Germany's incentive programme German Federal Film Fund (DFFF) has been so popular with local and international producers that only $ 3.8m (Euros 3m) are now left to pay out for the final two months of 2008.

According to the Berlin-based fund, $72.5m (Euros 57m) of its 2008 $76.4m (Euros 60m) budget was paid out to 91 projects up to the end of October.

The latest projects to be supported have included Michael 'Bully' Herbig's family entertainment film Wickie Und Die Starken Männer, Markus Goller's US-set road movie Friendship!, Lithuanian director Ignas Miskinis' Low Lights and Fatih Akin's Hamburg-set comedy Soul Kitchen.

Over a third of the supported projects so far this year - 34 - were international co-productions, ranging from Stephen Frears' Cheri through Gavin Millar's biopic Schweitzer to James McTeigue's Ninja Assassin.
They received $34.5m (Euros 27.1m) funding in recognition of fullfilling the criteria for their 'German spend'.

Feature films made up the bulk of the funded films - 65 in total - with $ 65.5m (Euros 51.5m) support, followed by 23 documentaries ($ 1.9m/Euro 1.5m) and 3 animation films ($ 4.9m/Euros 3.9m).

The DFFF pointed out that the 91 supported projects had an overall production volume of $ 599m (Euros 470.5m) with German production costs of over $ 442.7m (Euros 347.7m).

The incentive scheme was launched last year year with an annual budget of $ 76.4m (Euros 60m) to reimburse 20 cents ($ 0.25) of every Euro of 'German spend' up to a maximum of 80% of a film's total production costs