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BERLINALE 2020 EFM

The Match Factory heading to Berlin with Christian Petzold, Abel Ferrara and the D'Innocenzo brothers

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- The sales agent’s Berlinale line-up boasts three Golden Bear contenders, four Panorama entries and one Perspektive Deutsches Kino title

The Match Factory heading to Berlin with Christian Petzold, Abel Ferrara and the D'Innocenzo brothers
Undine by Christian Petzold

Prospects at the European Film Market of the 70th Berlin Film Festival look bright for Cologne-based sales agent The Match Factory, as eight titles on the company’s slate will be celebrating their world premieres at the festival.

Sparkling brightest on the firm’s line-up is Christian Petzold’s main competition entry Undine [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Christian Petzold
film profile
]
. The director, whose Transit [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Christian Petzold
interview: Franz Rogowski
film profile
]
competed in the 2018 edition of the festival, is returning to the Berlinale with a film that portrays the water nymph who seduces men in a number of mythological tales as a historian lecturing on Berlin’s urban development. When the man she loves leaves her, the ancient myth catches up with Undine, and she has to kill him and return to the water. Produced by Schramm Film Koerner & Weber and co-produced by Les Films du Losange, the film reunites Transit’s Paula Beer and Franz Rogowski in the lead roles.

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The Match Factory will also be pinning its hopes on the main competition entry Siberia [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Abel Ferrara. The maverick director’s new feature centres on a tormented man who hopes to find inner peace while tucked away in a remote mountain cabin. One evening, he begins a journey to the world he once knew, in an attempt to find his true nature. Produced by Vivo Film, RAI Cinema, Maze Pictures and Piano, the film co-produced by Faliro House and Rimsky Productions marks the sixth collaboration between four-time Academy Award nominee Willem Dafoe and Ferrara.

Another Golden Bear contender that the company will be negotiating deals for is Bad Tales [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Fabio and Damiano D’Innocenzo
film profile
]
by Fabio and Damiano D'Innocenzo. After presenting their debut feature, Boys Cry [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Damiano and Fabio D’Innocenzo
film profile
]
, in the Panorama section of the 2018 Berlinale, the D'Innocenzo brothers return to the festival with a dark tale about families living on a residential estate in the suburbs of Rome. Bad Tales was staged by Pepito Produzioni together with Amka Films Production SA and Quantum Marketing Italia.

Furthermore, The Match Factory is on board as sales agent for four films that will be celebrating their premiere in this year’s Panorama section. High up on the company’s Panorama slate is Georgis GrigorakisDigger [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Georgis Grigorakis
film profile
]
, a slow-burning contemporary western about a native farmer who lives and works alone in a farmhouse in the heart of a mountain forest in northern Greece, fighting against industrial expansion. The film was staged by Greece's Haos Film, Faliro House Productions and Blonde, France's Le Bureau, Germany's Match Factory Productions and Fassb Filmproduktion, and the USA's N-Coded Pictures.

Another Panorama title being handled by the sales agent is Visar Morina’s Exile [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Visar Morina
film profile
]
, a thriller about paranoia and identity that centres on a 45-year-old Kosovo-born pharmaceutical engineer living in Germany, who starts to feel discriminated against at work because of his ethnic background. The film was produced by Komplizen Film together with Frakas Productions and Ikonë Studio.

In Berlin, The Match Factory will also be presenting Srdan Golubovic’s Panorama entry Father [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Srdan Golubović
film profile
]
, a drama that hinges on a Serbian day labourer and father of two, who is ordered to give his children up to social services after poverty and hunger drive his wife to commit a desperate act. Determined to fight for his right to raise his kids, he travels across Serbia on foot and takes his case directly to the national ministry in Belgrade. Father was produced by Film House Bas Celik, ASAP Films, Neue Mediopolis Filmproduktion, Vertigo, Propeler Film and SCCA/PRO.BA, and co-produced by ZDF/Arte and Arte France.

Yet another title on the company’s EFM slate is Bastian Günther’s One of These Days [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Bastian Günther
film profile
]
, which will also be enjoying its world premiere in the Panorama section of the upcoming Berlinale. Staged by German company Flare Film, the film will focus on a contest that takes place in a small town in the Southern USA, during which the 20 participants struggle in order to win a new pick-up truck.

Lastly, The Match Factory will be in Berlin presenting Sisters Apart [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Daphne Charizani. Staged by Pallas Film and Match Factory Productions, together with View Master Films, the film tells the story of a family torn apart by war.

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