It is with a heavy heart that the DFFB says good­bye to its alum­nus and for­mer lec­tur­er David Sla­ma. The film­mak­er died on Octo­ber 15 at the age of 74.

After study­ing with Michael Ball­haus and Peter Stein at the DFFB in Berlin, David Sla­ma worked as a cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er on more than 80 fea­ture and tele­vi­sion films, col­lab­o­rat­ing with Luc Bondy, Rein­hard Hauff, Harun Faroc­ki, and Mar­tin Scors­ese, among oth­ers. He is right­ly con­sid­ered one of the most impor­tant cin­e­matog­ra­phers in Ger­man-lan­guage film.

Par­al­lel to his artis­tic work, David Sla­ma taught at the DFFB, the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ham­burg, the Uni­ver­si­ty of Applied Sci­ences Dort­mund, and the Uni­ver­si­ty of Applied Sci­ences Han­nover. In 2010, he was appoint­ed cin­e­matog­ra­phy pro­fes­sor at IFS Cologne. He was a mem­ber of the Ger­man Film Acad­e­my.

His enthu­si­asm for film­mak­ing and his great com­mit­ment to young film­mak­ers will be sore­ly missed.

In the com­ing aca­d­e­m­ic year, we will accept the new stu­dents who are cur­rent­ly under­go­ing the selec­tion process. This is part of the 2019 appli­ca­tion process, which had to be inter­rupt­ed due to the Coro­na Pan­dem­ic.

As a medi­um-term effect of the pan­dem­ic, there will be no appli­ca­tion pro­ce­dure at the DFFB in 2020.

Those who intend to study at the DFFB will find the appli­ca­tion mate­r­i­al for the fall 2022 pro­gramme on our web­site from Sep­tem­ber 2021.

To give you an idea of the DFFB in advance, we invite you to a dig­i­tal info day this autumn: date and pro­gramme will be announced short­ly.

Thank you very much for your under­stand­ing!

The Aca­d­e­m­ic Coun­cil — rep­re­sent­ed by stu­dents, lec­tur­ers and staff — of the DFFB would like to express its sol­i­dar­i­ty with the mem­bers of the Uni­ver­si­ty of The­ater and Film Arts in Budapest (SZFE).

The task of the cin­e­ma is a ver­sa­tile and pre­cise analy­sis of the world. This analy­sis is only pos­si­ble by seek­ing the truth, ask­ing ques­tions and rais­ing doubts. The basic con­di­tion for exper­i­men­ta­tion, which we call film­mak­ing, is a space where trust and free­dom pre­vail.

We can­not remain silent when such a for­ma­tive film land­scape as the Hun­gar­i­an one is robbed of its future. With­out the auton­o­my of edu­ca­tion, art can­not become autonomous either. We sup­port the inde­pen­dence of all artists* from any dom­i­nant gov­ern­ment and the right of every uni­ver­si­ty to insti­tu­tion­al auton­o­my.

Well, this is cause for cel­e­bra­tion!

On June 15 and 16, the meet­ing of the Jury for Fea­ture Film Fund­ing of the BKM took place. Fol­low­ing the rec­om­men­da­tions of the inde­pen­dent jury, Min­is­ter of State Moni­ka Grüt­ters is sup­port­ing numer­ous fea­ture film projects with a total of 4.74 mil­lion euros.

We con­grat­u­late no less than 12 mem­bers of the DFFB on the sup­port pro­vid­ed by the BKM — very well done!

Our alum­ni Chris Kraus (15 JAHRE), Ana-Feli­cia Scutenicu and Jonas Wey­de­mann (TRANSIT TIMES) are hap­py about a pro­duc­tion grant. The project AUS DEM LEBEN DER ECHSEN by our senior lec­tur­er for direct­ing, Christoph Hochhäusler, is also sup­port­ed by the BKM.

