We are hap­py to announce three nom­i­na­tions for this year’s FIRST STEPS Awards.

Two DFFB pro­duc­tion stu­dents are nom­i­nat­ed for the NO FEAR Award: Tama­ra Erbe for the film BABY BITCHKA (direc­tor: Anna Maria Roznows­ka, screen­writer: Anna Maria Roznows­ka & Tama­ra Erbe, cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er: Malte Siepen, pro­duc­tion: Tama­ra Erbe) and Sara Fazi­lat for NICO (director/​screenwriter: Eline Gehring, cinematographer/​screenwriter: Fran­cy Fab­ritz, producer/​screenwriter: Sara Fazi­lat).

In addi­tion, Aart Stein­mann is also nom­i­nat­ed for his grad­u­at­ing screen­play NIEMCY– DIE FREMDEN.

Con­grat­u­la­tions to all three stu­dents!

The FIRST STEPS award is the most impor­tant award for grad­u­at­ing films of film schools in Ger­man-speak­ing coun­tries. With a total of €119,000 in prize mon­ey, it is the largest endow­ment of its kind for young film­mak­ers. There are nine prize cat­e­gories and prizes are award­ed annu­al­ly to direc­tors, pro­duc­ers, cin­e­matog­ra­phers, and screen­writ­ers of short, medi­um-length, and fea­ture-length films, doc­u­men­taries, and com­mer­cials, as well as to actors. Each nom­i­nee receives €1000.

We are keep­ing our fin­gers crossed and will be excit­ed­ly watch­ing the award cer­e­mo­ny on June 21, which will be streamed live on the ARD Mediathek from 7 pm.

© FIRST STEPS

For the first time, Alexan­der Nanau, DFFB alum­nus and suc­cess­ful doc­u­men­tary film­mak­er, has sub­mit­ted a doc­u­men­tary film on behalf of his home­land Roma­nia to com­pete for the Oscar for Best Inter­na­tion­al Film.

In his project COLLECTIVE (direc­tor: Alexan­der Nanau, screen­writer: Alexan­der Nanau and Antoane­ta Opris, cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er: Alexan­der Nanau, pro­duc­er: Han­ka Kastelico­va, Bernard Michaux, Alexan­der Nanau, Bian­ca Oana), which had its world pre­miere at the Venice Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val in 2019, he fol­lows a group of inves­tiga­tive jour­nal­ists from the Roman­ian news­pa­per “Gaze­ta Spor­turilor” as they uncov­er a web of cor­rup­tion in the health­care sec­tor across the board.

In 2020, the doc­u­men­tary, co-pro­duced with MDR, Luxembourg’s Sam­sa Film, and HBO Europe, was award­ed the Euro­pean Film Award for Best Doc­u­men­tary.  His last film project, LUMEA VAZUTA DE ION B (THE WORLD ACCORDING TO ION B), is the recip­i­ent of an Emmy.

On Feb­ru­ary 9, the pre­s­e­lec­tion of the Oscars—the short­list of 10 films—for the Best Inter­na­tion­al Film will be announced. We’re keep­ing our fin­gers crossed for you, dear Alexan­der!

And all those who are now curi­ous about the doc­u­men­tary can watch it through the ARD-Mediathek.

Pho­to Copy­right: Dog­woof Ltd.

Yes­ter­day evening, the Ger­man Film Crit­ics Asso­ci­a­tion announced the 2020 award win­ners. The award-win­ning films also include pro­duc­tions by two DFFB grad­u­ates:

Melanie Waelde was pre­sent­ed with the Best First Fea­ture Award for her film NAKED ANIMALS. The jury explained its deci­sion with warm words: “Mean­while, the film itself takes off and dares itself to be a cin­e­ma that refrains from explain­ing away its char­ac­ters. The film takes an undog­mat­i­cal approach to its dra­matur­gies and gen­der images (…). The cam­era throws itself into the fray with rel­ish, want­i­ng to play along with the vio­lent hus­tle and bus­tle of a world with­out parental super­vi­sion, in which it is impor­tant nev­er to let your guard down. This debut film shows no stand­still. Rather, it cel­e­brates move­ment, flaunt­ing it by let­ting the char­ac­ters col­lide.”

