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Sweet Tooth has concluded its epic story with its third and final season on Netflix. Based on a DC comic book series of the same name by Jeff Lemire, the post-apocalyptical fantasy drama series follows a young hybrid boy going on a dangerous journey with his gruff protector that will change his life and the world forever. Sweet Tooth stars Christian Convery in the lead role, with Nonso Anozie, Stefania Lavie Owen, Adeel Akhtar, Dania Ramirez, Naldei Makel Murray, and Will Forte starring in supporting roles. So, if you miss all the post-apocalyptical and perilous adventures after the final season of Sweet Tooth, here are some similar shows you can watch next.

His Dark Materials (Max & Rent on Prime Video) Credit – HBO

His Dark Materials is a fantasy drama series created by Jack Thorne. Based on a trilogy of novels of the same name by author Philip Pullman, the HBO...

TrustNordisk has sold Georg Maas and Judith Kaufmann’s Franz Kafka biopic The Glory Of Life to several key markets, including North America and France.

Centered around Kafka and his great love Dora Diamant, the film had a closed market screening in Cannes and has now been sold to North America (Menemsha Films), France (Condor), Benelux (September Film), Spain (Divisa Red), Italy (Wanted Cinema), Turkey (Ozen Film), Former Yugoslavia (Cinemania Group), Taiwan (Swallow Wings) and Australia (Moving Story).

Based on the bestselling novel by Michael Kumpfmüller, the film is directed by Georg Maas and Judith Kaufmann, and written by Georg Maas and Michael Gutmann. Synopsis reads: Because of the power of love, the last year of Franz Kafka’s life becomes his happiest. He has never before been able to allow himself to experience intimacy, he suffers from tuberculosis and is dependent on his overbearing family. But the worldly-wise Dora...

Georg Maas and Judith Kaufmann’s The Glory Of Life, a biopic of legendary writer Franz Kafka, has secured key distribution deals including North America and France.

After a closed market screening at Cannes, the film has sold to North America (Menemsha Films), France (Condor), Benelux (September Film), Spain (Divisa Red), Italy (Wanted Cinema), Turkey (Ozen Film), Former Yugoslavia (Cinemania Group), Taiwan (Swallow Wings) and Australia (Moving Story).

International sales are handled by TrustNordisk, which announced the deals on the 100th anniversary of the death of Kafka.

The Glory Of Life centres on Kafka, the celebrated author of Metamorphosis, and his meeting with Dora Diamant,...

International buyers are swooning over The Glory of Life, a very un-Kafkaesque love story about Franz Kafka and his last romance.

The German-language drama, from directors Judith Kaufmann and Georg Maas, follows the romance between Franz Kafka (Sabin Tambrea) and Dora Diamant (Henriette Confurius) in the final year of the famed writer’s life, before his death from tuberculosis at age 40.

Unlike most adaptations of Kafka’s work — from Orson Welles’ The Trial (1962) to Steven Soderbergh’s Kafka (1991) to The Castle (1997) from Michael Haneke — angst and existential dread are mostly absent from The Glory of Life. Based on the best-selling novel by Michael Kumpfmüller, the film focuses instead on what the directors’ claim was the happiest period in Kafka’s life.

Menemsha Films has picked up North American rights to The Glory of Life, with Condor taking France, Wanted Cinema acquiring the movie in Italy, Divisa Red in Spain and...

Fahri Yardim as Larssen and Henriette Confurius as Ulrika, in the German crime series “Roots of Evil.” Courtesy of MHzChoice

German TV gives us this complex crime series, “The Roots of Evil,” (originally “Die Quellen des Bosen”) that straddles more genres than most even attempt. Set in a small community in 1993, it’s a murder mystery involving child abuse, long-buried emotional scars, arcane ritualistic symbols, political machinations (some left over from before The Wall was torn down a few years earlier), supernatural (?) elements, multiple family entanglements, and a large dose of bigotry in a product that blends standard contemporary procedurals with heavy Gothic overtones. The result is a highly bingeable production in six 45-minute episodes.

Ulrika (Henriette Confurius) is the lead detective, working with newly-arrived partner Larssen (Fahri Yardim). While hunting in the forest, Ingrid (Cloe Heinrich), a strange teenager from an even stranger family, finds the body of a...

The Girl And The Spider Photo: Beauvoir Films The Girl And The Spider, All4, on demand

We featured this when it was available on Mubi last year, but now you can watch it without subscription on Channel 4’s free streaming service. Ramon Zürcher and Silvan Zürcher have a distinctive style that's all of their own, making tensions spring up from what have previously appeared to be the most benign of environments. Their follow up to their equally quirky The Strange Little Cat centres on Lisa (Liliane Amuat) who is preparing to move from the place she shares with Mara (Henriette Confurius) and Markus (Ivan Georgiev) and into a new one where she will live alone. A real spider will make its presence felt across this web of relationships but the mood is dominated by the desire for connections that ebbs and flows over the course of a couple of days.

