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It was red hot outside but Munich is a contender for Europe’s most chilled film festival. As the mercury soared, the industry activity at the Munich International Film Festival was, as usual, centered around the Amerikahaus, a cultural institution that fosters transatlantic relations. Festival attendees sought out shady areas in the gardens for al fresco meetings.

Stellan Skarsgård ventured inside to collect his CineMerit Award, while the other recipient of the honor, Gillian Anderson, took to the stage of the Deutsches Theater to receive hers. Their movies – Joachim Trier’s Sentimental Value and Marianne Elliott’s The Salt Path – played at the Festival and other highlights thus far include Elena Oxman’s Outerlands taking the first Queer Media Society award for a feature film. Uta Brieswitz’s American Sweatshop also played at the festival and she gave an industry masterclass, hosted by Deadline, talking about her film and clueing...

Pauline Durand-Vialle has been appointed as the new executive director of the European Audiovisual Observatory (Eao).

Durand-Vialle joins from the Federation of European Screen Directors (Fera), where she has been CEO since February 2014.

She will take office on September 15, replacing Susanne Nikoltchev who retires this year after a career spanning 27 years at the Eao, first as head of the legal department and then executive director.

Durand-Vialle has previously served two terms as chair of the Observatory’s Advisory Committee, from 2021-2024, so knows the organisation well.

In a statement on her new appointment, she expressed “eagerness and a strong commitment...

Films by Richard Linklater, Oliver Laxe and Joachim Trier are among 53 titles selected by the Munich International Film Festival for its four main competition strands CineMasters, CineVision, CineRebels and CineCoPro.Munich runs from June 27 to July 6.

CineMasters

Oliver Laxe’s Sirat will be joined by another two Cannes 2025 Official Competition titles - Richard Linklater’s Nouvelle Vague and Mascha Schilinski’s award-winning Sound Of Falling - to screen in the CineMasters competition for the €15,000 CineMasters Award. The prize is being sponsored for the first time this year by Dorint Hotels & Resorts and is presented to the director of the best international film.

Mahdi Fleifel’s To A Land Unknown, Gábor Reisz’s Explanation for Everything, Federico Luis’ Simon Of The Mountain and Minh Quý Trương’s Viet And Nam, were the winners of the four main competitive strands of this year’s Munich International Film Festival (Miff) which closed on Saturday July 6.

The festival’s biggest award, the €100,000 CineCoPro award, provided by Fff Bayern to be invested in a future co-production, was presented to François Morisset’s company Salaud Morisset, the German co-producer of To A Land Unknown.

The first narrative feature by Palestinian filmmaker Fleifel is a refugee drama about two Palestinians stranded in Athens.

Viggo Mortensen did not plan to be in The Dead Don’t Hurt but had to dust off his cowboy boots and appear in the movie when another, unnamed, actor dropped out. That meant Mortensen added starring in, to writing, producing, directing and creating the music for the Western.

“I had not planned to act in the movie,” Mortensen said at the Munich International Film Festival. “The actor who had the part decided at one point late in preparation stages, after being with us for many months, to do something outside. So we tried to replace him with an actor who was younger than me, an actor the age as it was written originally, and was well-known enough for the financiers to say ok.”

Having failed to find the right person with the right availability, Mortensen had to add starring in The Dead Don’t Hurt to his to-do list. “In the...

The 68th BFI London Film Festival will open with the world premiere of Steve McQueen’s Blitz on October 9.

The Second World War drama is an Apple Original feature starring Saoirse Ronan, Harris Dickinson, Paul Weller, Kathy Burke, Stephen Graham, Benjamin Clementine and newcomer Elliott Heffernan.

This is the third time McQueen has opened Lff, following Widows in 2018 and Mangrove in 2020. The UK director also received the BFI Fellowship at the 2016 edition of the festival.

“Blitz is a movie about Londoners,” said McQueen. ”It honours the spirit of what and how Londoners endured during the Blitz, but also explores the...

