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In Günter Rohrbachs Geburtsstadt Neunkirchen ist heute Abend zum 14. Mal der Günter Rohrbach Filmpreis vergeben worden.

„Rickerl – Musik is höchstens a Hobby“ wurde beim Günter Rohrbach Filmpreis ebenso ausgezeichnet wie Hauptdarsteller Voodoo Jürgens (Credit: Giganten Film / Pandora Film)

Regisseur Adrian Goiginger und Produzent Gerrit Klein sind bei der 14. Verleihung des Günter Rohrbach Filmpreises in Rohrbachs Geburtsstadt Neunkirchen für ihre Tragikomödie „Rickerl – Musik is höchstens a Hobby“ mit dem mit 10.000 Euro dotierten Preis für den besten Film ausgezeichnet worden.

„Regisseur Adrian Goiginger hat ein Händchen für autobiografische Themen. Er kennt das Milieu mit Arbeitslosigkeit, Kleinkriminalität und Drogensucht – die Schicksale dieser Leute liegen ihm am Herzen. Sein Film zeigt das Wien der ‚Beisln‘, die inzwischen – im Zuge des Strukturwandels großstädtischer Viertel – größtenteils modernen Bistros und Cafés weichen muss- ten. Und vor allem ist es ein Film mit ganz viel Herz, mit Melancholie, großartiger Musik und über- zeugender Besetzung, der Rickerls...

Morgen startet endlich Andreas Dresens Berlinale-Hit „In Liebe, Eure Hilde“ im Verleih von Pandora in den deutschen Kinos. Höchste Zeit für ein Gespräch mit dem Regisseur, was ihm der Film bedeutet und wie er die Monate seit der Premiere in Berlin erlebt hat.

Regisseur Andreas Dresen (r.) mit Autorin Laila Stieler und seinen Darsteller:innen Johannes Hegemann und Liv Lisa Fries bei der Premiere von „In Liebe, Eure Hilde“ auf der Berlinale (Credit: Richard Huebner/ Berlinale 2024)

Was löst „In Liebe, eure Hilde“ in Ihnen aus, wenn Sie ihn jetzt, mehr als ein halbes Jahr nach der Premiere auf der Berlinale, sehen?

Andreas Dresen: Tatsächlich habe ich den Film seit der Berlinale nicht mehr am Stück gesehen. Weil es mir wirklich schwerfällt. Ich habe ihn logischerweise am Schneidetisch und in der Tonmischung sehr oft erlebt und verinnerlicht. Es ist eine harte Erfahrung, Hilde immer wieder auf ihrem Weg zu begleiten. Mit Publikum...

Zutiefst bewegendes Drama über die Widerstandskämpferin Hilde Coppi, die im Dritten Reich hochschwanger im Todestrakt einsitzt.

Fast Facts:

• Authentische Geschichte wider das Unrechtssystem des Nationalsozialismus

• Zwölfte Zusammenarbeit zwischen Drehbuchautorin Laila Stieler und Regisseur Andreas Dresen

• Aktuell ihr dritter gemeinsamer Kinofilm in Folge nach „Gundermann“ und „Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George Bush“

• Umjubelte Weltpremiere im Wettbewerb der 77. Berlinale

• Eröffnungsfilm des 18. Fünf Seen Filmfest

Credits:

Land / Jahr: Deutschland 2024; Laufzeit: 115 Minuten; Regie: Andreas Dresen; Drehbuch: Laila Stieler; Besetzung: Liv Lisa Fries, Johannes Hegemann, Alexander Scheer, Lisa Wagner, Florian Lukas, Fritzi Haberlandt, Emma Bading, Sina Martens, Lena Urzendowsky; Verleih: Pandora Filmverleih; Start: 17. Oktober 2024

Review:

Alltag. Alles Alltag. Selbst die Verhaftung am 12. September 1942. Alltag. Gerade isst Hilde Coppi im Kleingarten noch Erdbeeren, so rot, so saftig. Dann wird sie unvermittelt abgeholt von der Gestapo, verhört, kommt ins Frauengefängnis. Sie ist im siebten Monat schwanger. Etwas mehr als zwei Monate später bringt sie ihren Sohn zur Welt.

Am 19. Dezember bringt X Verleih im Vertrieb von Warner Bros. „Freud – Jenseits des Glaubens“ in die deutschen Kinos. Die Besucher der Filmkunstmesse können den Film bereits nächste Woche sehen. Für alle gibt es jetzt schon den Trailer.

„Freud – Jenseits des Glaubens“ kommt am 19. Dezember in die deutschen Kinos. Verleih X Verleih (Vertrieb: Warner Bros.) hat heute den deutschen Trailer in die Öffentlichkeit geschickt. Der Film, der auf dem Theaterstück „Freud’s Last Session“ basiert und von Matthew Brown inszeniert wurde, lässt mit Sigmund Freud und C.S. Lewis zwei der größten Denker des 20. Jahrhunderts aufeinandertreffen zu einem kontroversen Diskurs über Liebe, den Glauben, die Zukunft der Menschheit und die für sie alles entscheidende Frage: Gibt es einen Gott? In der Rolle von Sigmund Freud ist Oscargewinner Anthony Hopkins zu sehen, sein Kontrahent C.S. Lewis wird von Matthew Goode gespielt. Liv Lisa Fries schlüpft in die Rolle von Freuds Tochter Anna.

Beim Festival des deutschen Films in Ludwigshafen fand gestern Abend die Preisverleihung statt.

Jury und Preisträger des 20. Festival des deutschen Films Ludwigshafen am Rhein (Credit: Fflu / Elisa Berdica)

Elf Produktionen waren im Wettbewerb des 20. Festival des deutschen Films in Ludwigshafen angetreten.