The last love of Franz Kafka, the celebrated Czech author of “Metamorphosis,” will be portrayed in romantic drama “The Glory of Life.” TrustNordisk has boarded international sales ahead of Cannes, while Majestic is handling the domestic rights.

Currently shooting, “The Glory of Life” is directed by Georg Maas (“Two Lives”) and is inspired by the love story between Kafka and Dora Diamant.

The period drama was penned by Michael Gutmann and Maas. Producers are Helge Sasse and Solveig Fina for Tempest Film and Tommy Pridnig for Lotus Film.

Kafka and Diamant met in 1923 on the Baltic Sea coast, a year before the author died from tuberculosis. The worldly wise Diamant, who was working in a Jewish community, took him to Berlin, and as Kafka’s health deteriorates rapidly, they traveled together to a sanatorium in Austria. The memory of their time together will shape Diamant for the rest of her life.

Can space define our relationships? It’s a concept that directors Ramon and Silvan Zürcher investigate in their new film “The Girl and the Spider.” Set around the confines of a cramped apartment, the dwelling becomes a central character as important as the roommates — and possibly former lovers — who inhabit it. In the film, Lisa (Liliane Amuat) is about to move out but not before dealing with the peculiar qualities of Mara (Henriette Confurius).

Continue reading ‘The Girl And The Spider’ Trailer: the Zurcher Brothers Berlin-Winning Best Director Drama Opens On April 8 at The Playlist.

"You tried to smile. But you had tears in your eyes." The Cinema Guild in NYC has revealed a new official US trailer for the intriguing Swiss film titled The Girl and The Spider, which first premiered at the 2021 Berlin Film Festival last year. The film is the latest feature from Swiss filmmaking brothers Ramon & Silvan Zürcher, "the second work in the Zücher brothers' trilogy about human togetherness which began with the 2013 drama The Strange Little Cat." Lisa moves out, and Mara is left behind. As boxes are being moved and cupboards built, abysses begin to open up, an emotional rollercoaster is set in motion. It's described as "a tragicomic catastrophe film. A poetic ballad about change and transience." Starring Henriette Confurius, Liliane Amuat, Ursina Lardi, André Hennicke, and Sabine Timoteo. "Day turns into night and one final party in the apartment. When the last box is moved, the fragments of their lives remain.

Ramon and Silvan Zürcher deliver another droll, primary-colored wonder that never reveals its secrets — sexual, sinister, and otherwise — with “The Girl and the Spider.” Here, the brothers turn their camera from “The Strange Little Cat” (their previous film) to another creature that proves a point of connection for the residents of a Berlin apartment complex teeming with troubled people whose secret longings are rising to the surface. “The Girl and the Spider” won the Best Director prize at the 2021 Berlin Film Festival, and after a hearty festival rollout that included Toronto and New York and inclusion on Cahiers du Cinema’s list of last year’s 10 best films, it’s finally coming to U.S. theaters. Exclusively on IndieWire, watch the trailer for the film below.

“The Girl and the Spider” opens with a Pdf floor plan of an apartment layout, and ends with a young woman perhaps vanishing. The...

Exclusive: German actor Saralisa Volm makes her directorial debut with mystery thriller The Silent Forest, which is premiering tonight at the Berlin Film Festival in the Perspektive Deutsches section. Here’s an exclusive clip from the film.

The film is based on Wolfram Fleischhauer’s novel The Forest Stands Silent, about a trainee forester who sees parallels between a murder in the Upper Palatine Forest and the unsolved death of her father 20 years earlier. Fleischauer adapted the screenplay. It stars Henriette Confurius (Tribes Of Europa), Noah Saavedra, Robert Stadlober and August Zirner.

It’s produced by Volm’s Poison alongside Ingo Fliess’ if…Productions. Blue Fox is handling international sales for the title, excluding German-speaking Europe, where Arte will release.

Blue Fox’s US distribution arm plans late 2022 US release.

US sales outfit Blue Fox Entertainment has boarded German actress Saralisa Volm’s feature directorial debut The Silent Forest, a mystery thriller that is premiering in Perspektive Deutsches Kino at the Berlinale.

The Silent Forest is based on Wolfram Fleischhauer’s novel The Forest Stands Silent about a trainee forester who sees parallels between a murder in the Upper Palatine Forest and the unsolved death of her father 20 years earlier. Fleischhauer adapted the screenplay.

Henriette Confurius from the Netflix show Tribes Of Europa stars wth Noah Saavedra, Robert Stadlober and August Zirner.

“The Girl and the Spider” opens with a Pdf floor plan of an apartment layout, and ends with a young woman perhaps vanishing. The tantalizing mysteries in the latest film from the “Strange Little Cat” team of Ramon and Silvan Zürcher never quite reveal themselves in this story about two roommates torn asunder and to separate middle-class flats in Berlin. While the mad entropy of this chamber piece — filled with doppelgängers, women coming and going from rooms, as T.S. Eliot might say — will drive some viewers barking insane, .

