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’Someday We’ll Tell Each Other Everything’, ’The Survival Of Kindness’ and ’BlackBerry’ land with middling scores.

Emily Atef’s Someday We’ll Tell Each Other Everything, Rolf de Heer’s The Survival Of Kindness and Matt Johnson’s BlackBerry are the first titles to land on Screen’s Berlin 2023 Competition jury grid.

De Heer’s film leads with an average of 2.4, followed closely by the other two titles on 2.3.

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Seven critics are taking part in this year’s jury grid and will mark all 19 films playing in competition.

The Survival Of Kindness received four three-star ratings...

Row Pictures is the producer of Emily Atef’s Berlin competition title Someday We’ll Tell Each Other Everything.

Karsten Stöter’s Germany-based Row Pictures, the producer of Emily Atef’s Berlin competition title Someday We’ll Tell Each Other Everything, has unveiled a slate of features from Natja Brunckhorst, Markus Schleinzer and Eliza Petkova.

Brunckhorst’s second feature, Zwei zu Eins, is set to go into production this summer at locations in Central Germany and North Rhine-Westphalia. It will be co-produced by the Lübeck-based arm of zischlermann filmproduktion with backing from broadcasters Zdf and Arte as well as Mdm, the Film- und Medienstiftung Nrw and Bkm.

The trailer for “Someday We’ll Tell Each Other Everything,” French-Iranian filmmaker Emily Atef’s tale of forbidden love, which premieres in Berlinale Competition, has debuted (below). The Match Factory is looking after the film’s international sales, and Pandora Film is handling German distribution.

The film, based on Daniela Krien’s novel, is set in the summer of 1990 in the countryside around Thuringia, in former East Germany.

Maria, who is about to turn 19, lives with her boyfriend Johannes on his parents’ farm and would rather lose herself in books than focus on graduating. There is a sense of a new era dawning with the reunification of Germany.

When she bumps into Henner, the farmer living next door, one touch is all it takes to ignite an all-consuming passion between Maria and the headstrong, charismatic man twice her age. In an atmosphere buzzing with possibilities, love is born: a secret passion...

18 titles selected for competition, including films by Christian Petzold, Emily Atef, Margarethe Von Trotta and Philippe Garrel.

The 18-strong Competition line-up for the 73rd Berlin International Film Festival has been announced by festival heads Carlo Chatrian and Mariette Rissenbeek.

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New films from Christian Petzold, Margarethe Von Trotte, Emily Atef and Lila Avilés are among those selected. Some 15 of the 18 titles are world premieres, with international premieres for Celine Song’s Past Lives after debuting to strong reviews at Sundance; Makoto Shinkai’s animation Suzume, released in Japan last November; and Australia’s The Survival Of Kindness by Rolf de Heer,...

The films will play in the Laugh and Love strands respectively.

Modern Films has acquired UK-Ireland distribution rights on two films that will play in next month’s BFI London Film Festival.

From Memento Films, It has picked up Kristoffer Borgli’s Sick Of Myself, which will debut in the Laugh strand. Produced by The Worst Person In The World producers Dyveke Bjorkly Graver and Andrea Berentsen Ottmar, the film follows a couple in an unhealthy competitive relationship that takes a turn when one of them breaks through as a contemporary artist.

It debuted in Un Certain Regard at Cannes in May,...

Emily Atef, whose latest film “3 Days in Quiberon” competed at the Berlinale in 2018, is getting ready to shoot “More Than Ever,” a melodrama headlined by Vicky Krieps (“Phantom Thread”) and Gaspard Ulliel (“It’s Only the End of the World”). Jesper Christensen (“Before the Frost”) and Liv Ullmann will also star.

The Match Factory is representing the project in international markets.

“More Than Ever” (formerly known as “Mister”) was penned by Atef and German scribe Lars Hubrich, whose screenwriting credits include Fatih Akin’s 2016 film “Goodbye Berlin.” The movie is produced by Xénia Maingot at Eaux Vives Productions, and co-produced by Nicole Gerhards at Niko Film, Jani Thiltges at Samsa Film and Maria Ekerhovd at Mer Film.

The film follows Hélène, a 33-year-old women who lives in Bordeaux, France, and is in a happy relationship. Her life takes an unexpected turn when she finds out that she suffers from a rare lung disease.

