The Dusseldorf-based regional fund awarded $521,000 (Euros 400,000) to Gitai's Disengagement, which will be produced by Pandora Filmproduktion with France's AGAV Films and AGAT Films/Ex Nihilo, Italy's R&C, and Israel's AGAV Hafakot. Studio Canal will handle worldwide sales for the story of two sisters meeting again after 20 years' separation, which is set to star Juliette Binoche and Jeanne Moreau.
Pandora also received $377,000 (Euros 290,000) for Ballantyne's The Strength Of Water which will be co-produced with Filmwork Ltd and was one of the CineMart's projects in 2002. Briar Grace-Smith's screenplay, which centres on a young Maori boy in rural New Zealand who refuses to accept the death of his twin sister, was selected as one of the projects for the Sundance Institute's Screenwriters Lab last year.
The largest sum allocated at this funding session - $3.3m (Euros 2.5m) - went to Faerberboeck's Anonyma, adapted from an anonymous woman's diary of life in Berlin in last months of the war in early 1945, which will be produced by Gunter Rohrbach for Constantin Film as a TV two-parter and feature film for the cinema with Russia's Globus Film.
The TV-cinema combination is also being adopted by Heinrich Breloer for his adaptation of Thomas Mann's family saga Buddenbrooks, which is set to star Armin Mueller-Stahl, August Diehl and Jessica Schwarz. The co-production between Colonia Media Filmproduktion, Bavaria Pictures, and FilmInterest received Euros $2.8m (Euros 2.15m).
Other projects supported at this funding session included Oskar Roehler's love story Lulu Und Jimi, Vanessa Jopp's comedy Meine Schoene Bescherung, Joseph Vilsmaier's refugee drama Hafen Der Hoffnung - Die Letzte Fahrt Der Wilhelm Gustloff, and Michael Moeller's feature documentary Der Tunnel Von Sarajevo.
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