Among the recip­i­ents of the script spon­sor­ship are our alum­ni Sara Sum­ma (EIN SICHERER ORT), Emma Rosa Simon and Robert Bohrer (LA BEAUTÉ HUMAINE), Clau­dia Schae­fer and Sun-Ju Choi (STAATSSCHUTZ), Jonas Roth­laen­der (STURZWELLEN), Susanne Hein­rich (UNMÖGLICHE MUTTER) and Thomas Arslan (VERBRANNTE ERDE).

Con­grat­u­la­tions! This good news gives us hope, brings a new wind of change and above all we can expect a lot of great fea­ture films in the upcom­ing time!

The chal­lenges for the film indus­try in 2020 are unprece­dent­ed. While every­one is still adapt­ing to the dig­i­tal rev­o­lu­tion, we find our­selves in the mid­dle of the next dis­rup­tion by the Covid-19 cri­sis caus­ing a breath-tak­ing accel­er­a­tion of the on-going changes. NEXT WAVE address­es these changes by focus­ing on emerg­ing devel­op­ments in the film indus­try and beyond as well as cre­at­ing our own busi­ness mod­els. The 9‑month inten­sive pro­fes­sion­al train­ing pro­gramme run and designed by the DFFB and co-fund­ed by Cre­ative Europe MEDIA and Medi­en­board Berlin Bran­den­burg research­es cur­rent mar­kets, facil­i­tates inter­dis­ci­pli­nary dia­logue between pro­fes­sion­als and empow­ers its par­tic­i­pants to rethink the future of cinephil­ia and inter­na­tion­al film mar­kets.

The Dead­line for appli­ca­tions is June 30th 2020! 

 

For the next edi­tion we are cur­rent­ly look­ing for young pro­fes­sion­als from the fields of film mar­ket­ing, sales, dis­tri­b­u­tion, exhi­bi­tion and cura­tion. Our main require­ments are rel­e­vant work­ing expe­ri­ence of three to five years, a cre­ative, col­lab­o­ra­tive and entre­pre­neur­ial mind­set and a will­ing­ness to gain in-depth knowl­edge of the indus­try, to build a pro­fes­sion­al net­work and to devel­op own strate­gies for future film mar­kets. An excel­lent stan­dard of spo­ken and writ­ten Eng­lish is essen­tial as all class­es are taught in Eng­lish. NEXT WAVE will take on up to 15 Euro­pean par­tic­i­pants (in excep­tion­al cas­es up to three appli­cants from non-Euro­pean coun­tries will be accept­ed).

 

Detailed infor­ma­tion about the pro­gramme and the appli­ca­tion process can be found on our web­site. If you have any ques­tions, feel free to con­tact us via nextwave@​dffb.​de.

 

San­dra Braun will take over as inter­im direc­tor of the Ger­man Film and Tele­vi­sion Acad­e­my Berlin with imme­di­ate effect, suc­ceed­ing Ben Gib­son.

The DFF­B’s Board of Trustees con­firmed the appoint­ment of San­dra Braun as the new inter­im direc­tor of the DFFB at its meet­ing in April 2020. Braun will ful­fill this role in addi­tion to her role as the Acad­e­my’s admin­is­tra­tive direc­tor. An impor­tant goal in the com­ing year will be to ini­ti­ate a struc­tur­al reor­ga­ni­za­tion of the Acad­e­my in order to main­tain and advance the out­stand­ing qual­i­ty of its train­ing for the future.

San­dra Braun stud­ied law and holds a Mas­ter of Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion. After hold­ing posi­tions at BBC World­wide, Sen­a­tor Enter­tain­ment, and Rund­funk Berlin-Bran­den­burg, the 47-year-old joined the DFFB at the begin­ning of the year as Head of Admin­is­tra­tion. Speak­ing about her new role, San­dra Braun says: “The DFFB is one of Ger­many’s lead­ing film schools and enjoys an excel­lent rep­u­ta­tion in the edu­ca­tion and train­ing of young film­mak­ers. In the com­ing months, a spe­cial focus will be on respon­si­bly shap­ing the DFF­B’s teach­ing oper­a­tions dur­ing the Coro­na pan­dem­ic and prepar­ing the struc­tur­al and orga­ni­za­tion­al con­di­tions for the long-term announce­ment of a new man­age­ment team. I thank the Board of Trustees for their trust and look for­ward to shap­ing this process togeth­er with DFF­B’s com­pe­tent staff, excel­lent lec­tur­ers, and ded­i­cat­ed stu­dents.”

