EXPORT-UNION OF GERMAN CINEMA 4/2001

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SPECIAL REPORT Women Filmmakers in Today Kino Scene from ”Anam“ (photo © Bavaria Scene from Film International)

GERMAN CINEMA 6.–17. Februar 2002

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6 Departure from the 32 Hundsköpfe ”Women’s Corner“ Karsten Laske Women Filmmakers in Germany Today 33 Pigs Will Fly Eoin Moore 14 ”The State I’m In“ 34 Solino Director’s Portrait Christian Petzold Fatih Akin 34 Väter 15 Digging Deep for the Roots Dani Levy Director’s Portrait Monika Treut 35 Vier Tunten für ein Halleluja Rosa von Praunheim 18 Personal Connections World Sales Portrait RRS Entertainment

20 Retaining the Cinematic Aesthetic 36 The 100 Most Producers’ Portrait Schramm Film Significant German Films (Part 3)

22 KINO news 36 Die Brücke THE BRIDGE Bernhard Wicki 37 Abschied von Gestern 28 In Production YESTERDAY GIRL 28 Baby 38 Mutter Krausens Fahrt ins Glück Philipp Stölzl MOTHER KRAUSEN GOES TO HEAVEN 28 Ein Chinese mit dem Kontrabass Piel Jutzi Ullabritt Horn 39 Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler: 29 Dunkle Welten Der große Spieler, Ein Bild der Martina Reuter, Gavin Hodge Zeit (Teil 1) 30 Fickende Fische / Alles Positiv DR. MABUSE, THE GAMBLER: Almut Getto THE GREAT GAMBLER, A PICTURE OF 30 Ghetto Kids OUR TIME (PART 1) Christian Wagner 31 Glaube-Liebe-Hoffnung 40 Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler: Iain Dilthey Inferno, Ein Spiel von Menschen 32 Die Hitlerkantate unserer zeit (Teil 2) Jutta Brückner DR. MABUSE, THE GAMBLER: INFERNO, MEN OF OUR TIME (PART 2) Fritz Lang CONTENTS

42 New German Films 42 New German Films

42 Anam 51 Das Sams AT TO KYO Buket Alakus THE SLURB IN COMPETITION 43 Ankommen Ben Verbong ARRIVE 52 Suck My Dick Axel Müller Oskar Roehler 44 Demonium 53 Thomas Pynchon Andreas Schnaas – A Journey into the Mind of P. 45 Escape to Life – The Erika and Fosco Dubini, Donatello Dubini Klaus Mann Story 54 Toter Mann Andrea Weiss, Wieland Speck Christian Petzold 46 Malunde – Eine Freundschaft 55 A Woman and a Half – wider Willen Hildegard Knef AT TO KYO IN COMPETITION MALUNDE – AN UNLIKELY Clarissa Ruge FRIENDSHIP Stefanie Sycholt 47 – Her Own Song 57 Film Exporters David Riva 59 Foreign Representatives 59 Imprint

48 Mein Bruder der Vampir Sven Taddicken 49 The Navigators Ken Loach 50 Photographie und jenseits II PHOTOGRAPHY AND BEYOND II Heinz Emigholz DEPARTURE FROM THE ”WOMEN’S CORNER“ Since last year, there has been no overlooking them: films by Spanish-Greek co-production, was made parallel to her work as a women directors are being shown in cinemas, winning prizes professor at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne, and has just and getting themselves noticed. Esther Gronenborn had its premiere at the Montreal Film Festival. (alaska.de), Vanessa Jopp (Forget America/Vergiss Amerika, Engel & Joe), Connie Walther (Never Mind It would be possible to add many names. Vivian Naefe points the Wall/Wie Feuer und Flamme), Angela out that from her year at the Munich Academy of Television Schanelec (Passing Summer/Mein and Film the students Sherry Hormann, Ute langsames Leben) and Sandra Wieland, Liliane Targownik and she her- Nettelbeck (Mostly Martha/Drei self are repeatedly in the news, but nothing Sterne) belong to this series, but they is heard of the male colleagues who also include the Austrian directors graduated with them at the beginning Barbara Albert (Northern of the eighties. Skirts/Nordrand), Jessica Hausner (Lovely Rita) and The names of women television film Valeska Grisebach (Be My directors also make for a long list, Star/Mein Stern), whose including Gabi Kubach, Ilse graduation class at the Hofmann, Dagmar Damek,

Academy of Film is now being © Jens Berger/TIP Verlag) Carola Hattop, Martina Esther Gronenborn (photo hailed as the ”Vienna School“. Elbert, Claudia Prietzel and many others. Up-and-coming generation directors Maria Speth (The Days Margarethe von Trotta resisted Between/In den Tag hinein) working for television for a long time. and Barbara Gebler (Salamander) However, for some years now – as she told have made graduation films with very per- her biographer Thilo Wydra – she has permit- sonal stories regarding their own generation, ted herself to become involved ”in a relaxed, opti- and are on the threshold of their professional mistic way“ with the smaller screen format and the diff- careers. The actresses Maria Bachmann (Thema erent production conditions it presents. Her most recent work to Nr. 1) and Nicolette Krebitz (Jeans) moved into direction be seen on television – last year – was a mini-series version of last year, and the latter is also offering support to the chances of Uwe Johnson’s novel Jahrestage. digital film as a producer.

DEPARTURE FROM THE ”WOMEN’S CORNER“ Women Filmmakers in Germany Today by Claudia Lenssen Among the established women directors, Franziska Buch We shouldn’t forget the female documentary filmmakers who and Caroline Link have recently achieved successful statistics have followed the difficult road into the cinemas during the in the field of family cinema with their film versions of books by current year: Helga Reidemeister (God’s Cell/ Erich Kästner. Hermine Huntgeburth is presently Gotteszell) and Solveig Klaßen (Out of Tibet/ making Bibi Blocksberg, a fantasy film based on the famous Jenseits von Tibet), joined by Monika Treut series of children’s stories. And at the end of this winter, (Warrior of Light/Kriegerin des Lichts) with her Caroline Link’s new film Nowhere in Africa (Nirgend- portrait of a Brazilian woman who cares for street kids. And wo in Afrika), a story of youth in the Nazi period, will have its Karin Jurschick has won prizes with the portrait of her cinematic release. father It Should Have Been Nice After That (Danach hätte es schön sein müssen). Luzia Schmid Doris Dörrie, whose digitally-produced film Enlightenment from the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne has just won the Guaranteed (Erleuchtung garantiert) ”seemed to work“ First Steps Award for her documentary film Groundspeed – – as she herself put it – in cinemas last year, is beginning new film in addition to Schmid, nominations also included the German work in October. Parallel to this, she is publishing a book on Film and Television Academy student Juliette Cazenave which her new, six-person comedy is based. Vivian Naefe, (Nicole & Jean) and the ”Konrad Wolf“ Academy student last seen in the cinemas with Four for Venice (Zwei Shaheen Dill-Riaz Ahmed (Sand und Wasser). Männer, zwei Frauen, vier Probleme) in 1998, has New films by Susanne Ofteringer (Nico-Icon) and finished making five TV films over the last two years, and is now Aelrun Goette (Ohne Bewährung) are also to be preparing a fantasy film for the cinema. Jeanine Meerapfel’s expected soon. new film Anna’s Summer (Annas Sommer), a German-

