Line-up dominated by Western European titles
Eight Western European titles are hitting German screens this week.
Germany is represented by Petra Weisenburger’s biopic Ich will da sein - Jenny Gröllmann. This documentary – which screened at the latest Max Ophüls Film Festival – traces the last three years in the life of the Eastern German actress and ex-wife of Ulrich Mühe, who died of cancer in 2006. The title is released by defa-spektrum.
Croco Film are launching Steven Soderbergh’s German/US co-production Traffic.
French releases include the superb The Soldier’s Star [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (co-produced by Germany), the only narrative work by the late documentary filmmaker Christophe de Ponfilly (see news), who was a specialist on Afghanistan. The film is being released by NEF.
Also hitting screens is Erick Zonca’s French drama Julia [+see also:
trailer
film profile], which screened in competition at the latest Berlinale (distributed by Kinowelt).
Kinowelt are also launching Roger Donaldson’s UK thriller The Bank Job [+see also:
trailer
film profile], which is based on the robbery in Baker Street in 1971. For many years, the crime remained unsolved because, the film reveals, the safe contained not only valuable objects but also nasty secrets about people in high places.
Kinostar are releasing UK/Austrian co-production Jump!, by Joshua Sinclair. This psychological drama looks at the unfair murder trial of famous Jewish photographer Philippe Halsman in 1930s Vienna, where antisemitism was on the rise.
Udo Maurer’s Austrian/Luxembourg documentary Über Wasser is also hitting German screens (released by Neue Visionen). The film – co-written by Maurer and filmmaker Michael Glawogger (a well-known anti-globalisation campaigner) – reveals the preciousness of water, a commodity that is taken for granted in the West.
This week’s eighth European release is Swiss documentary Lucie et maintenant – journal nomade (“Lucy and Now – Nomadic Journal”) by Simone Fürbringer, Nicolas Humbert and Werner Penzel. Distributed by Peripher, the film follows two French artists as they retrace the month-long journey made by writer Julio Cortàzar and his partner 26 years ago on the “motorway of the sun” (from Paris to Marseille).
(Translated from French)
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