Weisse Rauschen

Eva Mattesin Das Sams

Marie-Lou Sellemin Mein Bruder der Vampir, Nichts

Bereuen and Hilfe, ich bin ein Junge!

B E S T S U P P O R T I N G A C T O R

Martin Feifelin Was tun, wenn’s brennt?

Remo Gironein Heaven

Matthias Habichin Nirgendwo in Afrika

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animation – made in germany

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