Tykwer/Weingartner/Akin Find Bank in Hamburg

Screen Daily has gathered some more details on the upcoming
financing slate for the Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein Film Fund. The FFHSH is a
film funding entity that provides subsidies for both features and TV
productions that promise high-quality content as well as showcasing the states
of Hamburg
and Schleswig-Holstein. As we reported yesterday, the institution has funneled $1.26
million into Fatih Akin’s upcoming comedy Soul Kitchen. That represents the
largest single contribution of a $4.8 million initiative to fund new films by
local auteurs Tom Tykwer (left), Hans Weingartner (center), and Akin (right).
Also included in the allocation is funding for international co-productions helmed
by France’s Eleonore Faucher (A Common Thread), Norway’s
Sara Johnsen (Kissed by Winter) and Poland’s Radek Wegrzyn, the lone
fresh face of the bunch.

Details are scarce on the various projects. Along with the Akin’s
comedy, Wegrzyn will be mining for laughs with Father, Son & Holy Cow starring Polish institution
and Kieslowski favorite Zbigniew Zamachowski (Trois Couleurs) as a
recently widowed man who comes to believe his late wife has returned as a cow. Faucher
will take the biopic route with Gamines, chronicling the life of actress Sylvie
Testud. Johnsen’s Upperdog rounds out the group with her ‘portrait of four lost
twentysomethings.’

Of most interest – at least for me – is the $310,000 given
to the Herbstfilm produced omnibus Deutschland 09. Featuring segments by the
aforementioned trio of Akin/Tykwer/Weingartner along with Isabella Stever
(Gisela) and Dominic Graf (The Red Cockatoo), the project is a platform for the
filmmakers to experiment with the form as they offer their personal insights on
the current political and social climate in Germany. The film is a nod to 1978’s
Germany
in Autumn featuring shorts by Sinkel and Fassbinder. If it’s half as
interesting as the original we should be in for a real treat.

No info on what Tykwer and Weingartner are cooking up on the
feature side respectively through this financing deal. Tykwer is currently putting
the finishing touches on the Clive Owen/Naomi Watts thriller The International for
early 2009. Weingartner last hit the screens with 2007’s Free Rainer. More as
we get it.