The mem­bers of the Board of Trustees, chaired by the head of the Sen­ate Chan­cellery Chris­t­ian Gae­bler, are look­ing for­ward to the col­lab­o­ra­tion: “San­dra Braun enjoys an excel­lent rep­u­ta­tion in the indus­try and with­in a very short time she has suc­ceed­ed in set­ting the course for dig­i­tal teach­ing dur­ing the cur­rent emer­gency as well as estab­lish­ing a cul­ture of con­struc­tive coop­er­a­tion at the DFFB. Her expe­ri­ence in film and tele­vi­sion, her exper­tise with change process­es and her inter­na­tion­al net­work are an asset to the DFFB. I am con­vinced that Ms. Braun will inno­v­a­tive­ly dri­ve the Acad­e­my’s  devel­op­ment, man­age the upcom­ing changes at the DFFB with a high lev­el of com­pe­tence, and pre­pare the replace­ment of the direc­torate from April 2021 with the utmost care,” con­cludes Chair­man of the Board of Trustees Chris­t­ian Gae­bler.

We look for­ward to work­ing with San­dra Braun as our Inter­im Direc­tor and are con­fi­dent that she will suc­cess­ful­ly nav­i­gate DFFB through the chal­lenges ahead, includ­ing those relat­ed to the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

Europe’s pre­mier post­grad­u­ate train­ing pro­gramme for TV writ­ers and pro­duc­ers, is cur­rent­ly accept­ing appli­ca­tions for the new admis­sions cycle. Ser­i­al Eyes pre­pares the next gen­er­a­tion of Euro­pean TV writ­ers to cre­ate high-end seri­al­ized sto­ry­telling and work in a writ­ers’ room set­ting. Teach­ing staff include top Euro­pean and Amer­i­can showrun­ners, writ­ers, exec­u­tive pro­duc­ers and com­mis­sion­ing edi­tors from major Euro­pean broad­cast­ers, includ­ing CANAL+, HBO Europe, RTL and SKY.

Ser­i­al Eyes is DFFB’s full-time, res­i­den­tial train­ing pro­gramme based in Berlin, run­ning from Sep­tem­ber 2020 through May 2021.

The Dead­line for appli­ca­tions is April 30th 2020! 

For full appli­ca­tion require­ments, appli­ca­tion mate­r­i­al and infor­ma­tion on the schol­ar­ship please vis­it https://​ser​i​al​-eyes​.com/​a​d​m​i​s​s​i​o​ns/.

We’re look­ing for­ward to a great, tal­ent­ed squad for this year’s pro­gramme!

Alum­na Angela Schan­elec pre­sent­ed her lat­est film I WAS AT HOME, BUT at the New York Film Fes­ti­val. The Lin­coln Cen­ter is also pre­sent­ing a com­plete ret­ro­spec­tive titled “Dreamed Paths: The Films of Angela Schan­elec” of the Berlin filmmaker’s work. You can attend the screen­ings at Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter until Feb­ru­ary 21.

Lis­ten to the con­ver­sa­tion about the film (and Shake­speare, Ozu, and Bres­son) here.

Pho­to­cre­d­it : Film at Lin­coln Cen­ter

This year, the DFFB will once again be present at the 70th Berlin Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val (Feb­ru­ary 20–March 1, 2020). The DFFB is con­tribut­ing to an excit­ing fes­ti­val with a doc­u­men­tary and a fea­ture film cre­at­ed by women grad­u­ates in two sec­tions as well as twelve projects fea­tur­ing alum­ni.