Sigourney Weaver will be honoured with Venice Film Festival’s Golden Lion for lifetime achievement.

The US actress will receive the award at the 81st edition of the festival (August 28 – September 7).

Weaver is a three-time Oscar nominee best known for the Alien, Avatar and Ghostbusters franchises while she has also received critical acclaim for roles in Gorillas In The Mist, Working Girl and The Ice Storm - winning a supporting actress Bafta for the latter.

“To be gifted this award is a privilege I share with all the filmmakers and collaborators I have worked with throughout the years. I proudly...

Oscar winner Kate Winslet will be honored at this year’s Munich international film festival with the festival’s CineMerit Award for extraordinary achievement.

Winslet will attend the German festival to present the European premiere of her new film, Lee, where she plays war correspondent and photographer Lee Miller. She will receive the CineMerit Award after the Munich screening of Lee and will take part in a sit-down discussion.

Directed by Ellen Kuras, Lee premiered in Toronto last year. Marion Cotillard, Andrea Riseborough, Noémie Merlant, Josh O’Connor, and Andy Samberg co-star. Winslet is also a producer on the film. StudioCanal is releasing Lee in Germany, bowing in theaters here in September.

“We’re delighted that Kate Winslet will be celebrating the film’s European premiere with us in Munich,” said festival director Christoph Gröner and artistic co-director Julia Weigl in a joint statement. “Lee is a wonderfully intense character portrait.

Kate Winslet will be honored with the Munich International Film Festival’s CineMerit Award. The Oscar winner’s movie Lee will also have its European premiere at the Festival.

Winslet joins the Jessica Lange, as previously announced, in receiving the Cinemerit accolade this year.

Lee tells the story of war correspondent and photographer Lee Miller. Winslet plays Lee and was also a producer on the film, which was the feature directorial debut of cinematographer Ellen Kuras (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind). The movie had its world premiere at Toronto. The cast includes Marion Cotillard, Andrea Riseborough, Josh O’Connor and Andy Samberg.

In its review of the movie, Deadline said it is a “thoughtful attempt to step back from what Miller actually did and to focus on the way she actually did it, usually with little encouragement and hardly any gratitude.”

“We’re delighted that Kate Winslet will be celebrating...

Two-time Oscar-winning actress Jessica Lange will receive this year’s CineMerit Award at the Munich International Film Festival, honoring her “remarkable contributions to the world of cinema.”

In addition to her two Academy Awards — for best supporting actress in Tootsie in 1983 and best actress in Blue Sky in 1995 — Lange can point to a total of six Oscar nominations, three Emmy wins (from 10 nods), five Golden Globes (from 16 noms) and one Tony award.

Alongside her impressive film career, Lange has more recently become something of a muse for Ryan Murphy, appearing in multiple seasons of American Horror Story — she’s picked up five Emmy nominations and two wins for the FX drama — and has been dazzling as Joan Crawford alongside Susan Sarandon’s Bette Davis in the FX/Hulu miniseries Feud: Bette and Joan.

Lange is currently up for a second Tony, nominated for her lead performance in Paula Vogel’s Mother Play,...

The German film industry is eagerly awaiting the appointment of the Berlin Film Festival’s new director, expected to be announced tomorrow, and as the guessing game surrounding the choice shifts into high gear, one thing looks increasingly clear: the new head will face considerable financial and political challenges at the Berlinale.

Speculation in the local industry has been rife with likely candidates to succeed Carlo Chatrian and Mariëtte Rissenbeek, who have co-led the Berlinale as artistic and executive directors since 2020 and will step down after this year’s edition when their respective mandates end.

A number of potential contenders have now quashed those rumors, among them Matthijs Wouter Knol, CEO and director of the European Film Academy, who made it clear to Variety that he was not in the running and was very content in his current post; Kirsten Niehuus, head of funding org Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, who said she...