Bei der Preisverleihung gestern Abend wurde Angelina Maccarone für„Klandestin“ mit dem Filmkunstpreis für den besten Film ausgezeichnet. Die Regisseurin, die nach die Preisverleihung nach Angaben des Festivals wegen einer technischen Störung bei der Deutschen Bahn verpasste, über das Festival: „Es ist wirklich das schönste Festival – die Atmosphäre, die Gestaltung des Ortes und besonders die Menschen! Ich bin sehr dankbar um diese Erfahrung – insbesondere Daniela und Michael Kötz, die wirklich bei jeder Vorstellung dabei sind und immer die passenden Worte finden – tausend Dank!“

Mit dem Filmkunstpreis für die beste Regie wurde Thomas Arslan für „Verbrannte Erde“ ausgezeichnet. Er bedankte sich bei der Jury und die „Einladung und Betreung“ und...

Mit Andreas Dresens „In Liebe, Eure Hilde“ ist die 18. Ausgabe des Fünf Seen Filmfestival gestern feierlich eröffnet worden.

Festivalleiter Matthias Helwig (links im Bild) mit Lisa Wagner und Andreas Dresen, Darstellerin und Regisseur des Eröffnungsfilms „In Liebe, Eure Hilde“, bei der Eröffnung des Fünf Seen Filmfestival (Credit: Jörg Reuther)

Rund 500 Gäste waren gestern Abend in die Starnberger Schlossberghalle zur feierlichen Eröffnung des 18. Fünf Seen Filmfestival gekommen.

Regisseur Andreas Dresen und Darstellerin Lisa Wagner präsentierten zur Festivaleröffnung Dresens Berlinale-Wettbewerbsbeitrag „In Liebe, Eure Hilde“. In dessen Hauptrolle spielt Liv Lisa Fries die Widerstandkämpferin Hilde Coppi, die von der Gestapo verhaftet wurde und im Gefängnis einen Sohn zur Welt brachte. Sie entwickelte eine Kraft, die ihr niemand zugetraut hätte.

In einem Publikumsgespräch im Anschlus an das Screening betonte Dresen: „Es war uns wichtig, die Widerstandskämpfer als Menschen aus Fleisch und Blut zu zeigen, als Menschen, die sich geliebt haben, die eine Familie und Kinder haben wollten,...

Beim Festival des deutschen Films in Ludwigsburg wurde gestern Abend noch ein Preis gegeben: Auch Christoph Maria Herbst wurde mit dem Preis für Schauspielkunst ausgezeichnet.

Christoph Maria Herbst bei der Preisvergabe mit Michael Kötz und Daniela Kötz (Credit: Arthur Bauer / Fflu)

Auf dem 20. Festival des deutschen Films Ludwigshafen am Rhein wurde Schauspieler Christoph Maria Herbst gestern mit dem Preis für Schauspielkunst geehrt. Vor ihm kamen bereits Liv Lisa Fries und Joachim Król zu diesen Ehren. In seiner Dankesrede sagte Herbst: „In dieser wunderbaren Laudatio habe ich einiges über mich erfahren, was ich noch nicht wusste. Aber es stimmte alles. Es ist für mich eine große Freude und Ehre! Meine Damen, meine Herren, ist der Preis auch dotiert? – Nein! – Ich nehme ihn trotzdem an. Und dieser Preis und auch die Blumen werden einen Ehrenplatz in unserer Wohnung finden.“...

Von 12. bis 15. September findet im brandenburgischen Bad Saarow zum zwölften Mal das Festival Film ohne Grenzen statt. Als Ehrengast wird am Abschlusstat des Festivals die Holocaust-Überlebende Margot Friedländer begrüßt.

Die Holocaust-Überlebende Margot Friedländer ist Ehrengast beim Festival Film ohne Grenzen (Credit: Imago / Eberhard Thonfeld)

Margot Friedländer ist in diesem Jahr Ehrengast des Festivals Film ohne Grenzen, das von 12. bis 15. September zum zwölften Mal im brandenburgischen Bad Saarow stattfindet.

Die 102-jährige Holocaust-Überlebende wird am Abschlusstag des Festivals in Bad Saarow zu Gast sein. Nach ihrer Begrüßung durch die Festivalleitung wird in der Kulturscheune Gut Eibenhof Julia von Heinz‘ „Treasure – Familie ist ein fremdes Land“ zu sehen sein; im Anschluss daran findet ein Filmgespräch mit der Regisseurin statt.

Schirmherr des Festivals, in dessen Rahmen rund 20 Filme gezeigt werden, ist Ronald Zehrfeld, der ebenso in Bad Saarow zu Gast sein wird wie u.a. Andreas Dresen, Liv Lisa Fries, Regisseur und Darstellerinnen...

Liv Lisa Fries ist beim Festival des deutschen Films in Ludwigshafen mit dem Preis für Schauspielkunst ausgezeichnet worden.

Liv Lisa Fries (Bildmitte) bei der Verleihung des Preis für Schauspielkunst mit den Geschäftsführern des Festival des deutschen Films, Daniela und Michael Kötz (Credit: Arthur Bauer / Fddf)

Vor 2.300 Gästen ist Liv Lisa Fries beim Festival des deutschen Films in Ludwigshafen mit dem Preis für Schauspielkunst ausgezeichnet worden.

Festivaldirektor Michael Kötz sagte in seiner Laudatio: „Als sie 2014 das erste Mal hier bei uns war, damals schon eine junge Schauspielerin, die von sich Reden gemacht hatte, weshalb wir sie in die Jury dieses Festivals gebeten hatten – da hätte sie damals diesen Saal noch nicht so schön gefüllt. Heute ist das anders, sie ist zwar immer noch jung, aber sie ist ein Star geworden. Unsichtbar zu sein finde sie wahnsinnig angenehm. Das verstehen wir, oder? Wenn man so oft sichtbar ist wie sie, und wenn...