One half of the splitting duo (and it’s never clear if she and her now-ex-roommate were ever quite romantic) is Mara (Henriette Confurius), whose odd tactile obsessions puncture the entire film and are immediately announced in the opening scene: she is oddly soothed by the sight and sound of a jackhammer. She hangs around in the wings, picking at a herpes blister,...

Eight years on from their landmark debut The Strange Little Cat (2013), Swiss brothers Ramon and Silvan Zürcher have made their long-awaited return with The Girl and the Spider, the second in a planned trilogy of films about human connection and the slippery nature of kinship. A genuinely sui generis work, The Strange Little Cat announced a singular worldview in which cinematic time and space are made to enfold and reanimate the messiness of everyday life. In The Girl and the Spider, the Zürchers apply this philosophy to a slightly larger story: set mostly in two apartments over two days (in contrast to the The Strange Little Cat’s one apartment-one day scenario), the film follows a pair of roommates, Mara (Henriette Confurius) and Lisa (Liliane Amuat), as the latter moves out of their shared apartment and into a new flat across town.From this threadbare setup, the Zürchers fashion an...

Film won best director and the Fipresci prize after world premiering in Berlinale’s Encounters section.

Dubai-based world sales company Cercamon has posted first sales for Swiss directors Ramon and Silvan Zücher’s The Girl And The Spider, following its prize-winning debut in the Berlinale’s Encounters section and the European Film Market.

The German-language film has sold to France (Wayna Pitch), Belgium and the Netherlands (Periscoop Films), Austria (Stadtkino Filmverleih), Portugal (Nitrato Filmes), Turkey (Bir Film) and Taiwan (Hooray Films).

HBO Eastern Europe acquired pay-tv rights for Eastern Europe.

In a deal announced out of the US overnight, Cinema...

Distributor negotiated deal with Cercamon.

Cinema Guild has picked up North American rights to Berlin Encounters double prize-winner The Girl And The Spider.

Ramon Zürcher was named best director for the German-language film about friends and flatmates whose lives are thrown into disarray when one of them decides to move out.

Emerging talents Henriette Confurius and Liliane Amuat lead the ensemble cast and the film also won the Fipresci prize.

Silvan Zürcher wrote and produced The Girl And The Spider, the second film in the Swiss brothers’ trilogy about human bonding.

They previously worked on 2013 Berlinale premiere The Strange Little Cat.

Cinema Guild has acquired North American rights to Ramon Zürcher and Silvan Zürcher’s “The Girl and the Spider,” which world premiered at the Berlinale in the Encounters section, and won best director.

“The Girl and the Spider” was co-written and directed by Ramon Zürcher, and written and produced by Silvan Zürcher. It marks the Swiss brothers’ follow-up to their critically acclaimed feature debut “The Strange Little Cat,” which won the Fipresci prize at Berlin in 2013.

Like “The Strange Little Cat,” “The Girl and the Spider” explores human togetherness, the need for closeness and the pain of separation through the story of two roommates. The film revolves around Lisa (Liliane Amuat), who is moving out of the apartment she shared with Mara (Henriette Confurius), and is set within the two apartments, the one Lisa and Mara shared and the new one Lisa is moving into.

“We had high hopes for...

Of all the locations one could possibly choose to stage modern relationship movies, cramped apartments surely rank as just about the least cinematic option. But that hasn’t stopped Swiss helmer Ramon Zürcher (“The Strange Little Cat”) from willingly embracing such boxy, where-to-place-the-camera confines yet again for his second feature, “The Girl and the Spider,” or from concocting clever ways to use such spaces to reveal the inner lives of his characters. Zürcher’s movies are like prisms, capturing the things people do when they think no one’s watching … and when they desperately wish they were.

His latest, co-directed with twin brother Silvan (a producer on “Cat” but a full-blown creative partner here), is all about the feelings that arise — more often implied rather than articulated in words — when Lisa (Liliane Amuat) abandons her roommates to rent her own flat. Amid all the commotion of the move, Mara (Henriette Confurius...

Relationships mix, simmer and boil in the cauldron of domestic spaces in the films of Ramon Zürcher, who follows up his 2013 film The Strange Little Cat with this second film in what is intended to be a trilogy about "human togetherness", this time co-directed and co-written by his twin brother Silvan, stepping up from his previous producer's role.

The shifting of emotions is matched by a physical restructuring of apartments as Lisa (Liliane Amuat) prepares to move out of the place she shares with Mara (Henriette Confurius) and Markus (Ivan Georgiev) and into a new one - a place where she will live independently - the camera watching the interplay not just between the three of them but a wide ensemble cast, who come and go over the course of a couple of days.

