Press release from 15/05/2024

Six feature film and one documentary film project will receive a total of 2,806,000 euros in funding following the latest meeting of the FFA Commission for Production and Screenplay Funding. The commission has approved a further 285,000 euros for nine screenplays and six treatments. A total of 22 projects will therefore receive 3,091,000 euros in funding.

Two projects already supported by the FFA at the script stage are now going into production: "Miroirs No. 3", the new drama by Christian Petzold about a student who unexpectedly becomes the guest of a stranger's family, reunites Paula Beer, Matthias Brandt and Enno Trebs after "Roter Himmel" and also stars Barbara Auer in the leading roles. And "22 Bahnen" by director Mia Maariel Meyer and author Elena Hell adapts Caroline Wahl's bestseller about two sisters growing up with a complex family history.

Two more of the currently funded films offer a reunion with characters popular with generations of children: "Bibi Blocksberg" by Gregor Schnitzler tells a new adventure from the Neustadt witch universe as a live-action film adaptation, and "Pumuckl und das große Missverständnis" brings the goblin back to the big screen under the direction of Marcus H. Rosenmüller, after his newly staged TV series was also successful with cinema audiences last year.

Two comedies round off the funded feature film projects: In "Gekommen um zu blieben", Marc Rothemund deals with the irritating issue of housing shortages and has a property mogul resort to unusual means to get rid of his tenants. And in her autobiographically inspired romantic comedy "No Good Men", Afghan director Shahrbanoo Sadat tells the story of everyday life in Kabul before the Taliban came to power.

Production funding is also being provided for the artist portrait "Rebecca Horn - The Weight of the World" by Claudia Müller, whose last documentary "Elfriede Jelinek - Letting Language Off the Leash" won the German Film Award.

With FFA screenplay funding, Feo Aladag and Theresa Brauer ("One Night in Kabul"), Fatih Akin ("Birds Without Wings") and Angela Schanelec ("Thomas"), among others, are writing new screenplays; Timm Kröger is working together with Roderick Warich and Sandra Wollner on the now funded treatment for "The Last Radio", the conclusion of his 20th century film trilogy after "Zerrumpelt Herz" and "Die Theorie von Allem".

The promotion in detail:

Production funding

BIBI BLOCKSBERG
Production: Wiedemann & Berg Film GmbH
Director: Gregor Schnitzler
Screenplay: Bettina Börgerding
Promotion: 560,000 euros
For once, Bibi and her friends are allowed to take part in the big international witches' congress, which only takes place every 13 1/3 years. When they are disappointed to realise that their voices as young witches are not heard, they decide to demand their right to have a say. However, Bibi's witchcraft gets out of control and upsets not only the congress on the Blocksberg, but also the whole of Neustadt.

PUMUCKL AND THE GREAT MISUNDERSTANDING
Production: NEUESUPER GmbH
Director: Marcus H. Rosenmüller
Screenplay: Matthias Pacht, Korbinian Dufter
Funding: 560,000 euros            
A turtle, a trip to the countryside and then neighbour Burke's birthday - Pumuckl and Eder have a lot going on this summer! Perhaps too much - because with so many events going on, the two of them are barely able to maintain their friendship. And when a big misunderstanding arises, everything changes between Eder and Pumuckl ... 

COME TO STAY
Production: DREIFILM GmbH
Director: Marc Rothemund
Screenplay: Maggie Peren, Paul Feldmann
Promotion: 500,000 euros
The property mogul's son goes undercover in their shared flat to get the rebellious tenants of a house earmarked for luxury renovation out. Contrary to expectations, however, he doesn't find any reasons to kick them out, but the family he never had.

22 TRAINS
Production: BerghausWöbke Filmproduktion GmbH
Director: Mia Maariel Meyer
Screenplay: Elena Hell based on the novel by Caroline Wahl
Funding: 475,000 euros            
This literary adaptation tells the story of two sisters who confront the difficulties of growing up with an alcoholic mother with their unshakeable belief in the beauty of life. A story of solidarity, a new love, a departure and a new beginning in a summer in which everything suddenly starts to move. The project has already received FFA screenplay funding. 