With GIRAFFE, anoth­er alum­na, Anna Sofie Hart­mann, was thrilled to receive the Best Fea­ture Film Award of the year. “On all lev­els, this film, which oscil­lates between essay, doc­u­men­tary and fic­tion, is skill­ful­ly direct­ed and is con­sis­tent­ly sur­pris­ing and fresh. (…) Down to the last, fad­ing moment, Anna Sofie Hart­mann suc­ceeds in con­dens­ing Euro­pean labour mar­ket real­i­ty and myth into a whole, which could not be more sober, top­i­cal, and enchant­i­ng,” said the jury.

The Ger­man Crit­ics’ Prize is award­ed annu­al­ly by crit­ics to Ger­man film pro­duc­tions that “are not judged accord­ing to eco­nom­ic, coun­try-spe­cif­ic, or polit­i­cal cri­te­ria, but exclu­sive­ly accord­ing to artis­tic ones,” explains the VdFk.

We con­grat­u­late both teams on their awards!

Demand. The Ger­man-Dan­ish film was pro­duced by Kom­plizen Film in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Pro­file Pic­tures and rbb.

Sev­er­al DFFB stu­dents and alum­ni worked on the project, which cel­e­brat­ed its world pre­miere at the Locarno Film Fes­ti­val in 2019 and has since expe­ri­enced a suc­cess­ful film fes­ti­val tour. The team com­pris­es Jen­ny Lou Ziegel as cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er, Jonas Dorn­bach on the pro­duc­er team, Ben von Dobe­neck in pro­duc­tion man­age­ment, Daria Wich­mann in pro­duc­tion man­age­ment, as well as Bor­bála Nagy, Faraz Fes­hara­ki, Lisa Rol­ing, and Oliv­er Göbel.

The film is about “A tun­nel is to be built to con­nect Den­mark and Ger­many; the present moves towards the future, change is in the air. (…) A Dan­ish sum­mer: long days turn into blue nights. Peo­ple meet, then part ways again.”

Worth a look!

Pho­to Cred­its: GRANDFILM Dis­tri­b­u­tion

The grad­u­a­tion film WHAT DO WE SEE WHEN WE LOOK AT THE SKY? by direct­ing grad­u­ate Alexan­dre Koberidze cel­e­brates its world pre­miere in com­pe­ti­tion at the 71st Berlin Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val.

Observ­ing every­day life in Kutaisi, Geor­gia, with humour and sen­si­tiv­i­ty, the 150-minute film paints a mag­i­cal love sto­ry that seems impos­si­ble, yet ends on a hope­ful note. “I want­ed to make a film about the love of cin­e­ma, in times when oth­ers have long since declared cin­e­ma dead,” says the direc­tor, who was born in Tbil­isi in 1984.

WHAT DO WE SEE WHEN WE LOOK AT THE SKY? was fund­ed by Medi­en­board Berlin-Bran­den­burg and Rund­funk Berlin-Bran­den­burg as part of the LEUCHTSTOFF pro­gram. With the young pro­duc­tion com­pa­ny New Mat­ter Films, found­ed by the stu­dents Mari­am Shat­berashvili and Luise Hauschild as well as cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er Faraz Fes­hara­ki, the direc­tor has gath­ered an ambi­tious, moti­vat­ed, and high­ly tal­ent­ed team around him, which suc­cess­ful­ly worked togeth­er on the real­iza­tion of this spe­cial grad­u­a­tion film.

We warm­ly con­grat­u­late the entire team for this huge hon­our and are already keep­ing our fin­gers crossed for the Gold­en Bear Awards on March 5!

It’s that time again: The 71st Berlin Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val is about to begin. Due to the pan­dem­ic, this year’s fes­ti­val will be divid­ed into two parts: a vir­tu­al indus­try event in March and an audi­ence fes­ti­val in June. We are delight­ed that fan­tas­tic pro­duc­tions fea­tur­ing the par­tic­i­pa­tion of numer­ous DFFB alum­ni will screen in the var­i­ous sec­tions.

Sec­tion: Encoun­ters

12 films, includ­ing 7 debut films, were invit­ed to the Encoun­ters com­pe­ti­tion, which is held for the sec­ond time this year.