The Zürchers have a keen eye for the tensions of the everyday and a potential for acts of.

Perhaps the highest compliment I can offer Swiss brothers Ramon and Silvan Zürcher is that while watching their first film, the precocious The Strange Little Cat (2013), and their much-anticipated second, The Girl and the Spider, my imagination ping-pongs around myriad other kinds of movies the duo could make. A spy film? Adapting La princesse de Clèves? A sports drama? An episode of Bridgerton? The mind-boggles. This is because these two movies, the first set in one apartment and the second—which is premiering at Berlin in the Encounters competition—ambitiously set in two, are exquisitely compact pinball machines of characters entering and leaving each frame, each room, each scene, and adding to and changing the movie at each occurrence, deepening the story’s mystery. Theirs is a cinema that refreshes moment to moment as person A talks to person B, a conversation we soon realize is being witnessed by person C,...

Warning: contains spoilers for Tribes of Europa episodes 1-6.

Netflix’ latest German sci-fi Tribes of Europa comes from the same producers that brought us twisty time-travel sci-fi Dark. If you’ve already binged all six episodes, you may have lingering questions, we certainly do.

There was plenty left unexplained by that cliffhanger of an ending, which we can only hope suggests that there may be a second season on the horizon.

The series follows three siblings of the Origine tribe, all of whom end up following very different paths after they discover a mysterious cube. The youngest, Elja (played by David Ali Rashed) arguably ends up on the most important route of all, beginning a quest to find out more around the unusual object. Liv (played by Henriette Confurius) plays a Katniss Everdeen-esque young girl, who will do anything to protect her family. Lastly, the eldest of the siblings, Kiano...

"Tribes of Europa" is a new live-action, science fiction Original Series,  set in the year 2074, starring Henriette Confurius, Oliver Masucci and David Ali Rashed, streaming February 19, 2021 on Netflix:

"...in 2074, three siblings set out to change the fate of Europe after a global catastrophe causes the continent to fracture into dystopian warring tribal micro-states, who vie for dominance over the other states. Three siblings get caught up in the conflict when they come into possession of a mysterious cube.

"The future is not what you expected as 'Kiano' (Emilio Sakraya), 'Liv' (Confurius) and 'Elja' get caught in the middle of this bloody war and forced to forge their own paths...." 

Click the images to enlarge...

Post-apocalyptic adventure series “Tribes of Europa,” which bows Friday on Netflix, is the latest sci-fi/fantasy show out of Germany, where the genre is heating up.

Created by Philip Koch and produced by Wiedemann & Berg Television, the company behind Netflix hit “Dark,” “Tribes of Europa” follows three siblings as they struggle to survive in a new Europe emerging from cataclysm. Henriette Confurius, Emilio Sakraya (“Warrior Nun”), David Ali Rashed and Oliver Masucci (“Enfant Terrible”) star.

Set in 2074, the story unfolds in a land divided into micro-states and tribes — some peaceful, others bloodthirsty.

It was 2016’s Brexit referendum that inspired the series, Koch tells Variety. As a supporter of the European Union, Koch found the decision “very shocking.”

Since then, however, the pandemic, a growing political divide in the U.S., not to mention the Capitol Insurrection in Washington, D.C., have made the premise of a show about the collapse...

"I'd always be scared of losing her." Cercamon has debuted an early promo sales trailer for an indie Swiss film titled The Girl and The Spider, which is premiering at this year's Berlin Film Festival coming up next month. The film is the latest feature from Swiss filmmaking brothers Ramon & Silvan Zürcher, "the second work in the Zücher brothers' trilogy about human togetherness which began with the 2013 drama The Strange Little Cat." Lisa moves out, Mara is left behind. As boxes are being moved and cupboards built, abysses begin to open up, an emotional rollercoaster is set in motion. Described as "a tragicomic catastrophe film. A poetic ballad about change and transience." The film stars Henriette Confurius, Liliane Amuat, Ursina Lardi, André Hennicke, and Sabine Timoteo. This looks like some tricky, complex European cinema that definitely won't be for everyone. Watch out - this trailer is Nsfw with a bit of nudity included.

This year’s Berlin International Film Festival will look a bit different this year, with a virtual edition taking place March 1-5 for industry and press, then a public, in-person edition kicking off in June.

The complete lineup has now been unveiled, including Céline Sciamma’s highly-anticipated Portrait of a Lady on Fire follow-up Petite Maman, a surprise new Hong Sang-soo feature, the latest work from Ryūsuke Hamaguchi, along with new projects by Radu Jude, Xavier Beauvois, Dominik Graf, Pietro Marcello, Ramon Zürcher & Silvan Zürcher, and more.

Check out each section below.

