Karl "Baumi" Baumgartner and Reinhard Brundig's distribution venture Pandora Filmverleih is staging a comeback on the German market nearly four years after being swallowed up by the Kinowelt empire in July 1998. Its first theatrical release - on 14 November - will be Aki Kaurismaki's Cannes prize-winner The Man Without A Past, which Pandora Film Produktion co-produced.

Pandora's revived theatrical arm will operate out of Aschaffenburg near Frankfurt under the management of Thomas Matlok who had served as head of distribution in the company's previous incarnation.

Matlok pointed out that there are "no plans to build up an enormous apparatus. We will stay quite modest and also handle the booking and billing from here".

"According to demand", Pandora Filmverleih will release between two to three in-house productions from the Cologne-based production arm Pandora Film Produktion or third party titles each year.