One of these films is BLOODSUCKERS by direc­tor Julian Radl­maier, which will have its world pre­miere at the fes­ti­val. Togeth­er with fel­low alum­ni Kir­ill Krasovs­ki (pro­duc­er) and Markus Koob (cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er), Radlmaier’s film won­der­ful­ly recounts the sto­ry of a pen­ni­less Sovi­et refugee who falls in love with a young, wealthy Ger­man vam­pire who spends the sum­mer by the sea with her awk­ward assis­tant. Alexan­dre Koberidze, direc­tor and recent DFFB grad­u­ate, stars in BLOODSUCKERS.

THE GIRL AND THE SPIDER by Ramon and Sil­van Zürcher, who both stud­ied with at the DFFB, is a film from Switzer­land that is in the run­ning for the Best Film Award, the Best Direc­tor Award, and the Spe­cial Jury Prize. Alexan­der Haßk­erl (cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er) cap­tured this tragi­com­ic poet­ic bal­lad about change and tran­sience.

Sec­tion: Panora­ma

In this sec­tion DFFB alum­nus Mar­tin Heisler pro­duced Hen­ri­ka Kull’s fea­ture film BLISS, which vivid­ly tells the love sto­ry of two sex work­ers. This film will debut the Berli­nale.

Sec­tion: Per­spec­tive Ger­man Cin­e­ma

The doc­u­men­tary WHEN A FARM GOES AFLAME by alum­nus Jide Tom Akin­leminu will cel­e­brate its world pre­miere in the Per­spek­tive Deutsches Kino. The film tells the per­son­al sto­ry of a father‘s dou­ble life and sen­si­tive­ly accom­pa­nies the char­ac­ters on their jour­ney of emo­tion­al heal­ing.

JESUS EGON CHRIST by David and Saša Vaj­da will have its world pre­miere at the Per­spek­tive Deutsches Kino. DFFB stu­dent Anto­nia Lange is the cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er of this inti­mate dra­ma about the lone­li­ness of psy­chosis and a group of junkies in with­draw­al.

We con­grat­u­late our stu­dents and alum­ni and very much hope to see all the films on the big screen very soon!

Pho­to Cred­it: WHEN A FARM GOES AFLAME © Jide Tom Akin­leminu 

TALES FROM THE BLUE BUS — GESCHICHTEN AUS ACCRA tells of the trag­ic jour­ney of sev­en strangers trav­el­ling in an old blue bus that has been cursed by a venge­ful god­dess. The African-Euro­pean web series was joint­ly devel­oped and pro­duced by stu­dents of the DFFB, the Nation­al Film and Tele­vi­sion Insti­tute (Ghana), and the Maisha Film Lab (Ugan­da).

This film explores the process­es of change in soci­ety and the asso­ci­at­ed per­son­al chal­lenges that young peo­ple in West Africa face. The themes of iso­la­tion and respon­si­bil­i­ty bind all the episodes togeth­er. But the film lan­guage is fresh and vis­cer­al and cre­ates an extra­or­di­nary view­ing expe­ri­ence far away from the con­ven­tions of estab­lished reportage and glossy pro­duc­tions.

Entwick­elt wurde die Serie von 15 stu­den­tis­chen Filmemacher*innen aus Deutsch­land, Ghana und Ostafri­ka. In mehreren Devel­op­ment-Work­shops in Ghana und Ugan­da hat das Team – beste­hend aus jun­gen Filmemacher*innen aus Accra, Kam­pala und Berlin – zusam­men die Geschicht­en weit­er­en­twick­elt. Für die Umset­zung war ein Showrun­ner aus Ugan­da zuständig; die Regie ver­ant­worteten Studierende aus Ghana und Berlin. Das Filmteam vor Ort umfasste ca. 50 Studierende des NAFTI. Unter­stützt und gefördert wurde die Gruppe vom Bun­desmin­is­teri­um für wirtschaftliche Zusam­me­nar­beit und Entwick­lung und der Deutschen Welle Akademie.

The series was devel­oped by 15 stu­dent film­mak­ers from Ger­many, Ghana, and East Africa. In sev­er­al devel­op­ment work­shops in Ghana and Ugan­da, the team—comprising young film­mak­ers from Accra, Kam­pala, and Berlin—developed the sto­ries togeth­er. The showrun­ner is from Ugan­da; the direc­tors are stu­dents from Ghana and Berlin. The film team on loca­tion con­sist­ed of about 50 NAFTI stu­dents. The group was sup­port­ed and fund­ed by the Ger­man Fed­er­al Min­istry for Eco­nom­ic Coop­er­a­tion and Devel­op­ment and the Deutsche Welle Acad­e­my.