StudioCanal Germany and local independent Prokino have signed a major deal that will see StudioCanal take over the physical and digital distribution of Prokino’s back catalog for the German market.

The deal, announced Thursday, includes more than 100 titles released by Prokino in German theaters in 2019 or earlier. Among the biggest hits are Oscar winner Slumdog Millionaire (2008), French-language blockbusters Amélie (2001) and Welcome to the Sticks (2008), and Emil Atef’s 2018 Romy Schneider biopic 3 Days in Quiberon, which won seven German Film Awards, including for best film, best director and best actress for Marie Bäumer as Schneider.

StudioCanal already ...

StudioCanal Germany and local independent Prokino have signed a major deal that will see StudioCanal take over the physical and digital distribution of Prokino’s back catalog for the German market.

The deal, announced Thursday, includes more than 100 titles released by Prokino in German theaters in 2019 or earlier. Among the biggest hits are Oscar winner Slumdog Millionaire (2008), French-language blockbusters Amélie (2001) and Welcome to the Sticks (2008), and Emil Atef’s 2018 Romy Schneider biopic 3 Days in Quiberon, which won seven German Film Awards, including for best film, best director and best actress for Marie Bäumer as Schneider.

StudioCanal already ...

The dramatic road movie will star Birgit Minichmayr and Alexandra Maria Lara. German filmmaker Nana Neul, known for To Faro (My Friend from Faro) and Silent Summer, is readying a new film. Based on German author Lucy Fricke’s successful novel of the same name, Töchter (lit. “Daughters”) is currently in production and will centre on Betty and Martha, two women pushing 40, who set off from Germany to accompany their dying father to Switzerland. There, he is to fulfil his last wish: that of committing assisted suicide in a special institute. Their journey leads them through Italy and Greece. Töchter will star Birgit Minichmayr and Alexandra Maria Lara in the lead roles, while Josef Bierbichler, Giorgio Colangeli and Andreas Konstantinou are also among the cast of the upcoming dramatic road movie. Filming took place in Germany earlier this year and continued in...

Receiving Variety‘s Achievement in International Film Award, Berlin Film Festival chief Dieter Kosslick bid a fond farewell to the event Monday as the end credits loom after his good humored and productive 18-year epic reign.

Speaking at the prize-giving event Monday at the Audi Berlinale Lounge – which overlooks the entrance to the fest’s main venue, the Berlinale Palast – to a hand-picked crowd of colleagues and industry friends, including actress Tilda Swinton – Kosslick said he was “honored” and “moved” to receive the award, as he gazed out wistfully through the window at the red carpet.

“It was 18 years of excitement and it was also really fun,” he said. In recent days, as people said goodbye, he had “become a little melancholic,” he said, but considered it to have been “a privilege” to run the festival.

Kosslick said this would have been beyond his wildest dreams when he started going...

Teutonic promotional organization German Films has announced that its annual initiative supporting German filmmaking internationally, Face to Face With German Films, will focus on actors and actresses as the campaign enters its fourth year.

Six of Germany’s leading thesps – Maria Dragus, Christian Friedel, Luise Heyer, Jonas Nay, Jördis Triebel and Fahri Yardim – will represent the German film and television industry’s recent accomplishments through activities at next month’s Berlin Film Festival, including a panel event in association with Variety and Drama Series Days, the European Film Market program focusing on serialized content.

The initiative launched in 2016 with six German actresses headlining the campaign – including “Toni Erdmann’s” Sandra Hüller, and Paula Beer of “Frantz” and the Golden Globe and Oscar-nominated “Never Look Away.” In 2017, the second phase of the initiative launched during Cannes and featured six of Germany’s most exciting actors, including established names such as Alexander Fehling and Tom Schilling,...

Pawel Pawlikowski’s “”Cold War” swept the European Film Academy Awards on Saturday, winning five of its bids: Best Picture, Director, Actress (Joanna Kulig), Screenplay and Film Editing. This Polish picture contended for the top prize against three other films that are also entered in this year’s Oscar race for Foreign-Language Film — Sweden’s “Border,” Poland’s “Cold War,” Italy’s “Dogman” and Belgium’s “Girl.” The fifth nominee was “Happy as Lazzaro,” which is also from Italy.

