All articles by Martin Blaney – Page 163
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German home entertainment market doubles over five years
Turnover in the German home entertainment market has more than doubled since 1999, when DVDs firstregistered significant business in Germany, according to figures compiled byGfK Panel Services Consumer Research for the video trade association BVV.Revenues from sell-throughand rental videos and DVDs increased by 103% from 1999’s Euros 860m to a ...
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Eastern European Acquisition Pool adds Slovenian partner.
Berlin-based Eastern European Acquisition Pool (EEAP) has expandedits influence in the Central and East European market with the Slovenian mediacompany Cinemania Group coming onboard as a new shareholder with a 26% stake.The agreement was signed by Cinemania's general manager SretenZivojinovic with EEAP's other shareholders, Berlin-based A Company Consulting& Licensing and ...
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Germany, Brazil sign co-production treaty
Germany and Brazil have signed a treaty to formalise theco-production of films between the two countries. Films co-produced by German and Brazilian companies under thetreaty will qualify as 'national films' and consequently have access toreciprocal benefits such as the German public funds as well as equivalentsources in Brazil.A co-production will ...
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GERMANY 22 February
Last weekend Germany's boxoffice received a welcome shakeup with the arrival of three new releases MeetThe Fockers, Constantine and the local family film Die Wilden Kerle 2- at the top of the chart, toppling the local animation feature Felix - EinHase Auf Weltreise which had itself pushed The Aviator off ...
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Berlinale Golden Bear winner takes everyone but the jury by surprise
Mark Dornford-May's U-Carmen eKhayelitsha has become the first African film in the history of the Berlinale to be awarded the top honours of the Golden Bear by the International Jury led by German director Roland Emmerich. The jury's choice of Dornford-May's version of Carmen's Bizet set in a South African ...
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Bavaria Film closes deals on Sophie Scholl
Bavaria Film International(BFI) has closed the first deals for Marc Rothemund's Sophie Scholl - TheFinal Days. The gripping drama on thelast six days of resistance figure Sophie Scholl has been sold to Japan(Kinetique), Spain (Lola Films), Scandinavia (Future Films), Mexico (QualityFilms), Portugal (Ecofilmes), former Yugoslavia (Discovery) and Peru (GatenoFilms).The UK, ...
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Reelmachine sets slate with Emmerich
Germany'spowerful VIP media fund and Berlin Jury president Roland Emmerich have set thefirst four films to go in to production from their newly-formed Reelmachineoutfit.Emmerichwill direct the first: a UK-based film with an all-British cast called SoulOf The Age. Scripted by John Orloff and exploring the origins ofShakespeare's plays, it is ...
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Germany's Priamos kicks off with Zanzibar project
WithBerlin awash with projects involving football, the island of Zanzibar hasjoined the team: Berlin-based production company Priamos Film is to launch withThe Dream Of Zanzibar set on the African island.Budgetedat $1.1m, the Dream Of Zanzibar will mark both the directing debut ofAlisan Saltik and the first project from Stephan Ottenbruch's ...
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Germany moves forward with sale and leaseback plans
Germany's adoption of a UK-style sale and leaseback (S&L) fundingmodel has come one big step closer after a meeting between German filmproducers and Federal Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder yesterday morning. According to one of the producers attending, a working group will becreated to draft a concept for a sale and leaseback ...
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Locarno to honour Jeremy Thomas
Britishproducer Jeremy Thomas will be presented with the Raimondo Rezzonico Prize forindependent producers at this year's Locarno International Film Festival (August 3-13).Commentingon the selection of the producer of such films as The Last Emperor, The Hitand The Sheltering Sky, Locarno's festival director Irene Bignardi said:"Jeremy is one of those producers ...
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Meirelles to produce Brazilian football documentary
City Of God director Fernando Meirelles is producinga feature length documentary called Ginga, about the relationshipbetween Brazilians and football.The documentaryis being made through his company O2 Filmes as a co-production with Nike andWieden Kennedy Entertainment.Meirellles hassecured three directors to co-write and shoot the documentary: Marcelo Machado,Hank Levine and Tocha Alves ...
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X-Filme, Promedia toon up with Robbers
Berlin-based X-Filmecreative pool and private media fund manager Promedia have launched a newanimation company, Animation-X, with a full-length traditional animation calledThe Three Robbers (Die Drei Rauber), to go into production in July ofthis year.Animation-X plans to makebetween two and three projects a year, both traditional and CG animation.Animation-X has brought ...
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Kinowelt acquires Warner titles from Epsilon
German distributor Kinowelthas taken rights to a package of films headed by Warner Bros titles MillionDollar Baby and Mr & Mrs Smith. Clint Eastwood'sOscar-nominated Million Dollar Baby has been widely advertised as beinghandled by Warner's German branch with a release date of March 3. Kinowelt'sBertil Le Claire said the company ...
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Instant replay for German version of Finnish football film
In an unusual move,Hamburg's Wueste Filmproduktion will remake the Finnish football comedy FCVenus before the movie is even in theatres at home.Finnish production companyTalent House will start shooting the Joona Tena-directed Venus at theend of May, while the German remake, to be directed by Ute Wieland, will beginfilming at the ...
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X-Filme launches in-house world sales division
Berlinproduction house X-Filme creative pool has set up an in-house world salesdivision to handle the international distribution of Dani Levy's box office hitGo For Zucker - An Unorthodox Comedy (Alles auf Zucker!). PreviouslyX-Filme's titles have been handled on a deal-by-deal basis by Bavaria FilmInternational and Beta Cinema, amongst others.X-FilmeWorld Sales ...
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Studio Babelsberg prepares for flotation
Studio Babelsberg is planning to go public in the first halfof this year, according to managing director and co-owner Carl Woebcken.In an interview with the business newspaper Euro AmSonntag at the weekend, he revealed thatthe German film studios were 'in intensive talks' about an IPO whichwould be undertaken within the ...
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Franka Potente readies directorial debut
Run Lola Run starFranka Potente, who is a member of the International Jury at this year'sBerlinale, is to make her directorial debut this spring with a 25-30-minuteshort film.Producer Stefan Arndt of X-Filme creative pool told ScreenDaily.com that Wer Die Tollkirsche Ausgraebt will be 'a really classical silent film likefrom the ...
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Eichinger voted 'most important player' in German film
Producer-distributor Bernd Eichinger has been voted as themost important player in the German film business in an industry surveypublished on Sunday.Industry veteran Eichinger saw his production of OliverHirschbiegel's Hitler bunker drama Downfallreceive a nomination in the Academy Awards' Foreign Language Filmcategory last month.A jury of leading film critics, TV executives, ...
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GERMANY 2 February
Despite a 58% week-on-weekdrop in box-office takings, Warner Bros.' Blade:Trinity held onto thetop spot for a second week with a $1.8m gross to bring its tally for the firsttwo weeks of release to over $ 7m.Last weekend saw threestrong new entries to the Top 10 with Lemony Snicket's A Series ...
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Demand heats up for Berlin market
The number of films submitted to Berlin's European Film Market (EFM) hasrisen by a third, underlining its growing importance as the first market of theyear following the AFM's move to autumn dates.Speaking to ScreenDaily.com,festival director Dieter Kosslick said that the market has seen "moredemand from all over the world, but ...