31/03/2025 - The German director’s feature debut will tell a story based on a 1975 novel by Nobel Prize in Literature winner Elfriede Jelinek

The cast, producers and director on the set of Liebhaberinnen (© Coin Film/Silviu Guiman)

In Germany’s Saarland, filming has just wrapped on Liebhaberinnen, the debut feature by German multihyphenate Koxi (aka Caroline Kox), for which she also co-wrote the screenplay with Antonio de Luca. The two have previously collaborated on several artistic projects using different mediums, including as the duo known as paradies. The film is led by Johanna Wokalek (The Baader Meinhof Complex [+see also:
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trailer
film profile]), with a supporting cast made up of Ben Münchow, Ulrike Willenbacher, Victoria Trauttmansdorff and Susanne Bredehöft.

Koxi’s film is based on a 1975 novel, Die Liebhaberinnen by Austrian author Elfriede Jelinek, widely considered as one of the most acclaimed contemporary German-language authors. The English title of the book is Women as Lovers. Jelinek is known for her works focused on female sexuality and critiques of a patriarchal, capitalist system that inherently oppresses women. She is also known for her semi-autobiographical 1983 novel The Piano Teacher, adapted for the screen into Michael Haneke’s 2001 erotic drama.

Set in 1970s Austria, the original book tells the story of 15-year-old Paula (Schiller) and the only slightly older Brigitte (Wokalek), working-class girls who seek to escape their respective societal conditions by marrying upwards in socioeconomic class. The two follow different paths: while Paula fantasises about true romantic love to a tragic end, Brigitte begins to lose her personal identity as she falls in line with heteronormative ideals of marriage and her role as a wife and mother. With Jelinek’s signature ironic and satirical flairs, the tale comments on the commercialisation of love and the interrogation of expected gender roles.

The 90-minute drama will also feature cinematography by Jakob Berger and production design by Ina Timmerberg. Liebhaberinnen is a German-Luxembourgish co-production by Cologne-based Coin Film in co-production with btf, Amour Fou Luxembourg and Saarländischer Rundfunk (SR), and in cooperation with MMC Movies Köln. Filmwelt holds the rights to world sales and German distribution, with plans to release the film in 2026, while Filmladen carries the Austrian rights.