6 Kino 4/2001 WOMEN FILMMAKERS IN GERMANY TODAY forced into the ”women’s corner“, they want to make films ”for The Rule or the Exception? everyone“ (Link). They aim to produce ”films for people, not films for women“ (Huntgeburth), they want to avoid ”the role Are we looking at a chance boom which is likely to ebb again in of the underdog“ (Naefe), and be taken seriously ”as a person“ the near future? Or have women in the film world achieved some- (Gronenborn). But on the other hand, those questioned have thing which is far from the case regarding top positions in noticed, in general, that women in the industry are viewed the economy, politics and culture in Germany – in a different way to men. Are they entrusted with equality without quota systems and any noise the same budget as an equally experienced man? of battle? Can they afford the same habits - at work, in their handling of the opposite sex – as It is certainly true that there have their male colleagues? Do they have never been as many women working equal opportunities right from the as directors, screenplay authors and start? The most recent example, producers as there are today. In perhaps a signal for the next addition, there are considerably slackening of the boom: at the more women directors and produ- First Steps Award this year, more cers at the broadcasting companies women than men were nominated and on promotional committees in all categories – except the cate- by comparison with the first small gory of full-length feature films. In wave of new German films by this ”royal discipline“, the up-and- women about twenty-five years ago coming male directors remained – as yet, however, there is no precise Doris Dörrie (photoRocholl) © Karin among themselves. study concerning current developments.

More women are making creative decisions A Look Back and directing proceedings within other artistic media, too. New impulses are coming from women in It is possible to describe what has really been achieved the theater, in the world of dance, and in music. Before this by taking a look back at history. Only during the last three of the overall background, women’s move to catch up in film, across almost eleven decades since cinema was invented have women the full range of specialist jobs and genres, resembles a long, made good their claim to become directors, at least in any quiet current no longer to be stopped by anything. number worth mentioning. Today there are almost as many female students as male at the German film academies, whilst However, a less relaxed situation emerges in conversation with female students were an exotic minority at their foundation some of the filmmakers named at the outset. On the one hand, around 1966. Within the older system of training in the German they maintain unanimously that the program for emancipation fol- Democratic Republic (GDR), despite formal equality, only a lowed by the older generation led to a dead end, as they see it, minute number of women managed to rise to the position of but on the other hand, many have noted with surprise that their director. profession is still a male domain today. So which standpoint is actually true of the situation? One maintains that there is no Cinema as a male domain – that was the general situation at the gender-specific exclusion, and that – inasmuch as it once existed – start, and it was only opposed, and certainly belatedly, by inter- men could not be held responsible for it. The other describes the ested women after the ’68 movement, or the Spring of . experience – as relevant as ever – of being confronted with At the beginning, cinema was a male domain per se; a technical ”buddy systems“ in the film world in which the dominant rules of toy for inventors and engineers, an investment in the future for the game are still not familiar to women. the entrepreneur. The traditional roles remained clearly distrib- uted: women had their part to play in front of the camera as On the one hand, Connie Walther, Hermine Huntge- spectacular eye-catchers and dramatic heroines, or they were burth, Sandra Nettelbeck, Esther Gronenborn, employed in the background, as cheap labor in the raw film Caroline Link and Dagmar Damek do not want to be factories, laboratories and copy works.

Helke Misselwitz, Franziska Buch, Hermine Huntgeburth (photo © Stefan Falke), Connie Walther (photo © Jens Berger/TIP Bildarchiv)

Kino 4/2001 7 DEPARTURE FROM THE ”WOMEN’S CORNER“ Henny Porten and Asta Nielsen founded production firms, and especially the 70s came from professions close to film: they but primarily in order to be able to develop interesting roles for were actresses, editors, photographers or television announcers. themselves together with their ”own“ directors. This called for a touch of eccentricity, a star reputation within the industry, and a In general, they drew attention to themselves with short films or lot of their own money. Even fewer women dared to take up learned their trade in collaboration with their partners before work as directors: these included Olga Tschechowa and liberating themselves from this kind of subordination. Female Léontine Sagan, for example, but each of them became well- graduates of film academies were by no means the majority. At known for only one single film. that time, Helma Sanders-Brahms, Margarethe von Trotta, Ulrike Ottinger, With her debut film The Blue Helke Sander, Jutta Light (Das blaue Licht) in Brückner, Elfi Mikesch, 1932, Leni Riefenstahl Helga Reidemeister, Ula made the most stubborn claim Stöckl, Susanne Beyeler and to stage her own films and to others did not form a firm group. control every aspect of film- They profited from an increased making in her company auto- interest in women’s themes which nomously. Oddly enough, she developed together with the feminist was able to develop her radical movement, and they intervened in authorship project further in the cultural discussions with their artistic service of Adolf Hitler. Her films comments on German reality. They of National Socialist party differed clearly amongst each other conferences and Olympia with respect to their proximity or made her into an absolute distance to the feminist trends of exception – in every respect – the times. Their narrative forms within the film apparatus emphasized the subjective perspec- controlled by Goebbels, and into tive, even though the basic motifs of the most controversial figure to Sander (photo Helke © Filmmuseum /Deutsche Kinemathek) their films were related to ”New be found in the German women German Film“, that is, they linked filmmakers’ rather limited social critical polemics with grief ancestral portrait gallery. over German history.

The women filmmakers of the first generation in the FRG all The First Generation laid claim to more autonomy. They focused on the woman’s perspective on their themes and characters, and parallel to this Neither the film boom in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) they also tried out new forms of production by deliberately taking during the 50s, nor the state-promoted, spoon-fed film culture in on women in their teams on occasion. Their films recount female the GDR, allowed women equal opportunities. In the television experiences and injuries; some concern themselves critically with world, too, the traditional distribution of roles remained during the consequences of the Nazi period, and all are characterized by the 60s. a radical mistrust in traditional role images. There were subtle psy- chograms of women, but also solid analyses of history, At the state film studio DEFA and within the social criticism and aesthetic utopias in these films. television production of the GDR, women with academic training in film did work as One may include among them May Spils’ dramatic advisors or authors quite subversive hippie comedy Go for It, early on. Many women were also Baby (Zur Sache, Schätzchen) a employed in film editing, costume playful portrait of a non-conformist making and make-up. However, man, but also All-Around despite the official policy of Reduced Personality – The supporting women in technical Link Caroline Outtakes (Allseitig reduzierte professions, during the forty years Persönlichkeit – Die of GDR history, the number of Redupers), Helke Sander’s women directors in both docu- dream of overcoming the Berlin Wall mentary and feature film by means of experiments by a woman remained noticeably small. Ingrid photographer, or Ulrike Ottinger’s photo © Buena Vista International) Reschke, Iris Gusner, Evelyn ( non-psychological, experimental films Schmidt, Sybille Schönemann, which sought the ”essential in the arti- Gitta Nickel and Helke ficial“ (Eva Meyer). Finally, there were Misselwitz are the well-known Margarethe von Trotta’s portraits of names. (By the way, the feminine form of the women, above all Marianne & Juliane (Die German word -”Regisseurin“ – was categorically bleierne Zeit). There never could be a sweeping rejected by the women of the GDR.) The limitations definition of feminist film, therefore, but over a dozen placed on their work by state surveillance are worthy of a story different signatures and imaginative worlds. of its own, meaning that they cannot be compared with the first generation of women filmmakers in the FRG. The women In each case, a difficult start in the profession almost inevitably directors of the ”New German Film“ in the FRG during the 60s led each of the women to formulate her own claim to be taken

8 Kino 4/2001 WOMEN FILMMAKERS IN GERMANY TODAY seriously as an individual artistic personality. That does not mean that they did not – in accordance with the general mood of Idols? departure – meet up at festivals and for symposiums, and were therefore able to make a louder voice heard for their group inter- If you ask today’s women directors about their idols, it is notice- est. On the other hand, there was also powerful criticism within able that the first, still active generation of women filmmakers and the small women’s film scene, for example in the journal Frauen their older films are rarely perceived as historical greats. Only und Film edited by Helke Sander; some women directors Margarethe von Trotta’s Marianne & Juliane has felt little sense of identification with the publication, some made a real impression on Connie Walther, Esther were even deeply insulted by it. And we should not forget: Gronenborn and Sandra Nettelbeck. Caroline Link among the women filmmakers as well as the men, there was values Jane Campion’s An Angel at My Table.