Competition Tiles

“Albatros” (Drift Away)

France

by Xavier Beauvois

with Jérémie Renier, Marie-Julie Maille, Victor Belmondo

“Babardeală cu buclucsau porno balamuc” (Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn)

Romania/Luxemburg/Croatia/Czech Republic

by Radu Jude

with Katia Pascariu, Claudia Ieremia, Olimpia Mălai

“Fabian oder Der Gang vor die Hunde” (Fabian – Going to the Dogs)

Germany

by Dominik Graf

with Tom Schilling,...

Feature is second work in a trilogy by Swiss brothers Ramon and Silvan Zücher.

Dubai-based Cercamon had taken international rights to Swiss directors Ramon and Silvan Zücher’s drama The Girl And The Spider, ahead of its world premiere in the Berlinale’s Encounters competition.

Rising young actresses Henriette Confurius and Liliane Amuat lead an ensemble cast as two long-time friends and flatmates whose lives are thrown-up in the air when one of them decides to move out.

The German-language feature is the second work in the Zücher brothers’ trilogy about human togetherness which began with the 2013 family drama The Strange Little Cat.

Day 3 of this year’s Berlinale announcements contain the line-ups for Encounters, Panorama and Perspektive Deutsches Kino. Check back in tomorrow for the Competition program.

Encounters was first introduced at last year’s festival to support new voices in cinema. A three-member jury will award Best Film, Best Director and a Special Jury Award during the industry event in March, with the prizes handed out physically at the summer event.

The selection consists of 12 titles from 16 countries, including seven debuts. Scroll down for the full list.

Over in Panorama, there are 19 titles including 14 world premieres. Several titles arrive from Sundance such as Prano Bailey-Bond’s UK feature Censor and Ronny Trocker’s Human Factors.

Perspektive Deutsches Kino will again present new views on German cinema, with six titles, all of which are world premieres. The full lists are below.

This week so far has seen the Generation, Retrospective, Forum, Forum Expanded and Shorts programs announced.

"Tribes of Europa" is a new live-action, science fiction original series,  set in the year 2074, starring Henriette Confurius, Oliver Masucci and David Ali Rashed, streaming February 19, 2021 on Netflix:

"...in 2074, three siblings set out to change the fate of Europe after a global catastrophe causes the continent to fracture into dystopian warring tribal micro-states, who vie for dominance over the other states. Three siblings get caught up in the conflict when they come into possession of a mysterious cube.

"The future is not what you expected as 'Kiano' (Emilio Sakraya), 'Liv' (Confurius) and 'Elja' get caught in the middle of this bloody war and forced to forge their own paths...." 

Click the images to enlarge...

Tribes of Europa Trailer 2 — Netflix‘s Tribes of Europa (2021) teaser trailer has been released and stars Henriette Confurius, Oliver Masucci, David Ali Rashed, Emilio Sakraya, Melika Foroutan, James Faulkner, Igor Pecenjev, Marie Mouroum, Alain Blazevic, David Bowles, Benjamin Sadler, Matteo van der Grijn, Hoji Fortuna, and Jeanette Hain. Crew Philip Koch and [...]

Continue reading: Tribes Of Europa Trailer 2: Netflix’s 2021 Post-apocalyptic Thriller TV series about a Warring, Tribe-split Europe...

The Girl and the Spider

Produced by Aline Schmid, Adrian Blaser

Directed by Ramon Zürcher

Written by Ramon Zürcher, Silvan Zürcher

Starring: Henriette Confurius, Liliane Amuat, Ursina Lardi, Flurin Giger, André M. Hennicke, Ivan Georgiev, Dagna Litzenberger Vinet, Lea Draeger, Sabine Timoteo, Birte Schnöink

Cinematographer: Alexander Haßkerl

Release Date/Prediction: Berlinale 2021 would be a logical repeat.

…...

"Tribes of Europa" is a live-action, science fiction original series,  created by Philip Koch, starring Henriette Confurius, Oliver Masucci and David Ali Rashed, streaming February 19, 2021 on Netflix:

"...in 2074, three siblings set out to change the fate of Europe after a global catastrophe causes the continent to fracture into dystopian warring tribal micro-states, who vie for dominance over the other states. Three siblings get caught up in the conflict when they come into possession of a mysterious cube.

"The future is not what you expected as 'Kiano' (Emilio Sakraya), 'Liv' (Confurius) and 'Elja' get caught in the middle of this bloody war and forced to forge their own paths...." 

Click the images to enlarge...

Tribes of Europa Trailer — Netflix‘s Tribes of Europa (2021) teaser trailer has been released and stars Henriette Confurius, Oliver Masucci, David Ali Rashed, Emilio Sakraya, Melika Foroutan, James Faulkner, Igor Pecenjev, Marie Mouroum, Alain Blazevic, David Bowles, Benjamin Sadler, Matteo van der Grijn, Hoji Fortuna, and Jeanette Hain. Crew Philip Koch and Florian Baxmeyer [...]

Continue reading: Tribes Of Europa (2021) Teaser Trailer: Tribal states fight for dominance in a Future Europe [Netflix]...