Winners of the 31st edition of these awards were decided by the 3,000 plus members of the academy, drawn from all parts of Europe. Scroll down to see all the winners (and nominees).

Last year Ruben Ostlund‘s satire “The Square” swept the EFAs with six wins including both Best Picture and Best Comedy. Ostlund claimed both the writing and directing awards for his savage satire set in the high stakes art...

“Cold War” was the big winner at the European Film Awards, picking up the prizes for Best European Film, Actress (Joanna Kulig), Director, and Screenwriter (both Paweł Pawlikowski). Best actor went to Marcello Fonte of “Dogman,” while Armando Iannucci’s “The Death of Stalin” was named Best European Comedy.

“Cold War” also led all films with five nominations, continuing a strong year for the black-and-white drama — Pawlikowski, whose “Ida” won the Foreign-Language Oscar, also took home Best Director laurels from Cannes.

Ali Abbasi’s “Border” and Alice Rohrwacher’s “Happy as Lazzaro” left the ceremony empty-handed despite picking up four nominations apiece.

The full list of winners:

Best European Film

“Border,” Ali Abbasi

“Cold War,” Pawel Pawlikowski

“Dogman,” Matteo Garrone

“Girl,” Lukas Dhont

“Happy as Lazzaro,” Alice Rorhwacher

European Comedy

“C’est La Vie,” Olivier Nakache, Eric Toledano

“Diamantino,” Gabriel Abrantes, Daniel Schmidt

“The Death of Stalin,” Armando Iannucci

European Director

Ali Abbasi,...

Pawel Pawlikowski’s “Cold War” has been named the best European film of 2018 at the European Film Awards, which were handed out on Saturday in Seville, Spain.

The decade-spanning drama, which was inspired by the stormy relationship between Pawlikowski’s parents, also won awards for its director, screenplay, lead actress (Joanna Kulig) and editor.

Marcello Fonte won the best-actor award for “Dogman,” which also took awards for its costume design and hair and makeup.

Also Read: 'Cold War' Film Review: Romance in Postwar Europe Is Ravishing and Haunted

Armando Iannucci’s “The Death of Stalin” was named the best European comedy, while “Bergman – A Year in a Life” won for documentary, and “Another Day of Life” won for animated film.

Four of the Best European Film Award nominees — “Border,” “Cold War,” “Dogman” and “Girl” — are the foreign-language Oscar entries from Sweden, Poland, Italy and Belgium, respectively. The fifth,...

“Cold War,” Pawel Pawlikowski’s black-and-white romance set in the 1950s, scooped the prizes for best film, director and screenplay at the 31st edition of the European Film Awards on Saturday.

“Cold War” star Joanna Kulig also won the award for best actress. Marcello Fonte, the star of Matteo Garrone’s “Dogman,” won for best actor.

Armando Iannucci’s political satire “The Death of Stalin” won for best European comedy. Adapted from the French graphic novel by Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin, “The Death of Stalin” is a comic look at how Joseph Stalin’s stroke in 1953 threw the U.S.S.R. into chaos and inspired a mad power grab among his top advisors.

“This is very brave of you. This movie was banned in Russia,” Iannucci said upon picking up his award onstage. The British writer-director added that he loved Europe and made a joke about Brexit.

Lukas Dhont’s “Girl,...

Famed for her turbulent lifestyle and intense on-and-off relationship with legendary French actor Alain Delon, Austrian actress Romy Schneider became a sensation at home when she was still in her teens by starring in a series of films about Empress Elisabeth of Austria in the hugely successful Austrian Sissi trilogy. She later moved to France where she made some of the most successful films of her career with some of the most acclaimed directors of the 60s and 70s including Luchino Visconti, René Clément and many more.

A year before her untimely death at the age of 43 and whilst at a detox clinic in the seaside town of Quiberon, Brittany, Schneider posed for exclusive photos and gave a deeply alarming and honest interview to a German journalist about her state of mind. In her new film 3 Days In Quiberon, director Emily Atef (The Stranger in Me) offers a beautifully...

Nominations for the European Film Academy Award were announced on Saturday (Nov. 10) at the Seville film festival in Spain. Four of the entries in this year’s Oscar race for Foreign-Language Film — Sweden’s “Border,” Poland’s “Cold War,” Italy’s “Dogman” and Belgium’s “Girl” — are up for Best Picture. The fifth nominee is “Happy as Lazzaro” from Germany (which submitted “Never Look Away” at the Oscars).