The festival closed on July 1.

Tunisian filmmaker Kaouther Ben Hania’s experimental mix of documentary and fiction Four Daughters won the main €50,000 Arri award for best international film in the CineMasters competition at Filmfest München on July 1.

The film’s German co-producer Thanassis Karathanos of Berlin-based Twenty Twenty Vision Filmproduktion quipped he had written so many cheques to Arri in the past and it was nice to be having one now coming in the other direction, when accepting the award at the festival’s closing ceremony,

Four Daughters is the second collaboration between Karathanos and Martin Hampel’s Twenty Twenty...

The festival runs June 23 - July 1.

Films by Jessica Hausner, Elegance Bratton and Sebastian Silva are among 36 titles selected for the Filmfest München’s three international competition strands, CineMasters, CineVision and CineRebels. The festival runs June 23-July 1.

CineMasters

Hausner’s Club Zero will be joined by another four Cannes competition titles - Aki Kaurismäki’s Fallen Leaves, Marco Bellocchio’s Kidnapped, Kaouther Ben Hania’s Four Daughters, and Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Monster - to screen in Munich’s CineMasters competition for the €50,000 Arri Award which is presented to the producers of the best international film.

The 12-title line-up also includes...

Exclusive: Leo Leigh’s directorial debut Sweet Sue and Vincent Perez’s fencing film The Edge Of The Blade are among six international films set to get their world premiere at the upcoming Filmfest München (June 23 – July 1), which this year celebrates its 40th edition. Scroll down for full list and details.

The large summertime festival has been known for premiering German films but this year has collated a stronger collection of global debuts, partly inspired by the launch at the event last year of Marcelo Gomes’ Brazilian film Paloma.

The six international debuts — heralding from U.S., Canada, UK, France, and Israel — are each looking for a German distributor. Directors and talent will be attending the screenings.

Leigh is the son of celebrated British auteur Mike Leigh. His BBC Films-backed comedy-drama, sold by HanWay, follows a woman back on the dating scene who embarks on a relationship with a...

Cameroon’s Cyrielle Raingou has won the Kirch Foundation Award, which comes with a €5,000 cash prize, for her film project “I’m Coming for You.”

The award comes at the conclusion of the first edition of Munich Film Up!, an eight-month mentoring and residency program for film school graduates that started in November.

The program was created by the Pop Up Film Residency, in partnership with the University of Television and Film Munich (Hff München) and the Munich Film Festival.

The six filmmakers who took part in the program were:

Lana Bregar, Slovenia (Film school: Agfrt Ljubljana) with “Dark Head”

Erec Brehmer, Germany (Film school: Hff München) with “Lightness and Weight”

Anastasiya Gruba, Ukraine (Film school: Kyiv University) with “Women Suicide Season”

Loïc Hobi, Switzerland/France (Film school: Ecole de la Cité) with “Crypto Lover”

Cyrielle Raingou, Cameroon (Film school: Doc Nomads Master) with “I’m Coming for You”

Pratik Thakare,...

The conference will form the centrepiece of the festival’s industry programme.

The FIlmfest München is traditionally the last opportunity for the German filmmaking community to meet up before the summer break, and this year’s edition has an industry programmed with a pronounced international dimension.

One of this year’s highlights is the two-day Cine CoPro Conference (June 29-30 ), hosted by the Filmfest and the Bavarian regional film fund Fff Bayern, in which around 40 German and UK producers, directors and screenwriters will come together to discuss opportunities for co-production between the two countries.

“he first thing that needs to...

The German festival is running from June 23 to July 2.

Marie Kreutzer’s Corsage will launch Filmfest München in an opening gala at the German city’s Isar Philharmonic concert hall today

The Filmfest is screening 120 films from 52 countries, including 35 world premieres. Italian actress Alba Rohrwacher will be presented with this year’s CineMerit Award, while there will be a homage to German filmmaker Doris Dörrie with the premiere of her latest film The Pool.

