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Exclusive: Concourse Media has acquired worldwide sales rights to In the Eye of the Storm, a six-part documentary series about lightning rod economist, whistleblower and politician Yanis Varoufakis, who famously resigned from his post as Greece’s minister of finance in 2015.

During his struggle to resolve the debt crisis in the most bankrupt nation in Europe, he befriended and battled with political heavyweights including Emmanuel Macron, Christine Lagarde, Wolfgang Schäuble, Bernie Sanders, Angela Merkel and Barack Obama.

Since his clashes with some of the mightiest institutions on the planet, Varoufakis – celebrated by some, vilified by others – is now a recognizable political figure in the western world and a frequent talking head on news stations including the BBC and CNN. His memoir, Adults In The Room, was named by The Guardian as one of the top 100 most important books of the 21st Century.

Throughout the series, Varoufakis reflects on the challenges faced by the European Union,...

Far too many adults, in far too many rooms, have far too many repetitive conversations about the arcane ins-and-outs of EU policymaking in Costa-Gavras’ maddeningly unfocused “Adults in the Room.” Amounting as much to a hagiography of erstwhile Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis (solidly played by Christos Loulis) as a very long-exposure snapshot of the closed-door 2015 negotiations when Greece attempted to revisit the disastrous terms of its EU debt repayment program, the film is worthily intended, meticulously researched and very dull. “I know you’re tired of this Greek drama — so are we Greeks!” quips Yanis at one point and if the play on “Greek drama” is as close as the movie gets to a bona fide joke, it is also a wild overstatement. Events here barely feel dramatized at all, let alone to the point that anyone kills his father or sleeps with his mother.

Apart from Yanis, whose...

Bernd Neumann, Germany’s former State Minister for Culture and Media, has weighed in with his own comments about the discussion on the German Federal Film Fund (Dfff) spend incentive.

Speaking in his current capacity as the president of the German Federal Film Board (Ffa), Neumann said that it was ¨regrettable¨ that, ¨in spite of the Dfff’s outstanding success and the commitment of [his successor] Minister Grütters,¨, finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble could not be persuaded to retain the fund’s budget at least at € 60m for 2015.

It was learnt a week ago that the Angela Merkel administration is likely to cut the Dfff’s budget by € 10m to € 50m as from next year.

Neumann had been the political architect of the ¨German spend¨ initiative which was introduced in 2007 and has been instrumental in making Germany an attractive location for international film productions.

A current example of a major international production benefiting from the Dfff is Steven Spielberg’s untitled...

The Berlinale has cut its discounts for festival and market accreditation for next year’s film festival.

The discount for the standard festival accreditation, which had been introduced by the Berlinale for its 60th edition has been abolished completely for the upcoming 65th edition (Feb 5-15, 2015).

The regular rate for the standard accreditation of €125 - which had already been increased by 25% to €100 at last year’s Berlinale - now applies for the Nov 30 and Jan 6 deadlines.

Offers for the market badge (€250 instead of €300) or the combined festival accreditation and market badge (€375 instead of €425) see €50 being shaved off the discounts compared to the previous year (€200 and €325, respectively).

As for previous editions of the Berlinale and European Film Market, a late fee of €50 will be incurred in addition to the regular rates for any registrations made from Jan 7.

Plans for Distributors Network

The Berlinale’s newly established World Cinema Fund (Wcf) Europe programme plans to create a Wcf Distributors...

Germany’s film producers have expressed ¨exceptional regret¨ at learning that Angela Merkel’s cabinet has proposed reducing the annual budget for the Dfff ¨German spend¨ incentive by another €10m to €50m in the global federal budget for 2015.

In a first reaction, the German Producers Alliance said that it welcomed the statement by the new State Minister for Culture and Media Monika Grütters that she would push in future budget negotiations for the current level of €60m to be retained.

However, the German film community had already been disappointed by Bernd Neumann’s successor earlier this year when she seem to go back on pronouncements made at the Berlinale in February to keep the Dfff’s budget at €70m when she indicated at the German Film Awards in May that €60m would be her goal.

It remains to be seen whether she has the political clout to hold her own - and the interests of the German...

Plans by the German government to slash the budget for incentive programme Dfff by €10m ($13.8m) has surprised the film community.

In her first public appearance before representatives of the film industry on the eve of this year’s Berlinale, the new State Minister for Culture and Media Monika Grütters had told the audience at the German Producers Guild conference that she intended to continue the good work achieved by her predecessor in the post Bernd Neumann.

At the time, Grütters pointed out that the budget for the Dfff had been increased from €60m to €70m ($83m to $97m) in 2013 “and we would like to leave it at least at this”.

She had also said that the coalition agreement between the Cdu/Csu and Spd had given a “clear signal” for Germany as a production hub by proposing that the Dfff .

However, less than a month later, finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble submitted a draft budget which envisaged...

European Commissioner Androulla Vassiliou also talks about future funding for Locarno festival.

Official negotiations between Switzerland and the European Union (EU) on membership of the future Creative Europe programme are likely to begin in a matter of weeks.

Speaking to ScreenDaily at Ascona’s exclusive hideaway Castello Del Sole during this year’s Locarno Film Festival, European Commissioner Androulla Vassiliou revealed that she had an informal talk with Federal Councillor and Interior Minister Alain Berset about extending Switzerland’s membership of the ccurrent Media 2007 into the new framework programme.

“He personally said that he wants Switzerland to participate in both strands of Creative Europe for Media and Culture,” she reported. “There are some difficulties which I understand because they need the approval of all of the Cantons for the Culture part of it, so there may be some delays. But, for the Media strand, we can start immediately in September to get the mandate from the European...