Andreas Dresens Berlinale-Beitrag eröffnet am 12. September die zwölfte Ausgabe des Festival Film ohne Grenzen im brandenburgischen Bad Saarow.

„In Liebe, eure Hilde“ eröffnet das Festival Film ohne Grenzen (Credit: Pandora Filmverleih/ Frédéric Batier)

Von 12. bis 15. September findet im brandenburgischen Bad Saarow zum zwölften Mal das Festival Film ohne Grenzen statt. Heute haben die Veranstalter das Programm bekannt gegeben.

Demnach wird das Festival am 12. September mit Andreas Dresens Berlinale-Wettbewerbsbeitrag „In Liebe, Eure Hilde“, den Dresen und die Schauspielerinnen Liv Lisa Fries und Sina Martens persönlich vorstellen werden, offiziell eröffnet.

Bereits am Nachmittag des 12. September wird Hanna Schygullas Dokumentarfilm „Denkste Puppe“ zu sehen sein. Darüber hinaus zeigt das Festival Film ohne Grenzen u.a. Wim Wenders‘ Oscarkandidaten „Perfect Day“, die Dokumentarfime „Union – Die Besten aller Tage“ von Anne-Katrin Hendel und „Filmstunde 23“ von Jörg Adolph und Edgar Reitz, Fabian Stumms auf dem Filmfest München mit dem Förderpreis Neues Deutsches Kino ausgezeichneten „Sad Jokes...

Das Festival des deutschen Films hat seine drei Schauspielpreise bekannt gegeben. Am Rhein geehrt werden dieses Jahr Liv Lisa Fries, Christoph Maria Herbst und Joachim Król.

V.l.: Joachim Król, Liv Lisa Fries, Christoph Maria Herbst

Im 20. Jubiläumsjahr vergibt das Festival des deutschen Films Ludwigshafen am Rhein drei Preise für Schauspielkunst. Die PreisträgerInnen 2024 sind: Liv Lisa Fries, Christoph Maria Herbst und Joachim Król. Das Festival findet vom 21. August bis 8. September statt.

Der Preis für Schauspielkunst geht traditionell an herausragende Persönlichkeiten der Schauspielkunst. Er betont die Bedeutung derer, die dem deutschen Film ein Gesicht geben und die dabei nicht nur für Glamour sorgen, sondern vor allem als wichtige Künstlerinnen und Künstler anzusehen sind.

„Sie ist der Star in ‘Babylon Berlin‘, der Serie in ihrer fünften Staffel. Als Charlotte Ritter in der Berliner Unterwelt der 1920er Jahre hat sie mit dieser Rolle Weltruhm erlangt – und einen Grimme-Preis, den Deutschen Fernsehpreis und den Deutschen Schauspielpreis.

Here we are Insiders, the sun is shining and Max Goldbart is present to guide you through the week’s headlines. Read on, and sign up here.

German Deep Dive

From ‘CSI: Berlin’ to nothing at all: The Munich Film Festival kicks off this morning, almost a year to the day that it emerged Sky Deutschland would be exiting the scripted original game in Germany, a decision that rocked the local production community. The tide has barely turned since, with Paramount+ and Starzplay (aka Lionsgate+) following suit and exiting drama and comedy production. “Paramount+ went from wanting CSI: Berlin to flatlined communications,” a well-known drama producer mused to Jesse and Stewart, who have spent plenty of time in Germany this past month. They’ve pieced together a comprehensive investigation spotlighting how the market has reacted to myriad setbacks, with potentially hundreds of projects back on the market and stuck at...

Am Dienstag wurde die fünfte und letzte Staffel von „Babylon Berlin“ bestätigt. Die Film- und Medienstiftung Nrw hat jetzt eine Förderung in Höhe von zwei Mio. Euro beschlossen.

Die Film- und Medienstiftung Nrw fördert die fünfte und letzte Staffel von „Babylon Berlin“ mit zwei Mio. Euro. Das teilt die Film- und Medienstiftung Nrw heute mit. Demnach seien 30 Drehtage in und um Köln geplant.

Die Film- und Medienstiftung Nrw fördert die fünfte und letzte Staffel von „Babylon Berlin“ (Credit: Ard/Frédéric Batier/X Filme Creative Pool/Ard Degeto/Sky/Beta Film)

Walid Nakschbandi, Geschäftsführer der Film- und Medienstiftung: „’Babylon Berlin‘ kommt nach Köln und darüber freuen wir uns sehr. Die Filmstiftung unterstützte 2015 als erste Förderung die Produktion der ersten Staffel und wird diese großartige historische Buchverfilmung bis zum Serienfinale konsequent weiter unterstützen. Ein starkes Stück Fernsehgeschichte, ein herausragendes Team und eine Serie zum richtigen Zeitpunkt.“

Erst am Dienstag war die fünfte...

For U.S. fans of Babylon Berlin the wait is finally over. The epic, ground-breaking German series, a noirish crime drama set during the Weimar Republic, was unceremoniously dropped by Netflix, which had been streaming the show stateside, after three seasons. Season 4 premiered in Europe in late 2022 but American viewers had to wait until specialist streamer MHz Choice finally picked up the show earlier this year. Season 4 launched on Tuesday, June 25.

For the uninitiated, Babylon Berlin is the story of Gereon Rath (Volker Bruch), a police detective traumatized by his experience in the trenches of World War I, who joins the Berlin force. The German capital is at the cutting edge of social and artistic experimentation — with a giddy, hedonistic nightlife — but is also a political tinderbox as sky-high inflation and rampant poverty meet a rising movement of far-right nationalists. At Rath’s side is Charlotte Ritter (Liv Lisa Fries...

