Film

"Seeking an identity" is the title of this contribution on the German film industry. While in the thirties, German film and many film actors were world-famous, the situation in the German film industry today is different. The article also discusses festivals and the promotion of young talent.

Seeking an identity – or what is German film?

"Why do the Germans always torment themselves like this? Why do they have to talk everything to pieces? Why can’t they celebrate their successful productions once in a while?" asks Neusa M. from Brazil. She is planning a German film festival in her home country. In order to gain a deeper insight into German film-making, she came to the legendary Berlin film studios in Potsdam Babelsberg for a film and television conference, where she followed a long panel discussion with German film producers on the subject: "Can success be planned?"

"Why is it that all the award-winning films were produced exclusively by film college graduates?" asks the young Indian director Anindila S. at the award ceremony of the prize for young film-makers, "First Steps", in Berlin. "Can’t you make films in Germany without a degree?" She came to Berlin to make a love film in "this exotic location", as her compatriots attest. Volker Schlöndorff, the maker of film adaptations of literary works, with whom she used the opportunity to make contact, thought this was "brilliant". She told him that she was "only" making a film for television. Nothing special, really. Unlike in Germany, television in India has little to do with films for cinema.

The German film scene holds a number of puzzles for anyone interested in film looking in from other European countries or other continents. German films are only rarely screened beyond the German borders. And for anyone who cannot draw any conclusions from the product itself and seeks further information in Germany, it is easy to lose one’s way in the jungle of an industry characterised by endless discussions about aims, desires and theories.

Nor is the annual German Film Award any exception in this endless circular process. When the 51st prize was awarded for the film "Run Lola Run" on 22 June 2001, the procession of the industry’s top names through Berlin’s state opera house was accompanied as expected by general murmurings in the media forest. It was not as if the only point of the occasion was to celebrate, even though, in a symbolic gesture, the opening speech was held by the German Chancellor for the first time in the history of the award. The award of the biggest German state prize for culture, which comes with an endowment of DM 5 million, was more than anything else an occasion to take stock. In most cases, the talk was of "a crisis". And there was enough to reflect upon, with fluctuating viewer interest within Germany, only a 1.5 per cent share of the foreign market, and no German film at the Cannes film festival in the last eight years.

Günther Rohrbach, aged 72, one of the best-known German producers (his films include "The Boat"), prominently expressed his views on the subject in the news magazine, "Der Spiegel". "Almost all of them are young, the heroes of the six feature films entered for the German Film Award", he observed in his article "Alles auf Anfang" (The focus is on the beginning). Whether in "Der Krieger und die Kaiserin" (The Warrior and the Empress), "Die innere Sicherheit" (Internal Security) or "Das Experiment" (The Experiment), it almost seemed as if "the film-makers (and the award jury) were focussing completely on the beginning: on young people, on new stories from a new era." While that was a sign of hope and self-confidence, "it could not cover up the fact that for years, German film has been held in low esteem internationally." This is "not necessarily due to the quality of German films", he believes, but, with few exceptions, "to their lack of identity. German films are less and less recognisable as such."

While producers in the seventies such as Werner Herzog, Wim Wenders, Alexander Kluge and Rainer-Werner Fassbinder adapted works of literature for the screen – "Fassbinder’s films were oppressively German through and through" – most young producers and directors take American films as their model. "Hollywood is the measure of all things – the code, magic formula, mythical aim." Yet they have had the "alarming experience that the more they try to imitate the admired model, the further they go from gaining international recognition. If you want to make Hollywood, you have to be Hollywood." The fact that the names of the creators of film adaptations of literary works are still remembered abroad as synonyms of German film is primarily because their themes and narratives bore witness to the state of a nation, "because their stories told of a faraway place called Germany which lay under a curse from the past."

