Bavaria Film International will handle international sales on theomnibus film Generation by six Central and Eastern European filmmakers,which goes into production next month.

The film, which was initiated by the 'relation' EastEuropean cultural programme of Germany's Kulturstiftung des Bundes, will seesix 12-18-minute shorts being made by Stefan Arsenijevic (Serbia &Montenegro), Nadejda Koseva (Bulgaria), Mait Laas (Estonia), Kornel Mundruczo(Hungary), Cristian Mungiu (Romania) and Jasmila Zbanic (Bosnia-Herzegovina).

According to relations' Katrin Klingan, the selection of theparticipating countries was "placed on those countries which may havetheir own film culture, but cannot exploit it at the moment due to economicand/or political developments."

The first film to go into production next month will be Zbanic'sshort documentary The Bridge about two ten-year-old girls who were bornin the Moslem and Christian communities of Mostar when the bridge was destroyedand have never met. In addition, Laas is beginning work on his animated shortwhich will serve as a link between the other episodes as well as standing onits own.

Introducing the project at last week's goEast Festival, HerbertSchwering of the supervising production company ICON Film explained that allsix filmmakers will be invited to do the postproduction of their films inCologne in the autumn. The Euros 400,000 low-budget project has receivedbacking from Filmstiftung NRW, and discussions are currently underway with aGerman broadcaster to participate in the financing. In addition, the projecthas attracted interest from "several German theatrical distributors"and has secured Fuji as a sponsor for the shorts to all be shot on 35mm.

The project's artistic director Nikolai Nikitin told ScreenDaily.comthat it is planned to have the film's premiere during the Berlinale TalentCampus next February.