The Wind Beneath Her Wings: Kavaite’s Sapphic Sophomore Sighs

Sophomore is an adjective that serves as a pun to describe Alante Kavaite’s latest film, The Summer of Sangaile, a coming of age tale concerning a young woman that discovers herself over the course of one very important summer. However, a similar interest in her woes isn’t extended to the audience. Though featuring a handful of sexual encounters, Kavaite’s film seems to be dabbling in the homoerotic tendencies of its protagonist, an emotionally troubled youth with little drive to pursue her greatest dreams. But beat by strained beat, there’s nothing innovative or subtle in this adolescent’s journey to spreading her wings and, literally, flying high.

In rural Lithuania, 17 year old Sangaile (Julija Steponaityte) meets the audacious Auste (Aiste Dirziute) at a local air show where a stunt pilot shows off fancy tricks. It’s obvious...

Exclusive: StudioCanal to handle world sales on Kai Wessel’s wartime drama.

StudioCanal is to handle international sales on Kai Wessel’s Fog In August (Nebel im August), the first feature film to address the Nazis’ euthanasia programme.

Based on Robert Domes’ 2008 eponymous historical novel, Fog In August centres on the authentic life story of 13-year-old Ernst Lossa who was committed to a mental hospital in Sargau in 1942 because of his origins in a family of travellers.

However, Ernst soon discovered the truth behind the hospital’s facade and sabotaged its euthanasia programme to help his new-found friends. But his actions did not go unnoticed by the institution’s administration.

The role of Ernst is played by the young Berliner Ivo Pietzcker who played the central character in Edward Berger’s Berlinale 2014 competition film Jack, which won a German Film Award last month.

The hospital’s staunch Nazi chief physician Werner Veithausen is played by Sebastian Koch who came...

Here are the films opening theatrically in the U.S. the week of Friday, January 9th. (Synopses provided by distributor unless listed otherwise.) Beloved Sisters Director: Dominik Graf Cast: Florian Stetter, Henriette Confurius, Hannah Herzsprung, Claudia Messner, Ronald Zehrfeld, Andreas Pietschmann, Maja Maranow, Peter Schneider, Michael Wittenborn, Anne Schäfer, Philipp Oehme, Thomas Kornack, Klaus Lehmann Synopsis: "The summer of 1788 in Rudolstadt. Rebellious poet Friedrich Schiller and two penniless sisters, members of the Thuringian aristocracy, experience an unforgettable period together which will eventually bind them forever. Unhappily married Caroline von Beulwitz and her shy sister Charlotte von Lengefeld take seriously their oath to share everything – even the author of ‘The Robbers’. Charlotte marries Schiller so they may pursue their ménage à trios under the guise of convention. Caroline, whose novel Schiller publishes anonymously,...

“But what a melodrama,” says one of the characters in director Dominik Graf’s “Beloved Sisters,” a film about a poet and his ménage à trois with two sisters. What’s astonishing is how little actual drama there is when Caroline von Beulwitz (Hannah Herszsprung) shares Friedrich Schiller (Florian Stetter), the husband of her sister, Charlotte von Lengefeld (Henriette Confurius). Instead, a narrator walks the audiences through the romance as the trio happily exchanges letters, with the only struggles in the relationship arising from outside the inseparable trio for most of the film. Their triangle seems to be a thoroughly modern arrangement, and Graf’s directorial choices reflect that. Titles in a contemporary font float into the screen, while the camera zooms in a way that isn’t traditionally done in films set in the 18th century, thanks to work from director of photography Michael Wiesweg. It infuses the German...

In a marvelously cheeky 1979 essay, the late, great Ellen Willis defined the difference between classical sex ("romantic, profound, serious...and typically feminine") and baroque sex ("pop, playful, funny...and stereotypically masculine"). So where shall we put German director Dominik Graf's Beloved Sisters, which tells the possibly semi-true story of the pact made by aristocratic sisters Caroline and Charlotte von Lengefeld (played by Hannah Herzsprung and Henriette Confurius) to peaceably share the same man, poet, playwright, and historian Friedrich Schiller (Florian Stetter)? Everything goes swimmingly for a time in this 18th-century idyll, and, particularly in the first section of the film, Graf brings a lush but discreet eroticism to the story. In the most ...

Chicago – The 2014 edition, the 50th Chicago International Film Festival, kicks off tonight on October 9th. The premiere film will be “Miss Julie,” an adaptation of the August Strindberg play adapted and directed by Liv Ullmann. The first weekend promises a scintillating variety of cinema indulgences.

HollywoodChicago.com contributors Nick Allen and Patrick McDonald have been sampling the festival offerings, and provide this preview to cover the first four days of the event. The depth and breadth of the films is a reminder to participate in the variety of the Festival, especially if interested in a particular country, for their cinema is a glimpse into their culture. Each capsule is designated with Na (Nick Allen) or Pm (Patrick McDonald), to indicate the author.

