Murder and romance from the harbour to the neighbourhood

25.06.2018 | Funding round Committee 1

Hamburg in the 20s, Hamburg in the 70s - and a sea glow in between: In its second meeting of the year, Committee 1 of the FFHSH funded 18 projects with a total of 3,225,000 euros. These include Fatih Akin's adaptation of the novel "The Golden Glove" and the new film by "Body and Soul" Director Ildikó Enyedi, which takes viewers into the Hamburg harbour milieu of the 1920s.

It's getting bloody on Hamburg's most famous party mile: In July 2018, filming will start on Fatih Akin'sThe Golden Glove (bombero international, Hamburg), which has received production funding totalling 750,000 euros. The film is based on Heinz Strunk's novel about the woman-killer Fritz Honka, who met his victims in the neighbourhood pub "Zum Goldenen Handschuh" in the mid-1970s.

Set in the Hamburg harbour milieu of the 1920sThe Story of my Wife (450,000 euros, Komplizen Film, Berlin) by Hungarian master director Ildikó Enyedi, who was nominated for an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film in 2017 with her film "Body and Soul". Her current project, based on the novel of the same name by Milán Füst, is dedicated to the love story of Captain Jakob Störr (Anders Baasmo Christiansen), who marries the first woman who enters the room on a café bet. The film is a co-production between Hungary, Germany, Italy and France, with Léa Seydoux playing the female lead.

The tragicomedySea light (450,000 euros, Fortune Cookie Film, Hamburg) by Hamburg-based Director Ulrike Grote will have around 20 days of filming in Schleswig-Holstein - a large part of it on Heligoland. What is it about? 72-year-old Ruben overcomes the death of his wife with the help of his grandson Pelle, frees himself from a fantasy world and, in the end, is finally able to encounter reality again and thus the people he had long excluded from his life. The leading role is played by Rutger Hauer, who became famous in the 1982 film "Blade Runner".

The animated hit "The Bunny School" from 2017 gets a successor: In the second partThe bunny school - The great egg theft (450,000 euros, Akkordfilm Produktion, Hamburg) by Directors Ute von Münchow-Pohl, the cunning city bunny Leo wants to abolish Easter and joins forces with the foxes to do so. The young Easter bunnies Max, Emmi and their friends do everything they can to stop Leo and the foxes.

As part of the "Nordlichter" production funding programme#Bonnie&Bonnie (Riva Filmproduktion, Hamburg) by up-and-coming Hamburg director Ali Hakim and Script Writer Maike Rasch received funding totalling 300,000 euros. The film tells the story of the secret love affair between Albanian Yara, who grew up in Hamburg's problem district of Wilhelmsburg, and the older, fearless Kiki.

Further production funding is available forWilli und die Wunderkröte (280,000 euros, filmtank, Hamburg). An adventurous children's film by Directors Dominik Wessely and Script Writers Kai Rönnau and Oliver Keidel set against the backdrop of a real-life drama. Following her Berlinale film "24 Weeks", Director Anne Zohra Berrached is devoting her current projectThe pilot's wife (225,000 euros, Razor Film Produktion, Berlin), an unusual love story that also takes place in Hamburg. Directors Shahrbanoo Sadat, on the other hand, is currently working on her new filmThe Orphanage (80,000 euros Adomeit Film, Lübeck), which will be set in Kabul in the 1990s and is the direct sequel to her Cannes film "Wolf and Sheep" - the Bollywood scenes will be shot in Hamburg, by the way. There is also a total of 40,000 euros in production funding for the feature film debutPlace de L'Europe (pong film, Berlin) by renowned documentary film director Philip Scheffner and Script Writer Merle Kröger.

A total of nine projects received production funding. Five of them were directed by women and seven scripts were written by women.

Grimme Award winner Daniel Nocke receives 30,000 euros in screenplay funding for his new projectYour stains (Studio Film Bilder, Stuttgart). 25,000 euros go to the animated filmFear (brave new work, Hamburg) by Tehran Taboo Director Ali Soozandeh and Script Writers Armin Hofmann, Frank Geiger and Rolf Giesen. ForPit's perfect plan (Bird&Bird Film, Hamburg) by Tobias Wiemann and Jytte-Merle Böhrnsen, which is being funded as part of the "The Special Children's Film" initiative, will also receive 25,000 euros.The Princess (The Child with the Golden Jacket, Hamburg) by Sylvia Borges and Craig Behenna receives 15,000 euros in screenplay funding. 25,000 euros for project development will go toJeanne Dark (Kinescope Filmproduktion, Hamburg) by Odine Johne (script) and Florian Eichinger (Directors, screenplay), 10,000 euros for project development go to Labyrinth (Cuckoo Clock Entertainment, Hamburg) by Script Writer Silja Clemens and Directors Stefan Ruzowitzky.

Distribution and sales promotion currently receive25 km/h (40,000 euros, Sony Pictures Releasing, Berlin) by Markus Goller andIn search of Ingmar Bergman (15,000, Weltkino Distribution, Feldafing) by Margarethe von Trotta andLittle heroes (15,000 euros, Little Dream Entertainment, Hamburg) by Anne-Dauphine Julliand.

A detailed overview of all funded projects is available here.

The funding decisions were made on Wednesday, 20 June 2018: Steen Bille, Maria Köpf, Sophie Molitoris, Christian Granderath, Peter Preisser and Caroline von Senden. Committee 1 of Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein (FFHSH) is responsible for projects with production costs of over 800,000 euros.