UIP's release of 7Dwarves (7 Zwerge - Maenner Allein Im Wald) blasted into the German Top 15at No. 1 taking over $ 11.7m with a tremendous $ 15,076 screen average from its777 screens.

Starring the creme de la creme of German comic talent suchas Otto Waalkes, Atze Schroeder, Christian Tramitz and Mirco Nontschew, the Dwarves' opening was the third best forthis year after another local comedy (T)RaumschiffSurprise - Periode 1 and Harry PotterAnd The Prisoner Of Askaban. The 1,565,655 admissions posted for the filmwere more than 50% of the 2.8m tickets sold at German cinemas over lastweekend. Moreover, 7 Dwarves' firstfour days were also the third best opening of all time for a German production.

The Euros 8m co-production between Zipfelmuetzen Film,Universal Film, Rialto Film, MMC Independent received around 50% of itsfinancing from the private German media fund VIP whose CEO Andreas Schmidforecasts that the film will attract 3.5m cinemagoers in Germany. Ironically,this fund-backed film knocked another production financed by German privateinvestors off the top spot: The BourneSupremacy which was backed last year by Munich-based Hannover Leasing.