Liv Lisa Fries as Charlotte Ritter, in the German historical fiction TV series “Babylon Berlin.” Courtesy of MHzChoice

“Babylon Berlin,” the most expensive series in the history of German television, continues in Season 4 to take us through 1930s Germany, including all its glory juxtaposed with the foreboding of horrors to come. Production quality of the first three seasons is not only maintained but expanded in a number of impressive scenes. Below is the link to last month’s review of the earlier years, bringing you up to speed: https://www.wearemoviegeeks.com/2024/05/babylon-berlin-seasons-2-3-tv-series-review.

Much of the cast returns, with the primary focus remaining on Rath and Charlotte, imposing more dramatic ups and downs on them than before. The action starts on 1930’s New Years Eve and runs through much of 1931. The Nazi honchos are dripping with even more evil – some via political manipulations; others, including many of the cops,...

Die Ard und ihre Partner haben heute eine fünfte und letzte Staffel der auf den Kriminalromanen von Volker Kutscher basierenden Serie „Babylon Berlin“ angekündigt, die ab Oktober gedreht werden sollen.

Volker Bruch und Liv Lisa Fries spielen auch in der fünften Staffel von „Babylon Berlin“ die Hauptrollen (Credit: Frédéric Batier/X Filme Creative Pool/Sky/Ard Degeto/Composing: Saskia Marka)

Wenn die entsprechenden Ard-Gremien ihre Zustimmung geben, sollen ab Oktober die acht Folgen der fünften und letzten Staffel von „Babylon Berlin“ gedreht werden. Das gaben X Filme Creative Pool, Ard Degeto Film, Swr, Wdr, Radio Bremen und Beta Film heute offiziell bekannt. Sky, bei den ersten vier Staffeln der auf den Kriminalromanen von Volker Kutscher beruhenden Serie mit Volker Bruch in der Rolle des Kommissars Gereon Rath und Liv Lisa Fries als ebenfalls bei der Polizei tätigen Charlotte Ritter noch an Bord, hatte im Juni vergangenen Jahres den Rückzug aus der fiktionalen Produktion verkündet.

It’s official: After more than a year of negotiations and financial wrangling, the producers of Babylon Berlin have received the green light for a fifth and final season of the ground-breaking award-winning German period drama.

Volker Bruch and Liv Lisa Fries will return to reprise their lead roles as police detective Gereon Rath and assistant Charlotte Ritter for a final eight-episode arc set in February 1933 as the Nazis finally seize power in Germany. The season will be based on Volker Kutscher’s fifth Gereon Rath novel, The March Fallen. Series co-creators and showrunners Henk Handlogten, Achim von Borries and Tom Tykwer will return for the finale season, producing via X-Filme Creative Pool and directing all eight episodes.

“In the final season of Babylon Berlin we put February 1933 under the magnifying glass: Rarely has a society been torn apart more radically in such a short period of time than Germany in this chaotic month,...

The fifth and final season of the global hit series “Babylon Berlin” has received an official green light, and eight new episodes will be shot this fall.

“Babylon Berlin” is produced by X-Filme Creative Pool in co-production with Ard Degeto, Swr, Wdr, Radio Bremen and Beta Film. When former producer-distributor Sky Deutschland announced last year that it was pulling out of scripted originals, there was a concern that “Babylon Berlin” could be a casualty of that change. However, Beta Film assured Variety it was talking with partners at German broadcaster Ard’s production company Ard Degeto and X Filme to continue the show, and the groups have found a way to do just that.

Based on Volker Kutscher’s fifth novel, “The March Fallen,” Season 5’s synopsis reads: “Set in the darkest period of German history, the new season dives deep into the dreadful February 1933 and its consequences, the take-over of power of the Nsdap.

The wait for news is over… Babylon Berlin is officially coming back for a fifth and final season.

The hit period drama’s future has been a topic of discussion since Sky Deutschland pulled out of original commissioning, leaving a funding gap in the series it shares with German pubcaster Ard Degeto.

It was still expected to move forwards, with producers saying they expected it to film a final season and star Liv Lisa Fries recently telling us of plans to shoot later in 2024. Today, the news became official, with X-Filme Creative Pool producing season 5 in co-production with Beta Film and local pubcasters Ard Degeto, Swr, Wdr and Radio Bremen.

Set in the darkest period of German history, the new season will be set in the dark times of February 1933, when the Nazi Party took power. The director/writer trio of Henk Handlogten, Achim von Borries and Tom Tykwer will return for the finale,...

A postscript to this philosophical effort explains that an unknown Oxford don visited Sigmund Freud’s London home shortly before his death in 1939. What if, the film asks, it had been C.S. Lewis? Well, then we might have had a conversation a little like this confection — although probably considerably sharper.

Freud (Anthony Hopkins) was a prominent atheist: not that that protected him from persecution by the Nazis for his Jewish roots, driving him to flee Vienna to London with his family. Matthew Goode’s Lewis, meanwhile, lost and rediscovered his faith after the early death of his mother and the trauma of World War I. As a second World War looms, both men reckon with its cost and their own regrets. Like One Night In Miami or Mary Queen Of Scots, this therefore uses an imaginary meeting to explore both men’s lives and work, but somehow to less than satisfying effect.

100 years after the death of Franz Kafka, a new mini-series aims to dive beneath the surface of an author who remains enigmatic even as his influence on the culture continues to grow.

Kafka, an ambitious German-language meta-drama written by Austrian writer/director David Schalko (Braunschlag) and best-selling author David Kehlmann (Measuring the World), is based on Reiner Stach’s exhaustive three-volume biography of Kafka and weaves together the writer’s life and work, finding the connections and gaps between the two.

Schalko, who spent more than a decade developing the series, and directs all six episodes, says he was well aware of the perils of trying to capture Kafka on screen. “Everything we think we know about Kafka has become a cliche,” says Schalko.

Kafka

There is a temptation to depict Franz Kafka, the writer, as a “Kafkaesque” character, and his work as simply a heightened reflection of his life.