Alfred Holighaus was this year commissioned by the new head of the Berlinale, Dieter Kosslick, to take charge of German films at the international film festival. At the presentation of the Federal Film Award, he criticised the often undifferentiated perception of many critics. The journalist, who himself has produced films, was first involved with Senator Film Produktion in developing and producing films (including "Comedian Harmonists"), and then became its managing director. He commented in an article in the Berlin culture magazine Tipp: "Gloomy observations are certainly a major factor in the self-destructive and cynically indulgent discussion of the crisis in the German film industry." While in the mid-nineties, "it was still possible for an unusual historical film such as "Kaspar Hauser" to be deemed a success when 330,000 people went to see it," just a few years later "the criteria of blossoming landscapes in German film were turned upside-down and film-makers and critics completely lost their heads." In the spring of 1997, just "three films had achieved a huge increase in the market share of German productions. "Rossini", "Knocking on Heaven’s Door" and the cartoon film "Kleines Arschloch" (Little Arsehole), based on a comic, were together seen by nearly ten million people in just a few weeks and became the new measure of all things without any consideration of their inherent qualities." The fact that the first film (Helmut Dietl’s Rossini) was a popular tragicomedy set in the world of film-making, the second was "a model of effectively combining young talent (editor’s comment: Til Schweiger) and highly-professional marketing" and the third was a "well-made and cheeky animated film" was not discussed at any depth. The only thing that counted was "ticket sales." That set the yardstick against which other films, whatever the genre, would be measured. The films that met these standards in 1998 included "Jenseits der Stille" (Beyond the Silence), the story of a girl who grows up with deaf parents, "Comedian Harmonists", a film about the legendary barbershop group in Germany in the thirties, Tom Tykwers "Lola rennt" (Run Lola Run), which was also an international hit, and, a year later, Leander Haussmanns "Sonnenallee" (Sun Boulevard), the story, told with tongue in cheek, of growing up in the GDR in the seventies.

Holighaus established that German film as a genre does not exist. It could not even exist. German film was "merely a sum of productions that could not be more varied." And it is in this diversity that German film has to be seen. That goes for the "contents just as much as for the budgets, for the number of people going to see the film, just as much as for the critics, promotions and awards."

The current situation – the film industry in Germany

75 German feature films came out in Germany’s cinemas in the year 2000. They included 28 co-productions with other countries. That not only includes films that found a distributor. Even the Spitzenorganisation der Filmwirtschaft (SPIO) e.V., the umbrella organisation of the various trade associations of the German film industry, cannot say how many films were made in the Federal Republic of Germany altogether. (The SPIO’s member organisations include the Verband Deutscher Spielfilmproduzenten (Association of German Feature Film Producers), the Bundesverband Deutscher Film- und AV-Produzenten (Federal Association of Film and Audio-Visual Producers), the Verband der Filmverleiher (Film Distribution Association) and the Hauptverband Deutscher Filmtheater (Association of German Film Theatres)).

In comparison with local productions in neighbouring France, where 145 films were screened in the same year, Germany’s total is low. It was no different in previous years. In 1999, 74 new films were shown in the cinemas (France: 150), in 1998 the figure was 50 (France: 148). These figures include German co-productions, of which there were 30 in 1999, and 11 in 1998.

Approximately 50 distribution companies operate in Germany. The eight big distributors bringing out more than 12 films per year include branches of American firms.

There are around 70 companies in Germany producing full-length feature films. These are often small companies producing one film each year.

In mid-2001, there were 1822 cinemas in Germany, with 870,000 seats. With 80.3 million tickets sold in the first six months of the year, the sector had 6 million more visitors than in the same period in the previous year. With average ticket prices at around DM 11, turnover at the cinema door amounted to DM 868.2 million to June 2001. That gives the film industry grounds for hoping that, with a total population of 82.2 million, it will finally reach the level aimed for of an average of 2.5 visits to the cinema per inhabitant.