Jeanine Meerapfel, Sherry Hormann (photo © Erika Hauri), Monika Treut, Margarethe von Trotta (photo © T.W.) a Berlin faction and one in Munich – factions with an attitude Earlier on, Doris Dörrie felt inspired by Agnès Varda and of reservation towards each other. There are parallels here to Martha Meszáros, but also by Martin Scorsese; now, the way in which the ”school of Berlin workers’ cinema“ drew the more films she makes herself, the more she sees her former sharp distinctions between its work and that of Munich film- idols pale. Jessica Hausner can remember short films by makers such as Klaus Lemke, or the experimental filmmaker from Vienna, Valie Export, Niklaus Schilling. and recalls Käthe Kraatz. For Dagmar Damek, who is interested in literary adaptations, Truffaut plays a significant At the climax of this first wave, women filmmakers already had role. refers to the works on film theory the same fears as their colleagues today, sensing that they might and criticism by Frieda Grafe. For her part, be forced into a niche entitled ”women’s film“. Reluctantly, how- Maria Speth has been stimulated by ever, they repeatedly found an audience with this label, for Angela Schanelec’s films their semi-commercial distributors advertised using this (also because they both work phrase, and the film critics paid attention to them in together with the same this context. They also became internationally cameraman, Reinhold known as a specialized, partial product of ”New Vorschneider). And German Film“. Fatally, therefore, the ”women’s Vanessa Jopp views corner“ was a bonus abroad but a curse at Lars von Trier and home. David Lynch as her idols. Overall, what developed was not only a suc- cess story. Films by Helma Sanders- Dagmar Damek It is noticeable that Brahms, Margarethe von Trotta, all of them agree when Jeanine Meerapfel and Ulrike Ottinger (photo © Jirka Jansch) emphasizing how import- polarized criticism as well as their audiences ant it is to develop one’s again and again, including those members of the own individuality. ”To public spurred by the women’s movement. Even remain true to yourself“ is today, those directors named point – passionately seen as the best means of offended – to their international reputation, seeing asserting oneself and becoming themselves unjustly humiliated by German critics or even at immune to the impertinent pre- times ”destroyed“, a feeling Margarethe von Trotta sumptions of mediocrity and stereotypes. recalls after the reaction to her film A Labour of Love (Heller Wahn) at the Berlin Film Festival in 1981. If we compare the older and the younger generation, it becomes clear that fundamentally, a gesture of emancipation has remained the same existential motor to their careers. But today the women’s strategies are based on different social patterns. The

Kino 4/2001 9 DEPARTURE FROM THE ”WOMEN’S CORNER“ dilemma involved in the fear of being excluded or of being unable ”Just do it“ – Doris Dörrie’s and Vivian Naefe’s maxim, to assert themselves is the same, but external conditions have meets with more scepticism than enthusiasm from the younger changed to such an extent that communication between the women. It’s true that some women directors are very much pre- generations has broken down. In brief: the confusing range of sent in the cinemas during this season, but that does not prevent the older women filmmakers’ works has disappeared from the them from seeing the situation more critically, by any means. collective memory of the younger women, and what remains is their defensive reaction against the ”women’s corner“. Before, women distanced How Should One themselves from dominant patriarchal film stereotypes and concentrated on Assert Herself? women’s stories in the process. They were less worried about mediocrity These women avoid the ”women’s or media compatibility than they corner“ and yet they still notice that were of being unable to live up to they are viewed as women – that is their own avant-garde demands. the diagnosis. They must prove that Today however, women film- they have mastered the necessary makers consider the specific focus technology and skills for the job, on women limited and avoid its whereas men on the set don’t pathos. But they do arm them- Schnitger/TIP Bildarchiv) necessarily have to do so. A woman selves with a comparable self-help ”has to be good“ according to program: by insisting on ”their own Vivian Naefe, Dagmar Damek, Angela Schanelec (photo © Harry stories“ (Speth, Hausner, Hermine Huntgeburth, Caroline Gronenborn, Nettelbeck), Link; ”she has to be better“ say Connie they want to hold onto the greatest Walther, Esther Gronenborn and possible autonomy as a means of artistic Sandra Nettelbeck. Jessica Hausner is survival. surprised that the gaffers in particular silently presume that the director does not know what she is The women filmmakers of the first generation emphasized their talking about at first. She recalls her own adolescence and, along autobiographical stories, their subjective honesty. That was one of with Caroline Link and Sandra Nettelbeck, she remarks their most powerful means in the struggle to be perceived as that the emancipated standards of that time have little validity independent. Today, the desire for authentic expression is just as in the film business. Esther Gronenborn thinks that this pronounced, but it has to assert itself against competition from a firmly-established behavior of men on the set can’t usually be much larger number of existing schematic plots – that is, against referred to as arrogance, more as a "not-listening syndrome". the framework of media compatibility. Doris Dörrie found Caroline Link thanks her mother’s generation for bringing her German women directors grim, the film women’s problems up in a completely equal way, and as a result, says she does not boring, and feminism unsexy. Looking back, she sees herself and need the feminist standpoint today. The necessary characteristics Vivian Naefe as the first girlie-generation during the early of a woman director, she says, include strength of will, a certain eighties. And overall, she pleads for a good-natured, humorous dominance and the ability to direct proceedings. They have to be handling, of flexible and cheap tough and capable of ”powering a means of production, as well way through“ in order to maintain as of material, themes and their command on the set. Perhaps gender roles. She claims that girls are still brought up to be she has ”never permitted“ the gentle, socially aware and full of man/woman debate to enter understanding, and so they do not into her projects. One’s image want to let themselves in for the should not come across as a hierarchical business of making films, warning sign. she suggests. By contrast, Dagmar Damek doubts that a woman can Vivian Naefe has never ex- assert herself by being dominant and perienced discrimination. In her loud. It is only possible by means of opinion, it is positive when one precision in her skilled work, clear is considered something special instructions and a pleasant tone, as a woman director. If a project otherwise everyone takes what she requires a sensitive touch, a says amiss, calling her ”bitchy“. woman is often commissioned. Marbach/Mathias Michaelis) Deutsches Literaturarchiv, Hard action films are out of the Helma Sanders-Brahms (photo © Schiller-Nationalmuseum Hermine Huntgeburth and question for her anyway, and so, Connie Walther warn against her Tatort-series productions ideas of things which are supposed tend to be thrillers. She is casual to be typical of women. In the field about the lethargy of those of cinema, one is often faced by making the decisions in tele- purely gender-related clichés which vision: after making a story tend to be a hindrance at work. So about workers, you are offered what do women filmmakers have to another five, after a women’s do in order to assert themselves story there is also a danger of and develop a lasting career? Write, being pinned down. be the author of your own films –

10 Kino 4/2001 WOMEN FILMMAKERS IN GERMANY TODAY Vivian Naefe, Dagmar Damek, Doris Dörrie and Whether the present season of women directors remains an Sandra Nettelbeck see this as the key to the necessary intermezzo also depends on what qualifications the up-and- patience, strength and skill in handling those who make the coming generation uses to master this difficult phase. How decisions. Angela Schanelec passes the long periods of well-prepared are young women filmmakers when it comes to waiting between projects in this way, and so develops the fighting their way through – with independent projects – against necessary confidence to view certain discussions on screenplay competition from their male colleagues and from the mainstream as superfluous. of the media?