Festival director Diana Iljine and artistic director Christoph Gröner talk to Screen about this year’s event and the Filmfest’s significance as a launchpad for international careers of German films.

The 39th edition of the Munich Film Festival, which runs June 23-July 2, will screen 120 films from 52 countries, including 35 world premieres, such as “Paloma” by Marcelo Gomes, one of several films in the festival that tackles the subject of trans identities.

The three international competition sections will feature numerous highlights from the Cannes Film Festival, including “Corsage,” which opens the event. Vicky Krieps was honored in Cannes with the best actress award in the Un Certain Regard section for her performance as Empress Elisabeth of Austria, also known as “Sissi.”

Four films come to Munich fresh from Cannes’ main competition: “Leila’s Brothers” by Iranian director Saeed Roustayi, about a family’s struggle for survival in an Iran economically weakened by Western sanctions and consumed by corruption; “Pacifiction” by Albert Serra, in which Benoît Magimel excels as a conflicted police commissioner; “The Eight Mountains,” directed by Charlotte Vandermeersch and Felix van Groeningen,...

Festival has programmed 120 films from 52 countries

The Munich Film Festival (June 23 – July 2) is showcasing many of the highlights from last month’s Cannes Film Festival when it returns with a full programme of features for the first time since 2019.

Munich pivoted online in 2020 due to the pandemic, and programmed a reduced number of films in 2021, mainly in open-air locations.

Munich is opening this year with Marie Kreutzer’s Corsage, which saw Vicky Krieps win the Un Certain Regard best performance award for her portrayal of Empress Elisabeth of Austria.

Corsage will play in Munich’s main Cinemasters Competition, alongside Cannes...

Festival has programmed 120 films from 52 countries

The Munich Film Festival (June 23 – July 2) is showcasing many of the highlights from last month’s Cannes Film Festival when it returns with a full programme of features for the first time since 2019.

Munich pivoted online in 2020 due to the pandemic, and programmed a reduced number of films in 2021, mainly in open-air locations.

Munich is opening this year with Marie Kreutzer’s Corsage, which saw Vicky Krieps win the Un Certain Regard best performance award for her portrayal of Empress Elisabeth of Austria.

Corsage will play in Munich’s main Cinemasters Competition, alongside Cannes...

Following the cancellation of the Munich Film Festival in April, the event was declared dead for this year. Yet a re-think has seen the creation of a Film Fest Munich pop-up festival, which will take place at a drive-in cinema and an open-air venue.

Starting on July 15 and running through to the end of August, the festival will show seven German films as world premieres. These include Maggie Peren’s “Hello Again,” which will be distributed by Warner Bros., veteran director Klaus Lemke’s “A Call Girl For Ghosts” and the opener, actor Kida Khodr Ramadan’s directorial debut “In Berlin Wächst Kein Orangenbaum.”

Variety can also exclusively reveal that the festival will end on Aug. 26 with the German premiere of Ulrich Thomsen’s “Gutterbee,” with the Danish actor and director in attendance.

Munich Festival Artistic director Christoph Gröner says the decision to cancel the German film festival this year,...

Organizers behind Germany’s Munich Film Festival, set to take place June 25 to July 4, decided to call off the annual event completely rather than postpone or go digital — a choice that came down to concerns around rights, piracy and accessibility.

The idea to postpone was discounted because of an already congested fall film festival schedule, which will soon leave little to no space to add events. Meanwhile, it’s still unclear when widespread coronavirus lockdowns will abate so that large gatherings can happen. Germany’s own lockdown was enacted March 22, and extended until April 19, while France and Italy’s lockdown measures will remain in place until May.

The assessment over whether Munich should put on a digital festival, however, was more intense. “We feel there are very limiting factors in going digital when you are a festival that plays a lot of films and tracks a lot of industry audiences,...