Ab 1. August wird Die Filmagentinnen das Booking & Billing für alle kommenden Starts sowie das Repertoire von Pandora Film übernehmen. Erster Film unter der neuen Zusammenarbeit wird Andreas Dresens auf der Berlinale gefeierter „In Liebe, Eure Hilde“ sein, der am 17. Oktober in die Kinos kommt.

„In Liebe, eure Hilde“ von Andreas Dresen ist der erste Pandora-Film, der von Die Filmagentinnen ins Kino gebracht wird (Credit: Pandora Filmverleih/ Frédéric Batier)

Der in Aschaffenburg ansässige Filmverleih Pandora Film geht eine langfristige Partnerschaft mit der Berliner Vertriebsagentur Die Filmagentinnen ein, die am 1. August beginnt und alle künftigen Filmstarts sowie das Repertoire von Pandora umfasst. Den Anfang macht Andreas Dresens Berlinale-Hit „In Liebe, Eure Hilde“ mit Liv Lisa Fries in der Hauptrolle, der am 17. Oktober gestartet wird. Darauf folgt am 21. November das Regiedebüt von Halfdan Ullmann Trøndel, „Armand“ mit Renate Reinsve in der Hauptrolle, der gerade in Cannes von der Kritik bejubelt wurde und in...

The genre-bending detective fiction series that is quickly becoming everybody’s favorite of the year is Sugar. The Apple TV+ series created by Mark Protosevich is set in Los Angeles and it follows the story of a private detective John Sugar as he is hired by a big-time film producer Jonathan Siegel to find his missing granddaughter Olivia. While, trying to find Olivia, Sugar stumbles into something far more dangerous than he could have anticipated. Sugar stars Colin Farrell in the lead role with Amy Ryan, James Cromwell, Sydney Chandler, Nate Corddry, Kirby Howell-Baptiste, and Dennis Boutsikaris starring in supporting roles. If you loved the mystery and thrill of Sugar here are some similar shows you could check out next.

The Man Who Fell to Earth (Rent on Prime Video) Credit – Showtime

The Man Who Fell to Earth is a sci-fi drama series created by Jenny Lumet and Alex Kurtzman.

Picturehouse Entertiainment has picked up From Hilde, With Love, the new drama from German director Andreas Dresen (Stopped on Track) for the U.K. and Ireland, adding to a swath of European deals for the title, which premiered at the Berlin Film Festival last month.

Liv Lisa Fries (Babylon Berlin) stars in the 1940s-set drama as Hilde Coppi, a member of a left-wing anti-Nazi resistance cell. Beta, which is handling international sales for the movie, previously announced deals for From Hilde, With Love with Haut et Court in France, Teodora in Italy, Angel Film across Scandinavia, September Film for Benelux and Outsider for Portugal, among other deals. Palace Film will release From Hilde, With Love in Australia and New Zealand. Pandora Film Verleih is handling the German release and will bow the movie in German-speaking territories this October.

Beta also announced a series of deals for its upcoming Bill Nighy road movie 500 Miles,...

Picturehouse Entertainment has acquired UK and Ireland rights to Andreas Dresen’s Berlinale competition film From Hilde, With Love from Beta Cinema.

The biopic stars Babylon Berlin’s Liv Lisa Fries as real-life German resistance fighter Hilde Coppi. The film depicts her relationship with Communist activist Hans Coppi, who brought her into the anti-Nazi resistance, and her subsequent arrest and imprisonment by the Gestapo while pregnant.

From Hilde With Love is written by Laila Stieler and produced by Claudia Steffen and Christoph Friedel.

Johannes Hegemann, Lisa Wagner and Alexander Scheer also star.

From Hilde, With Love is produced by Pandora Film Produktion,...

Following its world premiere in the competition section of the Berlin Film Festival, Beta Cinema has revealed first sales across Europe and to Australia and New Zealand for Andreas Dresen’s “From Hilde, With Love.”

The drama about anti-Nazi activists in Berlin, which is led by “Babylon Berlin’s” Liv Lisa Fries and introduces Johannes Hegemann in his first big screen appearance, will be released in France by Haut et Court, in Italy by Teodora and throughout Scandinavia by Angel Films. Beta Cinema also closed deals for Benelux (September Film), Portugal (Outsider), former Yugoslavia (Discovery), Hungary (Cirko) and Czech Republic (Film Europe). Palace Film picked up the film for Australia and New Zealand. Pandora Filmverleih will release the film in the German-speaking territories in October.

Variety film critic Catherine Bray praised “From Hilde, With Love” as “eternally urgent and relevant” and Fries’ performance was praised in the international trades. German...

Babylon Berlin has landed a new U.S. home on a newly-merged streaming service created as Kino Lorber’s MHz Choice and Topic combine.

The boutique streamer will be named MHz Choice and feature the likes of The Killing, The Bridge, Detective Montalbano, The Sea Beyond and Pagan Peak, alongside the popular Babylon Berlin, which moves over from Netflix after three seasons on that streamer.

Kino Lorber said the new streamer will “combine the best European dramas and mysteries with Nordic noir crime and thrillers under the MHz Choice brand.”

The Four Daughters distributor owns MHz Choice and Topic, the latter of which in a Jv with First Look Media under which Kino has a majority stake and management oversight. The news comes a few weeks after we revealed layoffs at First Look production subsidiary Topic Studios.

Viaplay has also exited the U.S. following a disastrous 12 months that has...

Kirsten Niehuus, head of German film fund Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, is confident that the changes to film funding proposed by the German government recently will have a “very positive effect on the production scene in Berlin-Brandenburg.”

The proposed changes to the funding system were presented last week to German lawmakers in the Bundestag by commissioner for culture and media Claudia Roth (see here).