MIROIRS NO. 3
Production: Schramm Film Koerner Weber Kaiser
Director: Christian Petzold
Screenplay: Christian Petzold
Promotion: 351,000 euros
Music student Laura is in crisis. After a car accident in the Berlin suburbs, she is taken in by a strange family. Laura feels at home here and blossoms - and so does the family. Until Laura realises that something is wrong with this family. The project has already received FFA screenplay funding. 

NO GOOD MEN
Production: Adomeit Film
Director: Shahrbanoo Sadat
Screenplay: Shahrbanoo Sadat, Mohammed Anwar Hashimi
Funding: 200,000 euros            
Naru, a television camerawoman, hates all men after she was repeatedly cheated on by hers. She now lives with her son in her parents' one-room flat in Kabul, but according to Afghan law, the son belongs to the father. At work, she falls in love with the married Qodrat - is he a spitting image of her ex-husband or is there really a good man in Afghanistan? And will Naru manage to keep her son? The project has already received German-French co-production funding. 

REBECCA HORN - THE WEIGHT OF THE WORLD
Production: CALA Filmproduktion GmbH
Director: Claudia Müller
Screenplay: Claudia Müller
Funding: 160,000 euros            
The documentary film explores the multi-layered and extensive oeuvre of the artist Rebecca Horn, who expanded the concept of art in the 20th century and created a foundation for subsequent generations of artists with her work consisting of performances, videos, films, site-specific installations, sculptures, poems and drawings.  

Screenplay funding 

BIRDS WITHOUT WINGS
Author: Fatih Akin based on the novel by Louis de Bernières
Production: bombero international GmbH & Co. KG
Funding: 25,000 euros
The adaptation of the novel "Dream of Stone and Feathers" tells the story of people who are expelled from their homeland, the story of the disintegration of a multicultural order. But it also tells the story of Rüstem Bey, who is educated from a chauvinist to a feminist in his search for personal happiness. 

THE INVENTION OF LIFE
Author: Ulrich Limmer based on the novel by Hanns-Josef Ortheil
Production: collina Filmproduktion GmbH
Funding: 25,000 euros
The literary film adaptation of Hanns-Josef Ortheil's autobiographical novel, in which he describes his childhood and youth and the arduous path of separation from his parents. The film is based on the writer's trip to Rome - the city that had a decisive influence on his career 30 years earlier. 

HATICES DREAM
Author: Süheyla Schwenk
Production: Bredok Film Production
Funding: 25,000 euros
Hatice is a friendly woman in her sixties. She routinely masters her stressful everyday life as a cleaner, wife, cook, mother and grandmother until the erotic dreams begin and irrevocably remind her of her sexual needs. 

MR OTTO, WHAT IS GERMAN TODAY?
Author: Carolin Otto
Funding: 25,000 euros
The documentary film follows Kaya Konstantin Otto, the author's 19-year-old nephew, on his research trip into the history of his families: his mother's German family and his father's Kurdish family. An individual search for a universally valid answer to the question of what is German today. 

MR WINTER THAWS (AT)
Author: Stefan Kuhlmann based on his novel of the same name
Production: Favourite film GmbH
Funding: 25,000 euros
On the very day of his retirement, Robert Winter loses his wife in a tragic accident. In order not to drown in his grief, the misanthrope decides to fulfil his wife's dream posthumously and win the title of "AVON Consultant of the Year" on her behalf. 

ONE NIGHT IN KABUL
Authors: Feo Aladag, Theresa Breuer
Production: Independent Artists GmbH
Funding: 25,000 euros
When the Taliban take power in Afghanistan, a young German journalist decides not to abandon her friends in Kabul. Her delicate rescue mission is not only a fight against time, but also against Western bureaucrats who, after twenty years of war in Afghanistan, want to leave without their allies. 