Click here to view the series. Enjoy!

The 42nd edi­tion of the Max Ophüls Preis Film Fes­ti­val in Saar­brück­en end­ed yes­ter­day. The award cer­e­mo­ny on Sat­ur­day evening was a joy­ous one for both DFFB stu­dents and alum­ni:

DFFB stu­dent Sara Fazi­lat was award­ed the Max Ophüls Prize for Best Young Actress for her role in NICO (director/​screenwriter: Eline Gehring, cinematographer/​screenwriter: Fran­cy Fab­ritz, producer/​screenwriter: Sara Fazi­lat).

“Sara Fazi­lat is con­vinc­ing as Nico through her every breath, move­ment, thought, emo­tion. We always ful­ly believe in her char­ac­ter. When she expe­ri­ences an assault, she takes the audi­ence with her through her painful jour­ney. In her des­per­a­tion to armour her soul as a way to heal, her char­ac­ter touched us deeply. Sara Fazi­lat shares her character’s laugh­ter, hap­pi­ness, vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty, anger, and self-con­fi­dence  with ter­rif­ic ease,” said the jury state­ment. Con­grat­u­la­tions, dear Sara!

BORGA (direc­tor: York-Fabi­an Raabe, screen­writ­ers: York-Fabi­an Raabe and Toks Körn­er, cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er: Tobias von dem Borne, pro­duc­er: Alexan­der Wadouh and Rox­ana Richters), in which many DFFB alum­ni par­tic­i­pat­ed, is the win­ner of the fes­ti­val with four awards! Not only did the project win Best Fea­ture Film Award, Ecu­meni­cal Jury Award, and the Audi­ence Fea­ture Film Award, asso­ciate pro­duc­er and actor Eugene Boateng was also award­ed the Max Ophüls Prize for the Most Social­ly Rel­e­vant Film for his per­for­mance.

What a fan­tas­tic fes­ti­val edi­tion! We warm­ly con­grat­u­late the win­ners and send them our best wish­es. Bra­vo!

The new year has just start­ed and the 42nd Max Ophüls Preis Film Fes­ti­val is already about to begin! In this year’s edi­tion, the films of young film­mak­ers will be screened online from Jan­u­ary 17 to Jan­u­ary 24 in the fea­ture film, doc­u­men­tary, medi­um-length film, and short film com­pe­ti­tions, as well as oth­er pro­gram series, such as the MOP Short­list.

The MOP in Saar­brück­en is the most impor­tant fes­ti­val for young Ger­man-lan­guage film and has stood for the dis­cov­ery of young tal­ent from Aus­tria, Ger­many, and Switzer­land for over 40 years.

Among these tal­ents in this year’s pro­gram are the DFFB films I WANT TO RETURN RETURN RETURN (director/​screenwriter: Elsa Rosen­gren, cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er: Giu­lia Schel­has, pro­duc­er: Mar­gari­ta Amine­va) , NICO (director/​screenwriter: Eline Gehring, cinematographer/​screenwriter: Fran­cy Fab­ritz, producer/​screenwriter: Sara Fazi­lat), which will run in com­pe­ti­tion, and LEIB (director/​screenwriter: Mar­i­jana Ver­hoef, cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er: Ley­la Hoppe, pro­duc­er: Ele­na Zur­buch & Elis­a­beth Köller), which will be fea­tured in the MOP short­list.

With BORGA (direc­tor: York-Fabi­an Raabe, screen­writ­ers: York-Fabi­an Raabe and Toks Körn­er, cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er: Tobias von dem Borne, pro­duc­er: Alexan­der Wadouh and Rox­ana Richters), and DAS MASSAKER VON ANRÖCHTE (cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er: Jesse Mazuch) oth­er stu­dents and alum­ni of the DFFB are also rep­re­sent­ed in Saar­brück­en. We are also keep­ing our fin­gers crossed for DFFB stu­dent Sara Fazi­lat, who is nom­i­nat­ed for the Max Ophüls Best Young Actress Award.

We wish every­one good luck and a great fes­ti­val sea­son!

Pho­to Cred­it: Max Ophüls Preis Film Fes­ti­val