Kirsten Niehuus, Martin Moszkowicz

Speaking to Variety Saturday at a party Medienboard hosted at Berlin’s Holzmarkt, Niehuus said the changes “will mean that we would have a tax system in place that could compete, for instance, with Budapest or Prague, so that not so many German productions would go and shoot somewhere else, and more foreign productions would come and shoot in Germany.”

Looking at the media landscape across Germany she notes that one major challenge is the decision by high-end outlets such as Paramount+, HBO and Sky to cancel local productions,...

“From Hilde, With Love,” which world premiered Saturday in competition at the Berlinale, has debuted its trailer (below). The film, directed by Andreas Dresen, centers on a group of young anti-Nazi activists in Berlin during World War II. (Read Variety‘s review here.)

The film, which is being sold by Beta Cinema and is produced by Claudia Steffen and Christoph Friedel for Pandora Film, stars “Babylon Berlin” breakout Liv Lisa Fries and Johannes Hegemann.

The film is a love story about two real life members of the pro-Communist, German resistance movement known as the Red Orchestra, Hilde and Hans Coppi. More than 50 members of the group were guillotined in Berlin’s Plötzensee Prison between 1942 and 1943, including the Coppis. Hilde gave birth to her son in prison. He is alive today and was consulted about the production.

In an interview with Variety, Dresen said that when Laila Stieler’s script for...

When Laila Stieler’s script for “From Hilde, With Love,” which world premiered Saturday in competition at the Berlinale, first came to director Andreas Dresen he was a little reluctant to take the project on.

The issue was not the script but the subject-matter: set in Nazi-era Berlin, “From Hilde, With Love” is a love story about two real life members of the pro-Communist, German resistance movement known as the Red Orchestra, Hilde and Hans Coppi. More than 50 members of the group were guillotined in Berlin’s Plötzensee Prison between 1942 and 1943, including the Coppis. Hilde gave birth to her son in prison. He is alive today and was consulted about the production.

“I was a little bit afraid of doing these films about Nazi times, because it’s always in sepia colors, you know, very historical, very artificial always, and this is not the style of cinema I like,” he tells Variety.

Andreas Dresen’s favorite Berlinale memory, as you’d expect, involves Currywurst.

“I was on the jury one year, And it was clear I was the local guy among all these big names,” he recalls. “Now the festival had a vegan menu already then, and at the awards dinner, we had great food but they were quite small portions and [jury president] Wong Kar Wai turns to me and says ‘Andreas, can’t we get some real food?’ So I took them all, Susanne Bier, Shirin Neshat, Tim Robbins, everyone in tuxes and evening gowns, to [legendary Berlin snack bar] Curry 36 for a Currywurst. Even Tim Robbins, who actually is vegetarian, tucked in. I personally saw him gobble up three Currywursts. It was the most Berlin moment ever.”

Dresen has had a few. The 60-year-old director has been a regular at Germany’s top film festival since 1991 when his student film So schnell es geht nach...

Two years after their Berlinale prizewinner “Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush,” veteran German director Andreas Dresen and his regular screenwriter Laila Stieler reteam for the moving drama “From Hilde, With Love.” Drawing on the compelling real-life case of Hilde and Hans Coppi, a young married couple arrested and executed for treason by the Gestapo in wartime Berlin, the film cross-cuts between an idyllic summer romance and much darker later events. While the couple’s relationship is necessarily a crucial part of the story, the focus is on Hilde, who was imprisoned while eight months pregnant, had her baby in prison, and faced the guillotine a short time later. It’s an emotionally relentless sequence of events which naturally provides a touching role for Liv Lisa Fries, who gives a subtle but layered performance.

Dresen and Stieler make a number of smart choices. Most of the Nazis here are not...

Filmmaker Andreas Dresen and actress Liv Lisa Fries took part morning in the press conference for new drama From Hilde, With Love, which debuts this weekend in Competition at the Berlin Film Festival.

Dresen’s affecting and resonant film, set in Berlin during the Second World War, charts the little known story of Hilde and Hans Coppi, a young couple who courageously become members of an anti-Nazi group known as The Red Orchestra (Die Rote Kapelle). The two spend a summer together until they get caught by the Gestapo and Hilde is imprisoned, eight months pregnant.

Dresen’s film received a warm response from journalists this morning at the press conference, with many noting they had been moved to tears by the feature.

The German director told the media he was initially attracted by the “humanity” of the story and the character of Hilde Coppi, who he described as “such a decent and brave woman.

Fries’s new role is as a real-life resistance fighter in From Hilde, With Love, opening at the Berlin film festival. She says her job is not to campaign against the AfD but to make people feel

To prepare for her role in From Hilde, With Love, a Nazi-era period drama that premieres at the Berlin film festival on Saturday, actor Liv Lisa Fries met the person she would have to cradle in her arms as a baby.

In the film, by veteran German director Andreas Dresen, Fries plays Hilde Coppi, an anti-fascist resistance fighter who was arrested for treason by the Gestapo and sentenced to death along with her husband Hans.

The build-up to the 74th Berlin Film Festival has been highly politicized, and the international jury press conference Thursday morning was no different.

Lupita Nyong’o presides over the International Competition jury, whose members include American actor and filmmaker Brady Corbet, Hong Kong filmmaker Ann Hui, German director Christian Petzold, Spanish filmmaker Albert Serra, Italian actress Jasmine Trinca and Ukrainian novelist and poet Oksana Zabuzhko.

This wasn’t like most jury press conferences, however, with members drawn into multiple — occasionally testy — discussions about their own political stances on events in Ukraine, Gaza and Germany.

Russia’s war in Ukraine was a central topic, with multiple journalists asking Serra about a 2018 interview in which he supposedly expressed admiration for Vladimir Putin. Serra was asked whether he had changed his mind on Putin since the war:

“I don’t know,” said the director. “This is a political question. Everyone is upset with Russia right now.

