German sales agents unveil AFM titles

Ida Martins’ Cologne-based Media Luna will have screenings of five new titles as market premieres:

• Stijn Coninx’s romantic feel-good drama Marina, based on the childhood memories of the Italian-Belgian singer Rocco Granata;
  
  
• Menno Meyjes’ psychological drama-thriller The Dinner, based on Herman Koch’s eponymous international bestseller, which had its world premiere at last month’s Toronto International Film Festival;
  
  
• Jan Verheyen’s courtroom drama The Verdict, which received the Best Award at the Montreal World Film Festival;
  
  
• Julia von Heinz’s German-Israeli romantic comedy Hanna’s Journey which celebrates its German premiere on at this week’s Hof Film Days and is nominated for the Millbrook Authors Prize;
  
  
• Bettina Blümner’s coming of age drama Broken Glass Park which was awarded the Goethe Institut’s Youth and Children’s Film Prize at the SCHLINGEL film festival in Chemnitz this week.

Picture Tree’s quartet

Andreas Rothbauer and Alec Schulmann’s new sales and production outfit Picture Tree International (PTI) will be flying into Santa Monica with four market premieres and a co-production project.

PTI’s AFM line-up ranges from costume drama to heavy metal:

• Victor “Young” Perez, based on the true story of the Tunisian-Jewish boxer Victor Perez before and during the Second World War. The film recently had its US premiere at the Hamptons International Film Festival and will be released theatrically in France on November 20 by Océan Film;
  
  
• Thomas Imbach’s period biopic Mary Queen Of Scots, based on a novella by Stefan Zweig and starring French actress Camille Rutherford as the tragic queen, will also be shown at AFI Film Festival taking place at the same time as the AFM;
  
  
• Icelandic director Ragnar Bragason’s emotional drama Metalhead which received its North American premiere at Toronto last month;
  
  
• Nana Neul’s Silent Summer which had its world premiere at this year’s Filmfest München and will be released theatrically in Germany by Zorro Film.

PTI will also present a promo-reel of Damian John Harper’s feature debut Los Ángeles, inspired by the director’s experiences during a year he spent in a small community in Southern Mexico after graduating in Anthropology.

Furthermore, Rothbauer will be using this year’s AFM to present Finnish film-maker AJ Annila’s ‘vision promo’ and screenplay for supernatural thriller Number 13 (previously known as Human). Apart from handling world sales, PTI is serving as the German co-production partner on the project together with Canada’s Perfect Circle Productions and Finland’s Blind Spot Pictures.

Global Screen takes Banklady

Global Screen will be introducing Banklady, Christian Alvart’s first German-language production since his 2005 film Antibodies, to international buyers for the first time.

The production about Germany’s first female bankrobber in the 1960s, which is described as ‘Catch Me If You Can meets Bonnie And Clyde’, received its world premiere at last month’s Filmfest Hamburg.

There will also be market screenings of Xavier Koller’s The Black Brothers, French film-maker Denis Dercourt’s German-language debut A Pact as well as the English-language productions A Thousand Times Goodnight, Run & Jump and Mr Morgan’s Last Love.

A clutch of new animation projects will be presented as ‘works in progress’: the 3D animation features Richard The Stork, 7. Zwerg, and Ooops, Noah Is Gone as well as the TV event Pinocchio.

ARRI sells Exit Marrakech

ARRI Worldsales has sold all US rights for Oscar-winning German director Caroline Link’s Exit Marrakech to Adopt Films following its US premiere at the Hamptons International Film Festival.

The film is being released theatrically in Germany by StudioCanal from tomorrow (Oct 24).

Adopt Films’ slate includes Ursula Meier’s award-winning Sister, Christian Petzold’s Barbara, and Croatian director Vinko Bresan’s tragicomedy The Priest’s Children which has been selected for the Feature Competition of this year’s FilmFestival Cottbus (Nov 5-10).