Opening Night “Miss Julie”

Jessica Chastain in ‘Miss Julie’

Photo credit: Chicago International Film Festival

Liv Ullmann, the legendary Swedish actress – and muse to director Ingmar Bergman – directs her fifth feature film,...

"...and that is why you should nominate us for Best Foreign Film at the Oscars."Our Nyff coverage continues with Nathaniel learning a 'don't procrastinate lesson'

This will be brief though the movie is not. IMDb lists the running time of Beloved Sisters, a fine new costume drama, as 138 minutes. The version that screened this past week at Nyff was 170 minutes long or nearly three hours. I do not know which version AMPAS  foreign language film committee will be screening but as soon as I find out I'll share. I do know this: a 170 minute long movie in which you can't read any of your notes (due to scribbling on the same line repeatedly in the dark) should be written up immediately and not left to swiss cheese memory. 

Beloved Sisters is a true(ish) story about sisters Charlotte (Henriette Confurius) and Caroline (Hannah Herzprung) and the talented man they...

Beloved Sisters producer Uschi Reich on Dominik Graf at the New York Film Festival: "It was very important for Dominik to work with the language." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Dominik Graf's Beloved Sisters (Die Geliebten Schwestern) starring Florian Stetter, Henriette Confurius and Hannah Herzsprung alongside Claudia Messner, Ronald Zehrfeld, Michael Wittenborn, Maja Maranow and Andreas Pietschmann, sharply re-invents the costume drama with an historical fiction centered around the ménage-à-trois love story between writer Friedrich Schiller (Stetter) and the sisters Caroline (Herzsprung) and Charlotte (Confurius) von Lengefeld.

I met up with producer Uschi Reich during the New York Film Festival to discuss her role in bringing the story to the screen. We also discussed Dominik Graf's voice and music, his relationship to Christian Kracht's novel Imperium and Frauke Finsterwalder's Finsterworld film, Caroline Link, the connection between Veit Heiduschka to Michael Haneke and Helge Sasse with Anton Corbijn's...

Dominik Graf's Beloved Sisters arrives at the New York Film Festival, and we've got the trailer, a clip and reviews, including James Lattimer's for Slant: "It's autumn 1787 and the predictably beautiful Charlotte von Lengefeld (Henriette Confurius) has been sent to the court in Weimar, where she's supposed to pick out a future husband of suitable affluence and standing. The only person to catch her eye, though, is famous, yet penniless, poet Friedrich Schiller (Florian Stetter), who eventually follows her back home at the behest of Charlotte's unhappily married sister, Caroline von Beulwitz (Hannah Herzsprung), who finds him equally alluring. Yet just as the stage seems set for a dully impassioned love triangle, the film blossoms instead into a breezily utopian depiction of a ménage á trois whose entirely matter-of-fact presentation sets up an intriguing dissonance with the prim period setting." » - David Hudson...

Dominik Graf's Beloved Sisters arrives at the New York Film Festival, and we've got the trailer, a clip and reviews, including James Lattimer's for Slant: "It's autumn 1787 and the predictably beautiful Charlotte von Lengefeld (Henriette Confurius) has been sent to the court in Weimar, where she's supposed to pick out a future husband of suitable affluence and standing. The only person to catch her eye, though, is famous, yet penniless, poet Friedrich Schiller (Florian Stetter), who eventually follows her back home at the behest of Charlotte's unhappily married sister, Caroline von Beulwitz (Hannah Herzsprung), who finds him equally alluring. Yet just as the stage seems set for a dully impassioned love triangle, the film blossoms instead into a breezily utopian depiction of a ménage á trois whose entirely matter-of-fact presentation sets up an intriguing dissonance with the prim period setting." » - David Hudson...

Dominik Graf has finally properly landed in America, and it's about damn time. The German director, known almost exclusively for a prodigious—and unexportable—output of work for television, has been directing since the 1970s, but only Beloved Sisters, one of this year's Berlinale competitors, has managed to secure proper theatrical distribution in the United States. I don’t know if the time is ripe or, more likely, if this is a mere fluke. Graf’s omnivorous ingestion of German social, political, cultural, and material histories and transformation of their tensions into deeply intelligent, supremely revealing genre dramas ipso facto must eventually create something international distributors think non-Germans might want to see. Then again, previous films by the director seemingly ripe or obvious for English-language audiences, including the Die Hard-like action-siege film Die Katze (1988, which was actually pathetically limitedly shown with an alternate soundtrack in the Us), the zany post-Berlin...

German Films said today that its nine-person jury has selected Dominik Graf’s Beloved Sisters as Germany’s official submission for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar race. The film tells the little-known true story of a ménage-à-trois among Friedrich Schiller and the von Lengefeld sisters, a utopia on the eve of the French Revolution. Florian Stetter, Hannah Herzsprung and Henriette Confurius have the lead roles. “This designation is for me the greatest joy and the confirmation of my work,” producer Uschi Reich said. “What great luck for us all.” Beloved Sisters premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in February and hit German theaters July 31 via Senator Film Verleih. Nominations for the 87th Academy Awards will be announced January 15.