 

DFFB Films at the Berli­nale

The DFFB grad­u­a­tion film BLUE EYES AND COLORFUL MY DRESS by Poli­na Gumiela—a doc­u­men­tary fol­low­ing 3‑year-old Zhana on her for­ays through her neigh­bour­hood in Plovdiv/Bulgaria—will cel­e­brate its world pre­miere in the Gen­er­a­tion Kplus sec­tion. A FISH SWIMMING UPSIDE DOWN by Eliza Petkova—a grad­u­a­tion film about an unusu­al love tri­an­gle in which the par­tic­i­pants expect more from each oth­er than they can handle—screens in Per­spek­tive Deutsches Kino. These two films will also be pre­sent­ed dur­ing the EFM mar­ket on 26.02. at the DFFB cin­e­ma.

 

Events Dur­ing the Fes­ti­val

The DFFB will also be present dur­ing var­i­ous events through­out the Berli­nale: The Film­net­zw­erk Berlin is par­tic­i­pat­ing in the open­ing con­fer­ence of the Crit­ics‘ Week on 19.02 dur­ing the work­shop “Film gegen Rechts“ (Film against the Right). Ser­i­al Eyes, the post­grad­u­ate pro­gramme for the devel­op­ment of tele­vi­sion series, will be present at the Berli­nale Series Mar­ket in the Zoopalast at “Hot Con­tenders 2020: Dis­cov­er the Next Gen­er­a­tion.”

On 26 Feb­ru­ary, grad­u­ates will present a selec­tion of dar­ing projects, which will then be dis­cussed with top-lev­el indus­try play­ers. That evening, the DFFB invites you to its annu­al recep­tion on the 9th floor of the Filmhaus. NEXT WAVE, the DFF­B’s new pro­gramme on the future of Euro­pean film mar­kets, focus­es on the top­ic “Chal­lenges of New Dis­tri­b­u­tion” at EFM Hori­zon, where solu­tions for chal­lenges in the areas of film fes­ti­vals, VOD, and microdis­tri­b­u­tion will be devel­oped.

DFFB stu­dents will also par­take in the fes­ti­val: cur­rent­ly in its 10th edi­tion, “Couch­surf­ing the Berli­nale” has invit­ed 25 film stu­dents from around the world to Berlin, pro­vid­ing them with a sofa to sleep on and the oppor­tu­ni­ty to explore the fes­ti­val togeth­er with DFFB stu­dents.

Addi­tion­al­ly, four DFFB stu­dents and alum­ni belong to this year’s Col­lec­tive of Berli­nale Tal­ents: cin­e­matog­ra­ph­er Con­stanze Schmitt, direc­tor Bor­bála Nagy, direc­tor Lukas Feigelfeld, and pro­duc­er Clemens Köstlin.

 

DFFB Alum­ni

UNDINE by Chris­t­ian Pet­zold (com­pe­ti­tion)

NAKED ANIMALS by Melanie Waelde (Encoun­ters)

ONE OF THESE DAYS by Bas­t­ian Gün­ther (Panora­ma)

DAYS OF CANNIBALISM by Tebo­ho Edkins (Panora­ma)

WAGENKNECHT by San­dra Kaudel­ka, shot by Michael Kotschi (Per­spek­tive Deutsches Kino)

VEINS OF THE WORLD copro­duced by Eva Kemme (Gen­er­a­tion)

KIDS RUN copro­duced by Mar­tin Heisler (Gen­er­a­tion)

WALCHENSEE FOREVER copro­duced by Mar­tin Heisler (Gen­er­a­tion)

SOMETHING SELFE EXPLANATORY (15x) by Harun Faroc­ki and Hart­mut Bit­o­m­sky (Forum anniver­sary pro­gramm)

THE WOMEN´S FILM by Helke Sander (Forum anniver­sary pro­gramm)

DUNKELSTADT shot by Emre Erk­men (Berli­nale Series Mar­ket)

 

Down­load images and press kits of the DFFB films, screen­ing dates of all films, and the DFFB logo here.

Pho­to: DAYS OF CANNIBALISM by Tebo­ho Edkins