The market share of German film productions to the middle of the year was 13 per cent. 9.9 visitors saw one German cinema film – altogether one million fewer than in the previous year. There were nevertheless five films that were seen by more than a million viewers. These were the teen comedy "Mädchen Mädchen" (Girls, Girls) (1.7 million), the thriller "Das Experiment" (The Experiment) (1.5 million), the children’s film "Emil und die Detektive" (Emil and the Detectives) (1.5 million), the cartoon "Petterson und Findus" (Petterson and Findus) (1 million) as well as Til Schweiger’s comedy, first shown back in December 2000, about three old ladies and a bank robbery, "Jetzt oder nie - Zeit ist Geld" (Now or Never, Time is Money) (1.2 million). There were great expectations regarding this year’s opening film at the Berlinale, the epic film on Stalingrad, "Duell - Enemy at the Gates", (Duel – Enemy at the Gates). Yet while it was seen by 200 million cinema-goers world-wide, it was viewed by only a disappointing 0.2 million people in Germany. The German Western spoof "Der Schuh des Manitu" (Manitu’s Shoe) is not yet included in these German Federal Film Board (FFA) statistics. It soon reached a record number of more than 5 million visitors in the second half of the year.

Hardly a cinema film is made in Germany without public funding being involved. Besides television, it is the most important partner in the realisation of projects. Approximately DM 350 was available for the promotion of films in Germany in 1999. Of this amount DM 211 million went into cinema film production and DM 23 million into television film production.

As a result of the demands of young German film producers such as Kluge and Schlöndorff in the sixties, there has been a Film Act for the promotion of German film and cinema since 1967, which has undergone several amendments since. In the seventies and eighties, in the wake of a discussion on decentralising film promotion, the German Federal Länder also established funds for promoting films. The conditions for promotion are essentially the same in all the Länder – the production must have some connection to the respective Land, e.g. as regards the film locations, use of the infrastructure available there and personnel resources etc. The amounts available vary from Land to Land. They are highest In Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Berlin, Hamburg and North-Rhine/Westphalia. More funding is meanwhile available from the Länder than from the Federation. The large number of sources of funding that have developed in Germany, however, are regarded as a dense jungle, even by insiders. That is to change. The Minister of State for Culture, Julian Nida-Rümelin, intends to present a new concept for the funding of films in the autumn of 2001.

There are close relations between television and film in Germany. One aspect of their relationship is that public and private TV stations broadcast a large number of feature films each year. They contribute to film productions, receiving broadcasting rights in exchange. In addition, TV producers also sit on committees for film funding and are involved in deciding budgets. "For decades, television in Germany has had a major influence in deciding what happens in our cinemas", says film director Günther Rohrbach in the news magazine "Der Spiegel". "Hardly a German film could be made without a substantial financial contribution from television. TV producers basically expect films to be suitable for prime-time screening i.e. that they are suitable for viewers over 12 years of age. They assume that the habits of television viewers will be taken into account." As others also lament, this inevitably affects the contents and aesthetic quality. "The influence of television thus extends far beyond what has to be conceded to it on account of its financial contribution", says Rohrbach. After all, the public and private television stations only contributed DM 11 million each towards funding films. "If anything is to change in the state of German film, the influence of television has to be reduced and at the same time, its financial contribution has to be tangibly increased", according to Rohrbach.

The most important film production locations are in Bavaria, North-Rhine/Westphalia and Berlin. After German reunification, the former temple of German film, the Babelsberg studios in Potsdam, where Fritz Lang, Marlene Dietrich and many others had worked, was acquired by the French concern "Vivendi", and developed into the "media city of Babelsberg". The production location, which will be celebrating its 90th anniversary in 2002, is once again a good address for major international productions, particularly after Jean-Jaques Annaud’s Stalingrad epic, "Duell - Enemy at the Gates" (Duel, Enemy at the Gates), which cost DM180 million to make. Roman Polanski’s "Pianist" has already been made. Istvan Szabó’s "Talking Sides", the story of the conductor Furtwängler after the Second World War, is being made, and Spike Lee has already been to take a look around the studios.