Political potential lies in an ability to fight for your own project, to stand by your own experience and to defend your Buddy Systems and own attitude to history – according to Maria Speth, Esther Gronenborn and Jessica Hausner. Beginners, says Maria Women’s Networks Speth, need sufficient conviction to test their confidence and assert their own political awareness before a forum, i.e. the On the one hand, the industry is waiting for new talent, on the decision makers, colleagues and the audience. A different other hand, it is afraid of the risk – the expected success quota in decisiveness is expressed here to that emphasizing pleasure and the cinema or on television might not be achieved. It is a matter humor which Caroline Link and Doris Dörrie saw as a vital of investments and prestige. precondition in their careers. But in the end, many women simply find no pleasure in going up against this hard, stressful profession, Larger budget decisions, innovative work with regard to form Caroline Link supposes. When the and content – these are youngest generation describe them- stress factors, and to avoid selves, they also connect questions of them men instinctively confidence and political attitude – and so prefer to rely on other they take up experiences, in a different men. Not least, this is also way, which Margarethe von Trotta associated with a traditional described in a similar fashion when lack of faith in women’s looking back. The task of making films ability to take strain. This therefore presents conditions under reflex is well-known to which the new women directors Dagmar Damek, repeatedly perceive themselves as Sandra Nettelbeck women – as aware women. and Connie Walther. Esther Gronenborn, And how is the women filmmakers’ will who has been making to assert themselves consistent with the music clips since 1997 – as desire for children? At present, Caroline one of the first women to Link rules out the possibility of career do so in Germany – de- and children, because her work demands scribed the rules of this so much of her time. Hermine absolutely male domain in Huntgeburth and Angela an article in the art journal Schanelec have experienced the fact Regina: there are systems that a profession and children are both of understanding amongst possible, at least if the family helps. men, she says, which Maria Speth finished her graduation women are far from seeing film more quickly than her student col- through, even when they Ulrike Ottinger Ulrike leagues – she says that her child helped have a clear view of a her to concentrate on the essentials. situation. By means of their everyday behavior, topics of conversation (football, cars, women), Taking a look over the border to Austria: a means discovered men create an atmosphere which lends them security, but often time and time again by independent filmmakers has also been stamps women as outsiders. employed by Jessica Hausner, Barbara Albert and two friends and colleagues. They have founded their own production ”The more money involved, the greater the pressure“, says company in Vienna, working together on their mutual projects, Sandra Nettelbeck. Like Esther Gronenborn and and so they have created a basis for themselves which Jessica Connie Walther, she is flabbergasted by the realization that Hausner finds important in order to be able to assert herself: these conflicts do indeed exist, although today everyone would it is a matter of keeping the power in one’s own hands when reject the notion of antagonism towards women at work. working with co-producers, and of investing the confidence won According to Sandra Nettelbeck, this is a typical situation: in the film. someone might find a young woman director ”quite charming“, but then he sees his false expectations disappointed when she Promising graduation films are made by women every year – even fights on behalf of her work and risks conflicts. if they often – see the First Steps Award – have the smaller format. Today they are produced as a result of early contacts to Connie Walther points out that many decisions in film production companies and television editors. A large number of production are made ”on an instinctive basis“. Men, or certainly annual graduates, according to Vivian Naefe, are as it were those with power, are caught up in this emotional, personal side ”carried along the path to their first film“. The real art is to of things as well, but they often view the pressure they exert establish oneself after that rather than sink under the immense as logical and rational. competitive pressure.

Kino 4/2001 11 DEPARTURE FROM THE ”WOMEN’S CORNER“ The question of clichés on both sides, which has a powerful influence in Hermine Huntgeburth’s opinion, is irritating to What About The Future? most of those questioned and it influences their work constantly. Two examples: it may happen that within the male domain of film, Among the many recent films named, only Caroline Link had women feel like the black sheep - that is, they secretly refer any a budget of more than 10 million marks available for her statement to themselves in a negative way, says Connie Nowhere in Africa. Vivian Naefe is aiming for a similar Walther. Women in a team often create a personal atmos- sum for her planned fantasy film – she hopes the success of phere, whereas in a decisive situation men are often able to Amélie might open some doors for her project. distance themselves from sympa- thies or animosity and prefer to Women filmmakers in Germany still make functioning bonds. have to be prepared to realize Sandra Nettelbeck advises: their stories more cheaply than their ”Just don’t lose your cool“ as

Maria Speth male colleagues working on com- that weakens your own position parable projects. Exceptions like and only serves the tiresome Sandra Nettelbeck’s Mostly cliché that women are hysterical. Martha are, as described, a matter Women who want to control of sheer nerve. If one bears in mind everything are feared but re- the poor chances for a large budget, spected – this is another experi- women continue to be treated as an ence frequently cited. up-and-coming generation for a longer period of time than their Esther Gronenborn adds male colleagues – some even feel her observation that women they have been given this role have to acquire skills in handling indefinitely. the ego problems of many col- leagues and of those making Perhaps Doris Dörrie’s advice, to decisions – and without expend- experiment with the digital camera ing too much energy in the and no-budget projects, fascinated process. As a director’s assistant, so few of her colleagues because Connie Walther already they still consider catching up on collected some experience of large projects a recognition of their the resistant image of the director genius idolized by female achievements. Nonetheless, it would be wrong to maintain that admirers. ”Where,“ she asks, ”is the fat, unattractive woman women filmmakers are fixated on the idea of catching up with director who presents her youthful lovers on the set?“ The comparable male colleagues. They expressly point out that the conclusion is that women are still measured by their superficial problems hampering their work are not just gender specific. attractiveness, whereas for men this is not necessary. What does become clear is that women filmmakers must cultivate the Hermine Huntgeburth refers to the decline of arthouse qualities which they need to assert themselves for all of their cinema culture, and also to the disappearing number of small working lives. If a woman is prepared to make herself unpopular distributors. The lack of a lasting presence of women directors in for the sake of her convictions, in the end only those the cinema is also partially due to the problem of poor remain who are really interested in her work, film culture as a whole, according to Connie according to Sandra Nettelbeck. Walther, Angela Schanelec and Sandra Nettelbeck. A growing market for Most of them do not view organized conformist television film formats means meetings or special associations that on the whole, the starting opportu- of women as particularly helpful – nities for original and authentic films are the ”women’s corner“ again. It decreasing. The kleines Fernsehspiel, is an illusion to think you can a program format at the German build up powerful networks in public broadcaster ZDF which was competition with the traditional open to the subjective film l’auteur ones, they believe. By contrast, of the first generation of women there is obviously a new, growing

Sandra Nettelbeck directors and has offered many interest in teamwork among women a forum, will most probably be women – without ideology, altering its program structure soon. relaxed and oriented on specific Maria Speth, Angela Schanelec projects. and many up-and-coming directors are worried by this loss. On the other hand, In the future, Esther Gronenborn since Tom Tykwer’s Run Lola Run would like to develop on her positive (Lola rennt), Vivian Naefe has observed a experience with this kind of work. Jessica new interest from television producers in ”crazy“, Hausner, Barbara Albert and Valeska even expensive, technically-oriented narrative forms – a new Grisebach also like to work together with women in a team. field for the young generation. So they don’t want a dogged program, but an open atmosphere with chances for women.