THEY ARE AMONG US
Author: Sven Taddicken
Funding: 25,000 euros
Socio-critical satire about the former residents of an old Berlin flat from the last 120 years who wake up together on the same morning in the present day. They are forced to come to terms if they want to survive and return to their era. The project has already received FFA treatment funding. 

THOMAS
Author: Angela Schanelec
Funding: 25,000 euros
Thomas and Carla are travelling together for the first time. Their love for each other has hit them unexpectedly and violently. In Lisbon, they experience ruptures, leaps and confusion that reflect a lifelong development in a fortnight' holiday. 

WARE WOMAN SAY MY NAME
Author: Nathalie Suthor
Production: nachtlicht film GmbH
Funding: 25,000 euros
Prostitution exists worldwide, with estimates of up to 400,000 women affected in Germany alone. Sandra and Liliam are representative of this: two women who are willing to provide insights into their life stories and their emotions in order to provide examples of what prostitution does to people. 

Treatment promotion 

1704 DAYS - KIDNAPPED BY THE IS IN THE SAHARA (AT)
Author: Johannes Preuss
Production: DOKblick
Funding: 10,000 euros
After almost five years of being held hostage by the "Islamic State in the Greater Sahara", aid worker Jörg Lange is released and finally sees his four children again, who fought for his liberation from Germany. The documentary film accompanies the family on a journey back to the Sahel. 

THE LAST RADIO
Authors: Roderick Warich, Timm Kröger, Sandra Wollner
Production: The Barricades GmbH
Funding: 10,000 euros
In 1997, a boy disappears under mysterious circumstances - only his sister believes he is still alive. Their search leads them to an ominous yacht, into the heart of a sect and to an island that is not on any map. 

THE MISSION
Authors: Antonia Rothe Liermann, Katrin Milhahn based on the novel by Hans Habe
Production: Kevin Lee Filmgesellschaft mbH
Promotion: 10,000 euros
1938: Heinrich von Benda, a respected Jewish surgeon from Vienna, is commissioned by the Nazis to present a cynical plan at the World Refugee Conference in Évian: The emigration of Jews from Germany and Austria in return for payment of a ransom by the host country.

LOST PLACES BERLIN
Author: Christoph Gampl based on the novel by Johannes Groschupf
Production: Syrreal Entertainment GmbH
Funding: 10,000 euros
Lenny has just driven the eleventh grade into the wall. He's supposed to spend the upcoming holidays poring over his school books. But all good intentions go out the window when you have to defend your crush against the bouncer at Berghain, take out a drug stash with your best friends and discover a corpse in an old meat factory. A film adaptation of a novel about a summer of the century in Berlin, in which Lenny, Moe, Kaya and Chris grow up. 

TIVOLI (AT)
Authors: Stefan Butzmühlen, Cristina Diz Muñoz
Funding: 10,000 euros
A comedy that develops from the drama with six employees of the bankrupt department stores' chain TIVOLI. A film about loneliness and playful real estate, but also about solidarity and resistance. Always playful and with a great love of comedy.  

MANY WAYS TO WHERE!
Author: Julia Becker
Funding: 10,000 euros
A mother sets off with her teenage daughter on a journey that was planned quite differently. But as we all know, there is more than one way to reach a destination, and so the journey gradually develops into an experience that will change their relationship.

Gender overview* - Production funding:
31 Applicationsof which
20 projects by/with the participation of a female author
18 projects by/with the participation of a female producer
17 projects by/with the participation of a female director

7 funded projectsof which
5 projects by/with the participation of a female author
4 projects by/with the participation of a female producer
3 projects by/with the participation of a female director

Gender overview* - Screenplay promotion:
64 Applicationsof which
32 by/with the participation of a female author

15 subsidised projects, thereof
9 by/with the participation of a female author

*Data on applications and authorisations contain contradictions

The next meeting of the Commission for Production and Screenplay Funding takes place on 9 and 10 July 2024 instead, Submissions are still until 27 May 2024 possible.