"German films are films for television" – the view of film producer Horst Wendlandt (aged 79)

Horst Wendlandt, one of the co-founders of Rialto Film, has been one of the most successful directors in the German film business since the sixties. At the beginning of his career he drew people into the cinemas in their masses with his films based on the Karl May books or Edgar Wallace mysteries, and later he made films with Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Volker Schlöndorff, among many others. In 1995, he was awarded the "Film Ribbon in Gold" for his "outstanding services to German film".

What are the reasons for the success or failure of German cinema productions, asked film producers such as Andrea Willson (Deutsche Columbia), Stefan Arndt (X-Filme), Norbert Sauer (UFA Film & TV Produktion) and Christoph Ott (Christoph Ott Film) in a panel discussion at the film and television conference "Babelsberg 2001" in August. Is it the books, the subjects, too little or the wrong kind of marketing? The discussion round, moderated by Alfred Holighaus of the Berlinale, did not come to any firm conclusions.

Horst Wendlandt sees one main reason why German cinema films do not always enthuse even a German audience as being primarily in the mix of cinema and TV. "The films made here are all co-financed by television. The station makes sure that a TV star is given a major role. But the audience is not willing to pay DM 12.50 to go to the cinema and see a TV star", he says provocatively. In the USA, it’s different. There no movie star in his prime would act in a TV series. To see a movie star, you just have to go to the movies. Another point was "the format of the films. German film is film for television. 80 per cent of films are made for television. But they still struggle against all the odds to get them into the cinema."

German film productions are much too dependent on TV and its financial clout. "90 per cent of German producers also work for television." But TV productions are, above all, cheap. A film must not cost more than DM 3 million. Ten per cent of that goes to the producer. A cinema film costs at least DM 5 million. Usually, the money is put together from funds from the German Federal Film Board (FFA), the distributor and from Land funding.

It is still barely sufficient. Even now, most films are not made in the studio, but on location. But "the effect is cold", he says. "It doesn’t have any atmosphere". Atmosphere has to be created for a film using buildings, light and sound. "Using your imagination, that is what film is about," he says, but that is not done "because there isn’t enough money." In the USA, 80 per cent of films are still made in studios, he says and it was this that created the mood that the films were trying to convey.

What was also important for success, however, was to get the timing of a story right. "You need a sense of zeitgeist, of what makes people tick. After all, film is a contemporary document", he declares. "Let’s just take the comedy "Männer" (Men) by Dorris Dörrie as an example. The subject was chosen just at the moment when many people were wondering whether to carry on being freaky or to have a career instead. That was what people were thinking about at the time. And Doris Dörrie came up with a good idea for a story with the two different men and the woman between them. Or take Alexander Haussmanns "Sonnenallee" (Sun Boulevard). People went to the cinema and they laughed. That was coming to terms with the past for you. Maybe it was not that funny in the GDR in the seventies. But it just might have been."

At the moment, Horst Wendlandt is not producing in Germany. But he is working on two projects in Canada and America. In order to reach a larger market, "it only makes sense to make films in English." In so doing, he is putting into practice what many in the industry are just talking about. "We take our time to get ready and to find the funding", he says, adding, "We’re not on the stock exchange, after all." A jibe, since Rialto Film was one of the sector’s few large companies not to be floated on the German stock exchange and get into difficulties when share prices plunged.

He finds it strange that most young film-makers in Germany today are trained at colleges of film and television. The fact that people need a qualification entitling them to enter university in order to get a place at film college was in itself "the biggest mistake. A school does not create talent. If you want to make films you have to have ideas and passions verging on obsession. If you have all that, then you can’t ask, "do you have the university entrance qualification too?" You can learn the techniques at school, but you can’t leave college and say "I’m a director". What it takes to make a director is something you only learn on set. To do that, you have to be where it is all happening, for example, next to the director Dietl, and to see how he does it. That’s the only way to learn how to do it." Even "a Schlöndorff" still states emphatically, "What would I be without Louis Malles." And he still remembers how Fassbinder watched "three or four films, one after another for nights on end, for example by Fritz Lang, and then said that he could not learn as much anywhere else."