12 Kino 4/2001 WOMEN FILMMAKERS IN GERMANY TODAY

Vivian Naefe (photo © Edith von Welser-Ude), Vanessa Jopp, Helge Reidemeister

To find an audience for one’s own films at all, which means getting and experiences. As has always been the case, voicing a confident into the cinemas – and not disappearing from them again imme- ”I“ with one’s filmmaking is an important impulse. Jessica diately without a sound – appears to be an additional problem Hausner, Barbara Albert, Esther Gronenborn, which is particularly difficult for women in a hard, competitive Connie Walther, Sandra Nettelbeck and Vanessa world. Jopp all start out from a desire for authenticity, for the possibility of communication and emotionality – even though their France cultivates its young generation of directors and introduces aesthetic solutions are not necessarily comparable. Vanessa considerably more women directors to the cinema. In Germany, Jopp asserted ”unconditional feelings“ against her co-author in by contrast, even more radical changes than those mentioned Engel & Joe, and Sandra Nettelbeck wrote a happy end have led to a deficit in film culture. At the end of the GDR ten for her characters into the screenplay of Mostly Martha, years ago, for example, the few women directors at DEFA also ”because they deserve it“. Angela Schanelec’s cinema became victims of the new competitive situation. Helke represents a counter-tendency – for example her laconic Misselwitz’s most recent project was the feature film Little selection of diverse relationships in Passing Summer. Angel (Engelchen) in 1996, and since then she has concen- She demonstrates a dramatic approach which mistrusts any trated on her teaching at the ”Konrad Wolf“ Academy of Film outright portrayal of feelings. and Television in Potsdam-Babelsberg. Many of the women independent filmmakers of the old FRG have long since moved For the moment, therefore, a contradictory impression remains: into teaching as well, including Helke Sander, Jeanine the new women directors experience old patterns of gender- Meerapfel, Claudia von Alemann, Ula Stöckl and related rivalry with respect to production conditions, and they Jutta Brückner. New films by these women have been few defend themselves; they don’t want to be left behind. However, in and far between in recent years, although further projects are their films – especially their stories about young people – they being prepared. Ulrike Ottinger compensates for the waiting recount the discord between men and women with an obvious for funds by means of theater productions and photography, longing for harmony. Helma Sanders-Brahms – as one example – made a short film on the current anti-globalization campaign. Both have presented their entire works in larger retrospectives. Claudia Lenssen is a film scholar and a writer for numerous film publications. But the activities of the older generation have not led to a firm presence of any pupils. It seems that the youngest generation are Translation: Lucinda Rennison discovering their means of expression in a new and spontaneous way, and are filtering them from the current spirit of the times. This gives their films a direct quality which still – upon exact observation – permits us to see parallels to earlier productions.

The successful new women directors – and this is a cautious thesis -– share a basic growing feeling that they are living in a world which can only be experienced in a surrogate way. This may be an explanation for their insistence on personal stories

Kino 4/2001 13 Director’s Portrait Christian Petzold

Christian Petzold was born in Hilden in 1960, and grew up in Haan in the Rhine- land, a dormitory town between Wuppertal, Solingen and Düsseldorf. After school graduation, he completed his alternative to military service in the local film club of the YMCA. After this, in 1981, he moved to Berlin in order to study German and Theater, completing these studies in 1989 with a thesis on Rolf Dieter Brinkmann. He then began a course at the German Film & Television Academy (dffb), during which time he made a series of short features and documentaries and worked as an assistant director to Hartmut Bitomsky and Harun Farocki. His graduation film, Pilotinnen, was described by the critics of the journal Gdinetmao as ”the finest German film of the year 1995“. His second full-length feature film, Cuba Libre, won the Jury’s Promotional Prize at the Max Ophüls Festival in Saarbrücken 1996. Die Beischlafdiebin (1998) was followed by The State I Am In (Die Innere Sicherheit), which was recently awarded a Golden Lola as the Best German Film of the Year 2001. Christian Petzold has just completed the television film, Toter Mann. ”THE STATE I’M IN“

In the spring of 2001, Christian Petzold succeeded – vampire motif as in this case. The State I Am In therefore with The State I Am In – in making the breakthrough, as far abstains quite consciously from radical jargon, scraps of which as both audiences and critics were concerned, from a little-known, usually characterize the language of left-wing radical activists in private tip to a new hope in quality German cinema. The film tells the story of a small family which has lived underground for years, ”in a kind of historical silence“. When the daughter reaches puberty and begins to voice some claims of her own, the inner structure, the micro-politics of this family begin to lose their equilibrium. The daughter’s attempts to liberate herself turn against the family’s ”inner secur- ity“: ”The film is all about this complex constellation within the family. That has to be absolutely realistic, in the sense that the inner communication is no longer directed towards an imaginary audience. Instead, on the contrary, we observe a family at work on its economy of guilt and its symbolism.“

Looked at superficially, the film appears to have been much helped by a coincidence quite effective for publicity, but if one is aware of Petzold’s way of working and knows his previous films, it becomes clear that this is not actually a coincidence – far more, it is the result of an extremely fortuitous combination of historical-political interests, an ability for precise observation, aesthetic sensitivity and a principle disquiet regarding the social status quo in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). When a film like The State I Am In meets with an audience aroused by current discussion on the radical biographies of those bearing political responsibility today, and – almost without meaning to – it becomes a kind of intervention in the debate, this confirms, first and foremost, Petzold’s assessment that the ”Red Army Faction phantom“ has not lost its virulence since the autumn of 1977. However, it also indicates that this material requires a different story, a different adaptation in order to be able to remind people of it, work it out and make it productive from a different perspective and under altered experimen- tal conditions; perhaps by means of a highly original combination of family story, political history and Christian Petzold (photo © Michael Weber)

14 Kino 4/2001 Director’s Portrait Christian Petzold film, so illustrating the political dimension of the figures. The men to bed then rob them – explicitly borrows a motif from State I Am In relates quite normal episodes from the everyday Alexander Kluge, whose way of thinking inspired him: life of an extreme family: ”The theft of clothing in order to be able ”Kluge has made a very considerable impression on me since I to plunge into a certain normality means becoming human for the read his Lebensläufe at the end of the 70s. In this work I found daughter, but for the parents it may perhaps mean death.“ something which demonstrated the cracks in this gruesome sub- urban reality of the FRG, revealing horrifying tragedies and opera In praise of dialectics! Christian Petzold’s films tell simple material behind them.“ and at the same time highly complex stories about damaged lives, the loss of utopias, the longing for a suburban family happiness Petzold’s films recount the ”gruesome suburban reality“, the which remains unfulfilled because the people within this system edges of the Federal Republic’s middle classes, showing the every- are not equal to the realization of their dreams. At the same day life, the dreams and the failures of cosmetics saleswomen, time, the films are dense (and this is their true art), psycho-social ”Beischlafdiebinnen“, dropouts, ex-political activists in the under- experimental models and unsentimental, hard FRG-noirs. On the ground, department store announcers. In fact, they are all quite one hand, it is possible to sum up the action of the individual films modest; they only want a fair share of the cake, but they are not in a few sentences, on the other hand there is sufficient psycho- granted even that, because they don’t know all the rules. logical motivation in their depth of structure to concern oneself with them for a long time and plumb the depths of all the implicit Is it possible to learn these rules, these strategies for happiness? and explicit dialectical turns in the plot. A reduction – as a result of experience – in the number of mis- takes we make in the field of social activity calls for a second In Petzold’s films, the Federal Republic stubbornly remains a chance in order to try out what has been learned in practice. foreign country, an ethnographic terrain whose rules of play must Petzold’s films are full of training opportunities, of repetitions, be examined precisely (which may teach us a great deal, but ulti- variations and reflections, they are also full of learning processes. mately does not help the characters much!). Sometimes the films The characters attempt to gain control over their lives by training, begin outside of the FRG, in Morocco or on the Portuguese coast, hoping to reduce contingency. In the process, they underestimate sometimes the figures have just returned to the FRG, and usually the extent to which projections hamper their perception, and also the characters dream of a life outside of the FRG: of a flat of their forget that life itself - that is, the conditions of the experiment – own in , of a life in Bora-Bora, of a new identity in Brazil. is always changing. The learning processes which Petzold has Moments of happiness and security only arise during the long car revealed up until now have usually remained ”fatal learning journeys through the countryside. Moments of mobility liberate processes“ – his films demand this measure of materialistic realism the characters from the pressure to consider their options to act: from the viewer, especially as they are often crime stories (the these are moments of happiness in a purely antisocial sense, but sociological content of a coherent crime story should never be unfortunately (of course!) they do not present a general solution underestimated: Petzold is a fan of Charles Willeford). to German miseries. Should, however, non-lethal learning processes take place amongst the audience, this is entirely in the spirit of the narrator. Die Beischlafdiebin – the title of the last-but-one film by Christian Petzold and the German term for women who lure Ulrich Kriest spoke with Christian Petzold