Pawel Pawlikowski’s “Cold War” leads with five nominations: Best Picture, Director, Actor (Tomasz Kot), Actress (Joanna Kulig) and Screenplay. “Dogman” and “Border” have four nominations apiece as does “Happy as Lazzaro.”

Winners of the 31st edition of these awards will be decided by the 3,000 plus members of the academy, drawn from all parts of Europe. The ceremony is scheduled for Dec. 15 in Seville.

Last year Ruben Ostlund‘s satire “The Square” swept the EFAs with six wins including both Best Picture and Best Comedy.

This year’s European Film Awards will be dominated by movies that won prizes at the Cannes Film Festival, with Pawel Pawlikowski’s “Cold War,” Matteo Garrone’s “Dogman,” Alice Rohrwacher’s “Happy as Lazzaro,” Lukas Dhont’s “Girl” and Ali Abbasi’s “Border” all in the running for best picture.

A 1950s-set love story shot in black and white, “Cold War” world premiered in competition at Cannes, along with the crime thriller “Dogman” and magic parable “Happy as Lazzaro.” “Cold War” won the award for best director, “Dogman” for best actor and “Happy as Lazzaro” for screenplay.

“Girl,” a drama about a transgender teen who dreams of becoming a ballet dancer, world premiered in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard and won four awards, including the Golden Camera for best first film. “Border” also opened in Un Certain Regard and won the top prize. It follows a customs officer with an extraordinary sense of smell,...

Just as the viability of classic film market models including Cannes and the Afm is coming into question, Rome’s Mia Market for feature films, TV series, and documentaries is gaining traction with a new concept.

Launched in 2015 as a re-invention of the Rome Film Festival’s Business Street mart in a concerted effort to put Italy back on the global content-markets map, Mia is a one-stop shop event for the cream of the crop in film, TV series and docs that instead of booths and stands provides meticulous assistance setting up curated business meetings in a congenial setting and a mix of quality fresh finished product as well as pitching sessions of upcoming selected movies, skeins and docs in various stages.

Mia, an acronym for Mercato Internazionale Audiovisivo or Intl. Audiovisual Market, is backed by Italy’s motion picture association Anica and TV producers’ org Apt. The mart was...

20 feature films, 17 documentaries and 20 TV dramas set for pitching forum.

A slate of 20 feature films, 17 documentaries and 20 TV dramas have been selected for the pitching session at the fourth edition of the Mia Market in Rome (October 17-21).

Feature Film

This year’s feature film projects, which come from 16 different countries, were selected by Jason Ishikawa (international sales at Cinetic Media), Anne Lai (cirector of creative producing and artist support for the feature film program at the Sundance Institute) and Sophie Mas (producer at Rt Features). Half the projects are directed by women.

Among these are productions that passed through the Sundance Screenwriting lab,...

Germany has selected Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s Venice-premiere title “Never Look Away” as its entry for best foreign language film at this year’s 91st Academy Awards. German Films, the local body for the promotion of German cinema worldwide, announced the choice Thursday.

It is the second time the director has had a film chosen as German’s Oscar submission following his Oscar-winning 2006 film “The Lives of Others.” “Never Look Away” has its world premiere in competition at the Venice Film Festival on Sept. 4 and will see its North American premiere in the special presentations section of the Toronto Intl. Film Festival on Sept. 8.

“My actors, producers and I asked ourselves in the making of ‘Never Look Away’: What movie would we like to see on the screen? The result is a love story, a family drama, a biography of Germany in the 20th century, and a stroll through modern art,...

‘Europe! Voices Of Women In Film’ will show the work of 10 directors across different genres.

Sydney Film Festival is working again with European Film Promotion (Efp) to present ‘Europe! Voices Of Women In Film’, a strand as part of this year’s event that will highlight ten European women filmmakers.

For the third year of the initiative, festival director Nashen Moodley made the final selection of 10 from 37 films submitted by 23 Efp member organisations. They include feature debuts as well as more established directors.

Emily Atef will bring her award-winning 3 Days In Quiberon to Sydney, while Dutch director Nanouk Leopold will present her latest feature Cobain,...