Promoting young talent

Celebrations in the foyer of Cinemaxx on Potsdamer Platz in Berlin. The famous actress Barbara Rudnik has just announced the winner of the German award for young talent, "First Steps 2001" in the "full-length feature film" category. It is "Das weisse Rauschen" (The White Rustling), by Hans Weingartner, a graduate of the media art college in Cologne. The film, which had already caught Alfred Holighaus’s attention for one of the various forums of the Berlinale, tells the story of a young man who leaves the country and goes to the city, but instead of finding the freedom he is looking for, almost loses himself. The jury referred to the achievement of the young director, who was also the cameraman, as a "challenge to the senses". His first award is accompanied by DM 50,000 in prize money. The aim of the award is to draw the attention of the industry to new creative potential and to make the transition into working life easier for graduates. The prominent members of the jury, including the director Margarete von Trotta, most certainly contribute to this.

Meanwhile, the public television stations also offer additional opportunities to present oneself. In addition to ZDF’s "Kleines Fernsehspiel" (Little Television Play), whose producers have done much to promote the creation of films for many years and who have also promoted foreign producers, there is a joint initiative by ZDF and the Ostdeutsches Rundfunk (ORB), which, under the "Ostwind" label are working together in aiming to help 12 films by young film-makers to make it into the cinemas by 2004. The ARD is showing a series of debut films, previously shown on the third channel, on the first channel. The Bayerische Rundfunk (BR) arranged the "SprungBRett" forum a year ago and the Westdeutsche Rundfunk (WDR) and the Film Foundation of North-Rhine/Westphalia are jointly producing a digital series, "Six-Pack" together with Roadmovies.

Festivals

As well as the Berlinale, which, alongside Cannes and Venice, is one of the biggest international film festivals, there are more than a hundred other festivals in Germany covering a wide spectrum. The festivals in Berlin, Mannheim, Oberhausen and Leipzig, which are now known internationally, have been in existence since the fifties. After its isolation on account of the "Third Reich", Germany has sought to return to the fold of the international film scene.

In the late seventies and early eighties, a time when television was booming and a time of new media, new festivals were created. They aimed to make up for the lack of high-quality films in the big cinemas and in particular to make accessible to a German audience interesting international productions which had little chance on the German screens.

Today, new German productions are to be found at various festivals. There are the new German film showings in Berlin, first feature films in Hof and Saarbrücken, young talent in Munich and short films in Oberhausen.

The "Neue deutsche Filme" series is organised by both parts of the Berlinale, the competition and the forum. It is intended to give foreign visitors in particular an opportunity to find out about the latest German film productions.

The Hof International Film Festival is considered to be the most unconventional German festival. The festival was created by Heinz Badewitz in 1967 with practically no money, but lots of enthusiasm. Meanwhile, it has developed into a festival where mainly new German films are shown, most of which are being seen by an audience for the first time.

The film festival in Saarbrücken is considered to be an important venue for young talent from Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Since 1980, the city has organised the "Max Ophüls Award" competition, named after the director who was born in Saarbrücken. The award, with prize money totalling DM 60,000, is used to promote young film directors.

Besides organising the FilmFest München, the Internationale Münchene Filmwochen GmbH also organises the Munich International Festival of Film Schools in conjunction with the Munich Television and Film College. Most of the schools entering the annual competition are from within Europe.

In addition to the awards, of which those in Berlin, Mannheim, Oberhausen and Leipzig are the most important, also internationally, there are a great number of awards in Germany for the creation of films. The most important ones are the following:

• The Bavarian Film Award, which has been presented by the Bavarian State Government in Munich since 1979,
• The German Film Award (formerly the Federal Film Award), which has been presented since 1951,
• The Ernst Lubitsch Award, with which the Berlin Club of Film Journalists – prompted by Billy Wilder – has paid tribute since 1957 to German directors and actors for "the best individual performance in a German-language comedy", and the
• German Film Critics’ Award, which has been presented for 50 years by the Working Group of Film Journalists.