Director’s Portrait Monika Treut DIGGING DEEP FOR THE ROOTS

Monika Treut was born in Moenchengladbach, a town near sado-masochism in Seduction: The Cruel Woman, or high- Cologne, close to the Dutch border, that is also the birthplace of lighting controversial personalities as in Female Misbehavior, Joseph Goebbels. There’s an irresistible sense of "poetic justice" or the transgender subculture of Gendernauts (winner of a in the Third Reich’s propaganda architect sharing a birthplace with Special Teddy Jury Award at the 1999 Berlin Film Festival) or a woman who exemplifies to the core of her being so many of creating a new kind of sex comedy in My Father is Coming the things that that regime opposed: radical feminism, personal (winner of the Best Feature Film and Audience Award at the 1991 freedom, sexual pleasure, gender exploration, and a refusal to Turin International Film Festival), Treut always manages to upend be cowtow to a romanticized image of ”the state.“ For while standard expectations and explore unusual people, places and German, Treut’s cinema – and person – knows no borders. situations, without resorting to ”shock“ tactics of any kind. As a Her films have been shot in , New York, San Francisco, result, she’s one of the few modern filmmakers who can be Mexico City and Rio de Janiero, and have been shown around counted on to show us women’s lives in all their complexity, the globe. Her forms have been both documentary and fictional. without a trace of condescension. Her mise en scène both dramatic and comic. Yet for all of these differences, there’s no mistaking a film by Monika Treut for ”The strangest thing is that I never started out wanting to make anyone else’s. For whether she’s delving into the world of movies,“ Treut recalls. ”I made a few documentary videos as

Kino 4/2001 15 Director’s Portrait Monika Treut

Monika Treut was born on 6 April 1954 in Moenchengladbach. She studied Literature and Politics at Philipps-University in Marburg, and published her PhD thesis The Cruel Woman. Female Images in the Writings of Marquis de Sade and Leopold von Sacher-Masoch in 1984. Since 1990, she has been teaching Film at colleges, art institutes and universities in the United States. Her first feature, co-directed with Elfi Mikesch, was the controversial Seduction: The Cruel Woman (Verführung: Die grausame Frau, 1985), which since has become a classic in Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The black and white, coming-out tale Virgin Machine (Die Jungfrauenmaschine) followed in 1988. Her film My Father is Coming, a comedy of manners set in New York, won the audience and jury awards at the Torino Film Fest in 1991 and was screened at numerous festivals throughout the world. In 1992, Treut began directing documentaries, including: Female Misbehavior, a four portrait series on ”bad girls“, Didn’t Do It For Love (1997), a portrait of the B-movie star Eva Norvind, and Gendernauts (1999), a group portrait of trans-gendered cyborgs in San Francisco. All of Treut’s films have enjoyed festival screenings around the world and distribution in the United States, the United Kingdom and some also in the Netherlands, France, Australia and other countries. Most recently, she completed Warrior of Light (2001) on Yvonne Bezerra de Mello, an award-winning human rights activist and sculptress who works with endangered children in the slums of Rio de Janeiro. Warrior of Light premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival 2001.

went to New York and applied for a grant to do a documentary video, and that saved me in a way because I was exposed to people again. From then on my focus

Monika Treut became making movies.“ And the movies she has made owe little to literature. Mixing millimeters and video image, her films are as many-imaged as her many- gendered subjects.

Seduction: The Cruel Woman may touch on the life and art of Leopold Sacher-Masoch, the man retrospectively responsible for the creation of the term ”masochism“, but the world Treut evokes in that film and such related works as Virgin Machine and Didn’t Do It For Love go well beyond the ken of that sexual explorer, particularly in the way they give women voice to their desires. And the ”dominant“ woman of those films casts light on women of other kinds such as the cheery porn performance artist Annie Sprinkle, the fierce anti-feminist academic Camille Paglia, the transgender ”cyborg“ Texas Tomboy, and even Yvonne Bezerra de Mello, the human rights activist at the center of Treut’s latest work Warrior of Light, which while dealing with the plight of Brazilian slum children, rather than avant-garde sex- uality, still features a ”difficult“ woman as its point of focus.

”Most people cannot stand bossy women,“ Treut observes, ”whereas I find them very entertaining. I think Camille Paglia is a refreshing influence on feminism. And Eva Nordvind (the German-born Mexican B- movie starlet turned professional Dominatrix and ”sexual therapist“) is a pioneer too. What connects Camille and Eva is that they’re both full of themselves. They’re way beyond the traditional image. Annie Sprinkle believes that anyone can be a porn star. Global Capitalism separates people into different groups, saying ’These are sexy and these are not.’ Annie is against that. In one of her projects she took very ”ordinary“ women, glamorized them, and turned them a student just because I enjoyed doing it. Then I wrote my into the image of porn stars. It’s very liberating. And so is trans- dissertation, and not to become like some old-fashioned genderism. That’s really a millennial phenomenon. People are academic, as recreation I did documentary videos on the side. wondering about how female or male they are and exploring that. My dissertation was entitled The Cruel Woman. Female Images in Except for the gay community in West Hollywood. They’re all just the Writings of Marquis de Sade and Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. so male!“ I was digging deep for the roots, and pretty much ’gone’ for two years researching. I was immersed in books and theory. Then I David Ehrenstein spoke with Monika Treut

16 Kino 4/2001

World Sales Portrait RRS Entertainment

Established in 1990 Managing Director Robert Rajber Additional contact Rommy Ryba (Business Affairs Manager), Andrea von Langsdorff (Operations Manager), Michael Graf de La Rosé (Legal Affairs and Film Consultancy) Main fields of activity acquisition, distribution and co-pro- duction of theatrical features, family entertainment, animation Regular attendance of the following film and TV markets AFM, Cannes, MIFED, MIPCOM, MIP-TV, NATPE Number of titles on offer c. 7 Percentage of the German titles on offer world-wide 10% Buyers include TV channels in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, France, Israel, United States Best-selling titles currently on sale The Three Bears, The Ugly Duckling, Race in the Streets

RRS Entertainment Gesellschaft für Filmlizenzen GmbH Sternwartstr. 2 · D-81679 Munich phone +49-89-2 11 16 60 · fax +49-89-21 11 66 11 · email: [email protected] PERSONAL CONNECTIONS

As anyone will tell you, the film business is a people business. connections, Robert Rajber, managing director of Munich- What you know is very important but the decisive factor is whom based RRS Entertainment, is well in the loop, as the you know. And when it comes to those all important personal Americans would say.