Spoiler Alert: The following interview reveals plot points.

Exclusive: Babylon Berlin star Liv Lisa Fries recently sat down with us to discuss powerful and timely Berlin Film Festival Competition entry From Hilde, With Love, which debuts at the festival this coming weekend.

Andreas Dresen’s affecting and pared back film, set in Berlin during the Second World War, charts the little known story of Hilde and Hans Coppi, a young couple who courageously become members of an anti-Nazi group known as The Red Orchestra (Die Rote Kapelle). The two spend a summer together until they get caught by the Gestapo and Hilde is imprisoned, eight months pregnant.

Fries gives a memorable performance as Hilde. In the above first footage from the movie, she and co-star Johannes Hegemmann discuss an act of resistance for the first time. Pandora Film produces from a script by Laila Stieler. Beta Cinema handles sales.

Director...

Exclusive: Things have been quiet on the Babylon Berlin front since the shock news came down middle of last year that Sky was pulling out of original commissioning in Germany, including on the hit period drama.

Series four aired last fall and fans have been waiting for an update on the fate of series five, which producers said last summer would go ahead without Sky.

In a new interview with Deadline set to run tomorrow, the show’s lead actress Liv Lisa Fries confirmed that the plan is to shoot the “last” series of the show later this year:

“At the end of this year we’re going to shoot the last season of Babylon Berlin. It’s still in financial process but they’re writing. Money is a question mark but my schedule is to shoot it later this year.”

Producer Beta Film couldn’t confirm a timetable or...

Babylon Berlin is leaving Netflix next month, and subscribers won't be seeing the fourth season before it goes. The German series premiered on the streaming service in January 2018, and seasons two and three followed. Season four aired on Sky in 2022 but was never released on Netflix.

Created by Tom Tykwer, Achim von Borries, and Henk Handloegten, the series is set in 1920s Berlin and is inspired by the novels by Volker Kutscher. Starring Volker Bruch, Liv Lisa Fries, Peter Kurth, and Matthias Brandt, the Babylon Berlin series follows a police inspector from Cologne trying to take down an extortion ring.

Read More…...

The Berlin Film Festival on Monday unveiled the titles selected for its official competition and its sidebar Encounters competitive section.

A total of 20 films have been selected for the international competition, with highlights including La Cocina, directed by Alonso Ruiz Palacios and starring Rooney Mara. The pic is described as a “kinetic and cinematic love story” set over a single day in a Times Square kitchen. French-Senegalese filmmaker Mati Diop returns with Dahomey, a 60-minute doc about art repatriation and Hong Sangsoo plays in competition with A Traveler’s Needs, starring Isabelle Huppert. Scroll down for the full lineup.

The Berlin Film Festival takes place February 15-25.

Organizers have already announced more than 100 titles across sidebars spanning Panorama, Forum, and Berlinale Special. Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger, a feature documentary about influential British filmmakers Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger narrated by Killers of the Flower Moon...

The Berlin Film Festival has unveiled a promising competition lineup for its upcoming edition, peppered with prestige star-driven titles such as the New York-set “La Cocina” with Rooney Mara, sci-fi drama “Another End” pairing Gael García Bernal and Renate Reinsve and its opening film “Small Things Like These” starring “Oppenheimer” protagonist Cillian Murphy.

As is customary, political elements play a prominent role. But the complete Berlinale roster revealed on Monday by artistic director Carlo Chatrian and executive director Mariëtte Rissenbeek – following previous announcements in past weeks – makes for the fest’s strongest selection in recent memory in terms of heft and ensures a rich red carpet following the Hollywood strikes hiatus.

Rissenbeek and Chatrain started the press conference with a statement on the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. “Festivals provide a space for artistic expression and enable peaceful dialogue. They are places of encounter and exchange and contribute to international understanding.

The 74th Berlin International Film Festival unveiled its full lineup Monday at its official press conference in the House of World Cultures in Berlin. Berlinale managing director Mariëtte Rissenbeek and artistic director Carlo Chatrian presented the films that will compete for this year’s Golden and Silver Bears both in the competition and encounters sections.

Mexican director Alonso Ruizpalacios, a Berlinale regular and two-time Silver Bear winner — for A Cop Movie in 2022 and Museo in 2018 — returns to Berlin competition with his English-language feature debut La Cocina. Rooney Mara and The Cop Movie alum Raúl Briones star in the drama set over the course of a single day in a bustling New York City restaurant. Briones plays an undocumented cook in a relationship with Julia (Mara), an American waitress who cannot commit to their relationship. Fifth Season and WME are selling North American rights to La Cocina with HanWay handling international sales.

(L-r) Matthew Goode as C.S. Lewis and Anthony Hopkins as Sigmund Freud, in ‘Freud’s Last Session.’ Photo credit: Sabrina Lantos. Courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics

Sigmund Freud (Anthony Hopkins) and C.S. Lewis (Matthew Goode) debate their opposing views on religion verses reason on the verge of World War II, in Freud’S Last Session.

Freud’S Last Session is based on the stage play of the same name, in which the now-elderly famous Dr. Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, invites the much younger professor C. S. Lewis, a rising Oxford don who will write the Narnia book series, into his home in London, to which the Jewish doctor fled ahead of Hitler’s invading troops from his native Vienna. On the brink of Britain’s entry into WW II, these two intellectual giants meet for the first time and discuss a range of philosophical topics, including the existence...

Chicago – Patrick McDonald of HollywoodChicago.com appears on “The Morning Mess” with Scott Thompson on Wbgr-fm on January 4th, 2024, reviewing “Freud’s Last Session,” featuring Anthony Hopkins portraying Sigmund Freud. In theaters January 5th, 2024.