BAFTA said today that American filmmaker David Fincher will discuss his life and career during the group’s A Life in Pictures event next month. Fincher is a two-time Oscar...

Dominik Graf’s ménage-à-trois drama to compete for the Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards.

Dominik Graf’s period drama Beloved Sisters is to represent Germany as the official submission for the 87th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film.

The decision was made today (Aug 27) by an independent jury in Munich, which was appointed by German Films to preside over the selection process.

In a statement explaining its motivation, the nine-person jury chaired by Peter Herrmann said: “Beloved Sisters is a modernly told ménage-à-trois that takes us back to the 18th century with a certain lightness.

“Dominik Graf directed, with his own personal signature and great sensitivity, the story of a moving love affair. The film convinces with the direction of the actors, the images suffused with light, and its very clever and unconventional composition.”

Producer Uschi Reich: “This designation is for me the greatest joy and the confirmation of my work.”

The...

Opening Night – World Premiere

Gone Girl

David Fincher, USA, 2014, Dcp, 150m

David Fincher’s film version of Gillian Flynn’s phenomenally successful best seller (adapted by the author) is one wild cinematic ride, a perfectly cast and intensely compressed portrait of a recession-era marriage contained within a devastating depiction of celebrity/media culture, shifting gears as smoothly as a Maserati 250F. Ben Affleck is Nick Dunne, whose wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) goes missing on the day of their fifth anniversary. Neil Patrick Harris is Amy’s old boyfriend Desi, Carrie Coon (who played Honey in Tracy Letts’s acclaimed production of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?) is Nick’s sister Margo, Kim Dickens (Treme, Friday Night Lights) is Detective Rhonda Boney, and Tyler Perry is Nick’s superstar lawyer Tanner Bolt. At once a grand panoramic vision of middle America, a uniquely disturbing exploration of the fault lines in a marriage,...

Daniel Bruhl is among the cast that will be putting on a modernized adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s “White Nights,” according to Screen Daily. Russian director Tatyana Voronetskaya will be behind the camera, while German-Dutch actress Henriette Confurius is also part of the cast. The lead role, known as the Dreamer, will be filled by an as yet uncast Russian actor. The tale follows our narrator as he meets a young woman, quickly falls in love with her, and then despairs as she reveals she’s still in love with her boyfriend, who has been gone for a year but promised to come [...]

The post Daniel Bruhl to Star in Dostoyevsky Adaptation ‘White Nights’ appeared first on Up and Comers.

Films by Todd Solondz, Ralph Fiennes and Andrei Konchalovsky as well as an adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s White Nights, starring Daniel Brühl, are among 12 projects to be supported by Russia’s Ministry of Culture this year.

Solondz, Fiennes and Bekmambetov are set to join director colleagues Avdotya Smirnova, Bakur Bakuradze, Cedric Klapisch, Igor Voloshin, Ilmar Raag and Sam Rockwell in shooting episodes of the omnibus film Petersburg: A Category Of Feelings.

The project, which is to be produced by Lenfilm Studio in cooperation with Sergey Selyanov’s St Petersburg-based production powerhouse Ctb Company, will invite the filmmakers to present their views of the “Venice of the North” through emotions or qualities whose first letters make up the city’s name: Pleasure, Effort, Trust, Envy, Repose, Shrewdness, Bravery, Uncertainty, Refuge and Glee.

The idea for the project originates from Selyanov, and one of the episodes will be directed by actor-director-producer Fedor Bondarchuk who is also serving as the...

The 64th Berlin International Film Festival may have ended, but acquisition season is still in full swing. Music Box Films has obtained the U.S. and Canadian distribution rights to Berlin competition title "Beloved Sisters," the period romance film by Dominik Graf. Florian Stetter stars as the Romantic era poet Friedrich von Schiller. The film follows Schiller's love affair with the aristocratic von Lengefeld sisters, played by Hannah Herzsprung and Henriette Confurius.  Graf is best known for the German thrillers "The Invincibles" and "A Map of the Heart," the latter of which was a Berlin competition title in 2002. No release date is set.

Music Box has picked up rights in the U.S. and Canada for Beloved Sisters, the German period drama from Dominik Graf that had its world premiere in competition at the Berlin International Film Festival last week. The drama stars Florian Stetter as 18th century romantic poet Friedrich von Schiller. The film focuses on his passionate love affair with the two aristocratic von Lengefeld sisters, played by German actresses Hannah Herzsprung and Henriette Confurius. “Dominik Graf, his wonderful performers and production team have brought the Romantic Era and the lives of Schiller and the von Lengefeld sisters to life for

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