”I know what the broadcasters are looking for,“ affirms Rajber. ”I have very good personal contacts with the broadcasters and they tell me what their needs are and I look at the market to Robert Rajber see what can be had where, and then I buy and sell accordingly.“

Established by former commercial broadcaster ProSieben manager Rajber in 1990, RRS Entertainment licences features films and animated series, ”selling ninety percent of our rights to Germany and the German-speaking territories, predominantly to broadcasters. Ten percent of our activity is international, basically to television.“ The company also co-produces the occasional feature and animated series.

RRS has a team of ”three and a half partners!“ One in LA provides information about new projects on the market and what rights are available for Germany, another takes care of the financial affairs, Rajber looks after general operations. The ”half“ takes care of contractual matters and consults.

As befits any small company, RRS Enter- tainment has found and filled its niche, as Rajber explains.

”We are small and like it that way. We don’t want to go blowing bubbles. We don’t want to do any large pre-buys, with the exception of our stakes in the production of animated series. The company has grown slowly, is well established, does very nicely and we’re satisfied. We don’t disturb any- body. We’re as happy to do business with the Kirch Group as we are with Bertelsmann or the

18 Kino 4/2001 Producers’ Portrait RRS Entertainment public broadcasters. We are not obligated to one or the other. deals with Italy and France, also Switzerland. In the past we’ve also If there’s a deal to be made, we’ll then make that deal.” been able to sell German films on behalf of other companies, again to Italy. Films such as RTL TV-movies or the odd theatrical As for the product itself, ”I have just B-movies and maybe the feature. Internationally, I believe the whole thing, in the end, is like titles won’t say very much to people; B-movies for the 10pm night a supermarket. If you can place something via personal connec- time slot,“ says Rajber. ”Tell Me No Lies is one of them. tions it works wonderfully.“ I also have various children’s and family entertainment programs for the afternoon slot. Lloyd is a theatrical feature which Rajber’s own viewing tastes are ”basic commercial films. I found screened in Berlin, at the film festival, and aired on RTL2 very Shrek as much fun as Die Hard. I don’t have any great cineaste successfully.“ demands.“

RRS’ know-how is bundled towards the German-speaking Consummate businessman that he is, he declaims ”a good film is markets with the main territory, Germany, proving ”extremely one that sells well and otherwise subjective evaluations should be difficult at the moment“. The broadcasters are in a very good left out of it. When the product is well received, when it sells, it position whereby they can select whatever they want and at sells.“ dumping prices. The market is flooded with product. Producers with script in one hand and begging bowl in the other ”In the feature film area and for TV-movies it is, in Germany at are well advised to look elsewhere. ”Theoretically, I’m interested,“ any rate, very, very difficult because many time slots (prime and says Rajber. ”In practice, I’m not.“ late night) have been cancelled by the TV stations and the big TV groups have very restrictive purchasing policies. If they buy at all.“ But anyone with a good solid B-movie, as in good, solid entertain- ment, be it action, adventure, thriller, erotic, science fiction, But this is where being small means being nimble, and con- drama, or family entertainment, wanting to get it sold, either in the nections are decisive. German-speaking territories or further afield, will be hard pushed to find a better connected company. ”I don’t believe a broadcaster can live from big budget features alone. Small B-movies have a place in the schedule,“ says Rajber. Simon Kingsley spoke with Robert Rajber And citing the company’s own co-produced erotic thriller, Midnight Hour (starring American Beauty’s Amber Smith), ”this year we sold it to an American company which then signed a deal with Artisan on video and Showtime, for television. For a B-movie it did quite well. In Europe we signed

VERBAND DER AGENTUREN für Film, Fernsehen und Theater e.V.

VORSTAND GESCHÄFTSSTELLE Bernhard Hoestermann RAe Lansnicker & Schwirtzek Dr. Marlis Heppeler Kurfürstenstraße 33 • 10785 Berlin Marie-Luise Schmidt Telefon 0 30-2 30 81-90 Telefax 0 30-2 30 81-9 19 www.vda.fnw.de • [email protected]

Kino 4/2001 19 Producers’ Portrait Schramm Film Koerner + Weber

The Berlin-based production company Schramm Film Koerner + Weber was established in 1991 by Florian Koerner von Gustorf and Michael Weber and has since produced over a dozen feature-length films. A particularly fruitful collaboration has developed over the years with the public broadcaster ZDF, producing such films as Christian Petzold’s Pilotinnen, Angela Schanelec’s Places in Cities (Plätze in Städten), Florian Gärtner’s Drachenland and, most recently, Henner Winckler’s Klassenfahrt. Almost all of Schramm Film’s productions have been shown at national and international film festivals, and highlights have included the invitation in 1998 to Places in Cities to screen in the Un Certain Regard sidebar in Cannes, and the world premiere of Christian Petzold’s The State I Am In (Die Innere Sicherheit) at the 2000 Venice Film Festival and its presentation at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival as ”Discovery of the Year“ by FIPRESCI. In June 2001, Schramm Film received a Golden ”Lola“ with a premium of up to DM 1 million at the German Film Awards in Berlin for Petzold’s film.

Schramm Film Koerner + Weber · Bülowstr. 90 · D-10783 Berlin phone +49-30-2 61 51 40 · fax +49-30-2 61 51 39 · email: [email protected] RETAINING THE CINEMATIC AESTHETIC

Celebrating their tenth anniversary of operations as Schramm as location manager or assistant director in addition to our Film, Florian Koerner von Gustorf and Michael producer chores. Even on our latest project Klassenfahrt this Weber couldn’t have had a better year, what with the screening summer I was ferrying actors from Berlin to the set on the Baltic of Angela Schanelec’s Passing Summer (Mein lang- coast in Poland“. sames Leben) at the Berlinale’s Forum, the invitation to Cannes’ Critics’ Week sidebar for Christian Petzold’s The State I ”We were forced by the low budget to take on these other duties, Am In (Die Innere Sicherheit) as FIPRESCI’s ”Discovery of but because of this, we are more aware of the specific needs of the Year“, and then winning the top Lola for ”Best Film“ at the the director and his team and are able to react much swifter“. German Film Awards in June. After making Petzold’s TV film Pilotinnen as a co-production ”We both come from the practical side of the film industry“, with the dffb and ZDF in 1994, Schramm Film reunited with says Florian Koerner recalling their origins, ”Michael and I the director in 1995 for his thriller Cuba Libre and then in 1997 had worked on several films by the dffb [German Film & for the TV film Die Beischlafdiebin, which was awarded the Television Academy] doing the lighting and sound and, after Producer’s Prize at the Max Ophüls Festival in Saarbrücken. three or four films, we decided that we belonged on the other side. And so we came to be producers who could draw on the The State I Am In, which was shot in Hamburg and Portugal experiences we had personally gathered whilst working on the in April and May 2000, marked a double first for this team, since it film sets, and that meant we had an idea of the kind of films was the first theatrical feature for both Petzold and Schramm one could produce“. Film.