Rating: 4.5/5.0

This was a fictional story … based on a play … about the last days of Sigmund Freud (Anthony Hopkins), who died in London in 1939. The main action takes place in Freud’s London office just as World War II is beginning for England, as he reluctantly keeps an appointment with academic C.S. Lewis (Matthew Goode), who in the future will be a famous theologian and creator for the Chronicles of Narnia. As the radio gives news of impending attacks, the two philosophers debate the existence of God and what life means. Freud in the meantime reveals that he is dying of oral cancer, which escalates the discussion to a new level.

”Freud’s Last Session” expands wider in theaters on January 5th.

Seeing two towering individuals portrayed by actors with incredible talent is never a chore.

Freud’s Last Session finds Anthony Hopkins as Sigmund Freud welcoming Matthew Goode as C.S. Lewis, who at the time had only just begun his career of Christian leaning works, carrying on a conversation about the existence of God.

It sounds like a discussion for the ages from two brilliant minds who had more than their share to say on the matter.

The film is based on a 2009 play by and adapted for screen by Mark St. Germain.

Reviews for the play with stage actors at the helm were raving about the quality of the performances as well as the taut writing about a subject many are leery of discussing at all -- the presence of God.

Freud and Lewis, by all accounts, never actually met, although Freud did host an unknown scholar from Oxford shortly before his death.

Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series spotlighting the year’s most talked-about scripts continues with Freud’s Last Session, which Sony Pictures Classics pre-bought after teaming with star Anthony Hopkins to release his Oscar-winning turn in The Father.

The film had its world premiere at AFI Fest and hits U.S. theaters December 22.

Freud’s Last Session began as a play by Mark St. Germain, who adapted the script for the feature with director Matt Brown. The premise originally came to St. Germain after reading Harvard psychiatrist Armand Nicholi’s book The Question of God (later a PBS series), which compared Sigmund Freud’s and C.S. Lewis’ thoughts on faith and human nature based on their collective scholarship and letters.

Both the play and movie are set on September 3, 1939, when the atheist Freud (Hopkins) and devoutly religious Lewis (Matthew Goode), two of the century’s greatest minds, meet and debate the...

Anthony Hopkins takes on the role of famous psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud in Freud’s Past Session. Here’s the trailer.

Anthony Hopkins is no stranger to playing psychiatrists, though this role is unlikely to involve fava beans and a nice Chianti. In fact, this time, it looks as though dinner is off the menu entirely.

Freud’s Last Session, based on the play of the same name by Mark St Germain, itself based on the book The Question Of God by Dr Armand M Nicholi, Jr, imagines a scenario wherein Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis, invites Chronicles Of Narnia author Cs Lewis, here played by Matthew Goode, over for a debate about the existence of God.

Sounds like just the kind of fodder that actors love getting their teeth into, and the acclaim for the play itself suggests that it’s no chore for audiences either. The adaptation into a film should build on that,...

"You bury your doubts... You bury your memories of the war... But in the core of your being, we're all cowards before death." Sony Pictures Classics has revealed the full official trailer for the film Freud's Last Session, directed by filmmaker Matt Brown, based on Mark St. Germain's play of the same name. The film premiered at AFI Fest in Los Angeles last month (here's the teaser), and it will sneak into the awards season debuting in select theaters later in December before 2023 is over. On the eve of WWII, two of the greatest minds of the 20th Century, author C.S. Lewis and psychologist Sigmund Freud, converge for their own personal battle over the existence of God, each with opposing views. Freud's Last Session interweaves the lives of Freud & Lewis, past, present, and through fantasy, bursting from the confines of Freud's study on a dynamic journey. Starring Anthony Hopkins as Freud,...

An imagined conversation between two eminent historical figures who may or may not have ever met — nobody seems to know — forms the heart of Freud’s Last Session, an intellectual fable from Sony Pictures Classics that grew out of a play and, before that, a book and an Ivy League seminar.

Oscar winner Anthony Hopkins plays the inventor of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, opposite Matthew Goode as the celebrated author and theologian C.S. Lewis in a cerebral clash of titans. But as co-writer and director Matthew Brown said on Deadline’s Contenders Film: Los Angeles panel, the movie version as he envisioned it almost didn’t happen.

“I mean you always dream that you would have an actor like Hopkins say he would do the role,” Brown said. “And we did try once and we didn’t get very far. And then we did some more work on the script and tried again.

Bigger and longer are not always better. Case in point: Freud’s Last Session, the lavish film based on a modest off-Broadway play that captivated theater audiences a decade ago. Playwright Mark St. Germain worked with director Matthew Brown (The Man Who Knew Infinity) to reshape his two-character drama about an imaginary conversation between Sigmund Freud and C.S. Lewis as they debate the existence of God. That provocative exchange is still in the movie, and it sometimes crackles, thanks to the performances of Matthew Goode as Lewis and, especially, Anthony Hopkins as Freud. But the heart of the story is constantly undermined by a surfeit of asides about Lewis’ experiences in the First World War, Freud’s highly charged relationship with his daughter Anna, and several other subplots.

The main culprit here may be the current fashion for time-fractured, nonlinear narratives. It is rare these days to see a movie...

Hollywood has tried for decades to make psychoanalysis compelling for the layman, whether that’s David Cronenberg’s “A Dangerous Method” to Bill Condon’s “Kinsey.” Director Matthew Brown (“The Man Who Knew Infinity”) is the latest to look at the density of psychology, philosophy and existentialism with his quasi-historical drama “Freud’s Last Session.”

The film tells the story of a fictional meeting between Sigmund Freud (Anthony Hopkins) and author C.S. Lewis (Matthew Goode). Freud is suffering from oral cancer while Lewis has embraced a newfound love for Christianity. The pair meet in the hopes of crafting some type of relationship and spend the day going back and forth on the everything from God to the meaning of life.

It’s a fairly simple premise that holds promise: what would the greatest psychoanalyst and the most pronounced theologian have to talk about? The answer is enough to fill a two...