Mariette Rissenbeek, managing director of German Films, welcomed members of the international film industry to the German Films Cocktail at Cannes’ Villa Rothschild on Saturday.

German filmmaker Margarethe von Trotta, whose film “Searching for Ingmar Bergman” plays in Cannes Classics, was one of those presented on stage as well as Wanuri Kahiu, the director of German co-production “Rafiki,” which plays in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard.

Among the other German co-productions in the festival are competition titles Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s “The Wild Pear Tree,” Sergey Dvortsevoy’s “Ayka,” and Alice Rohrwacher’s “Lazzaro Felice,” as well as Un Certain Regard films Sergei Loznitsa’s “Donbass,” and Ulrich Köhler’s “In My Room.”

Among the guests at the cocktail were Tom Bernard of Sony Pictures Classics, Richard Lorber of Kino Lorber, Peter Herrmann, chairman of the board of German Films, Bernd Neumann, president of Ffa, Peter Dinges, chairman of Ffa, Dennis Lim...

Historical romance, literary adaptations, arthouse drama, star-studded comedies, children’s pics, animated fare and a high-profile documentary are among the many German films and co-productions on offer at this year’s Cannes Film Market.

Unspooling as part of the festival are Wim Wenders’ “Pope Francis: A Man of His Word,” repped by Focus Features and bowing in Special Screenings; “In My Room,” Ulrich Koehler’s story of a man who suddenly realizes everyone around him has disappeared, which world premieres in Un Certain Regard; and, in Intl. Critics’ Week sidebar, Anja Kofmel’s Swiss co-production “Chris the Swiss,” a partially animated documentary from Urban Distribution that investigates the mysterious death of a young Swiss journalist during the Yugoslav wars.

On the market side, one historical niche that is proving particularly successful is that of the turn-of-the-century artist.

Picture Tree Intl. is following its 2016 hit “Egon Schiele — Death and the Maiden,...

Beta Cinema is headed to Cannes with “The Gentle Indifference of the World,” which will premiere in the Un Certain Regard section in Cannes, and “Woman at War,” which will play in Critics’ Week.

Kazakh director Adilkhan Yerzhanov’s “The Gentle Indifference of the World” follows two young villagers, Saltanat (Dinara Baktybayeva), and her penniless admirer Kuandyk (Kuandyk Dussenbaev). The lovers are forced to leave the countryside for the big city in an attempt to save Saltanat’s mother from jail.

Yerzhanov’s previous films include “The Owners.” The Gentle Indifference of the World” is produced by Astana Film Fund, Short Brothers in co-production with Arizona Productions.

“Woman at War” (pictured) is by acclaimed Icelandic filmmaker Benedikt Erlingsson (“Of Horses and Men”), and follows fifty-year-old Halla as she declares a one-woman-war on the local aluminium industry to protect the pristine Icelandic landscape.

Birgitta Bjornsdottir who produced the film has been...

Emily Atef’s film about actress Romy Schneider receives 10 nods including best film, best direction.

Emily Atef’s Berlinale Competition film 3 Days in Quiberon has dominated the nominations for this year’s German Film Awards (also known as the Lola Awards).

It scored ten nods, including best feature film, best direction, best lead actress (for Marie Bäumer), best supporting actor, best cinematography and best film score.

The Rohfilm Factory production will compete in the best feature film category with another of this year’s Berlinale competition films, Thomas Stuber’s In The Aisles, the Berlinale Special title The Silent Revolution,...

For all of its well-documented troubles, the Berlin International Film Festival is still a veritable smorgasbord for adventurous distributors who might be willing to take a chance on some exciting arthouse cinema. Most of the approximately 400 movies that play at the massive annual showcase will never see the light of day in the United States, either in theaters or even on streaming platforms, but the ones that are scooped up for domestic release tend to make an outsized impact once they land on these shores. Two of the current nominees for Best Foreign Language Film premiered at last year’s Berlinale (“On Body and Soul” and “A Fantastic Woman”), while other standouts from the 2017 edition like “Félicité” and “The Other Side of Hope” eventually became highlights of the fall movie season.

As always, the 2018 festival was completely overwhelming, and offered a handful of buried treasure that American audiences deserve to see.