Thanks to their good contacts to the dffb in Berlin, The four years of development of the project – from the time Schramm Film’s first two films were graduation films, when they submitted the expose to Filmboard Berlin- including Pilotinnen by Christian Petzold, which marked Brandenburg for development support at the end of 1994 to the beginning of a long-standing working relationship between the film’s shooting in spring 2000 – were, as Koerner admits, ”a the production company and the young director. Pilotinnen very long process, but that only benefitted the screenplay“. also sowed the seeds for a fruitful collaboration with the Das Moreover, the project had been conceived from the very outset as kleine Fernsehspiel unit of public broadcaster ZDF. a film for the cinema and went on to attract over 100,000 admis- sions on its theatrical release in Germany. ”This collaboration with Das kleine Fernsehspiel developed very well“, Koerner explains, ”because their structure was very Despite the fact that television was the key financier for its pro- close to our own and because they had the focus on low-budget jects, Schramm Film has always encouraged its filmmakers to films. We were a small firm and often worked on the projects retain their ”cinematic“ aesthetic and, thanks to the close collab-

20 Kino 4/2001 Producers’ Portrait Schramm Film Koerner + Weber Florian Koerner von Gustorf, Michael Weber (photo © Henner Winckler) von Gustorf, Michael Weber Florian Koerner

oration with Das kleine Fernsehspiel, they have also been able to ”What you need is an apparatus which can serve several projects show their films at festivals in Germany and abroad before the TV at the same time“, he continues. ”But that would mean us having airing and sometimes have even found a distributor to give the film to expand and employ a junior producer or a story developer“. a limited release. According to Koerner, the films’ exposure at festivals can bring benefit for the director and him as producer, as Being just a two-man outfit, he argues, has its pros and cons. well as drawing attention to the work of Das kleine Fernsehspiel, On the one hand, Koerner and Weber are very much which has played a key role in the support of international inde- ”hands-on“ as far as the day-to-day production is concerned, pendent cinema for almost 40 years. primarily out of financial necessity. But this labor intensive approach means that they can only really tackle a maximum of The State I Am In marked a new departure for Schramm two film projects a year. Film in various respects since its DM 3.4 million budget was quite unlike anything they had tackled before. While the producing ”I think we are very free in the way we operate at the moment“, duo’s previous projects had all hovered in the DM 500,000 – Koerner explains. ”The pressure grows a lot on a production DM 1 million bracket and seen the bulk of the financing coming company when it has a number of permanent employees and from a broadcaster, this project tapped into such public funds as consequently, must produce. This year, for example, it was Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg, FilmFörderung sufficient for us to make just one film. That’s quite a luxury. So, Hamburg, the German Federal Film Board (FFA) the step to grow would have to be well-considered“. and the State Ministry of Culture (BKM) and received backing from broadcaster Hessischer Rundfunk and the MB Franco-German cultural channel ARTE.

With their latest project – Henner Winckler’s Klassen- fahrt – Schramm Film has returned, though, to the situation before The State I Am In: 60% of the film’s DM 1.2 million budget comes from Das kleine Fernsehspiel, with the remainder coming from Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg and deferrals.

”It is a question of whether we can carry on like this“, Koerner suggests. ”In the long term, we will have to see if we should be investing more in development to try out more things and invest money in ideas. The problem is the time that it takes to finance a feature film. Five years for The State I Am In was an extreme case, but 11/2 to 2 years is quite normal“.

Kino 4/2001 21 Kino news

Filmboard Berlin-Brandenburg’s for cinema, in addition to the other often-used mediums of computer and television. With special topics like ”School and Reader’s Report Guidelines Film“, ”Church and Film“ and many others, teachers and Well Received school children will be able to use the film medium as an additional educational learning tool. The reader’s report guidelines developed by Brigitta Manthey, funding consultant at the Filmboard Berlin- Brandenburg, and Ralf Ruschewitz have gained wide appreciation throughout the industry. MFG Star Award for Promising Young Talent Industry professionals as well as other funding institutions welcomed the Filmboard’s initiative. Alaric Hamacher, The MFG Star Award for the promotion of up-and- CEO of Virtual Experience, Munich, stressed ”the impor- coming directorial talent will be presented for the second tance of reader’s reports and script development“, while time at the Baden-Baden Festival of TV-Films Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung-CEO Manfred (28 November - 1 December 2001). This year’s prize will be Schmidt announced that the MDM is going to adopt the awarded, in combination with a ”carte blanche“ for a training Filmboard’s standardized reader’s report. The Production and seminar of the winner’s choice, by juror Oskar Roehler. Media Business Department at the HFF Munich is already using The MFG-initiated co-production meeting ”Europa der kur- the guidelines, as is the Film Academy Ludwigsburg. zen Wege“, organized for the fifth time in cooperation with FFF Bayern, the Austrian Film Institute and the And interest has already spread beyond Germany’s borders. Swiss Federal Office for Culture, will also take place ”... Extremely useful and helpful to decision-makers and within the framework of the festival. The meeting provides a producers as well as our authors,“ says Hanna Miller who, forum for the participants to present their projects and as head of Estonia’s Film Funding Institution, is currently to locate European co-production partners. spreading the reader’s report guidelines throughout Estonia.

The Filmboard’s editorial workshop run in cooperation with the Institut Potsdam was also a great success, with requests pouring in for workshops in Leipzig, Ludwigsburg and Munich.

The reader’s report guidelines can be down- loaded from the internet at www.filmboard.de.

”Kids’ Stories“ in Lübeck Klaus von Trotha (photo © Michael Holzinger) Klaus von Trotha

As part of the Nordic Film Days in Lübeck (1 - 4 Novem- ber 2001), the FilmFörderung Hamburg and the Gabriele Röthemeyer, last year’s winner Sabine Brodersen, last year’s Gabriele Röthemeyer, Media Desk Germany will present Kids Stories to MFG Screenplay Award German and Scandinavian producers. Alongside North by Northwest Classic, Kids Stories is another training program for script writers of children’s films. The film The MFG announces its fourth Screenplay Award with institutes of Denmark, Finland, and Norway are prize money in the sum of DM 50,000. All of the nominated already associated with the program, and both Great Britain screenplay writers will be invited to attend the award cere- and Ireland have expressed their interest in joining. Other mony during the Berlinale 2002. All nominated writers German partners are invited to participate in Lübeck. The will also receive a nomination award of DM 2,000. Freelance FilmFörderung Hamburg is the German partner of authors, writing teams, and producers may submit completed the script writing program North by Northwest which scripts for fictional feature films. Pre-requisite is that the has become an important European network for authors, author lives in Baden-Württemberg or that the story takes producers and directors over the last five years. place in Baden-Württemberg. Submission deadline is 1 December 2001. Please send four copies of all scripts to:

Cinema Goes MFG-Filmförderung · Karin Frey ”Drehbuchpreis“ to School Breitscheidstr. 4 · D-70174 Stuttgart phone +49-7 11-90 71 54 04 In order to attract more children and youth into the cinema, fax +49-7 11-90 71 54 50 · email: [email protected] the German Federal Film Board (Filmförderungs- anstalt, FFA) and the German film industry are starting a new pilot project, ”Cinema Goes to School“, this fall in German schools. The aim is to heighten cultural awareness

22 Kino 4/2001 Kino news

"Movies Made in Bavaria" Go Tunnel) won the Audience Award. And the Kassel Art East and Inspire Audiences in Academy film student Holger Ernst received the Second Prize in the short film competition for his film Little Fish Moscow and Cairo (Kleine Fische).

With an acclaimed presentation of eight current German films At the Venice International Film Festival (29 August in Moscow, the FilmFernsehFonds Bayern put new – 8 September