Titel Kino 2/2001(2 Alternativ) - German Films

World Sales Portrait german united distributors
waving her gun! It’s a reflective examination of people and how
they deal with their situations.“
Because german united works closely with buyers, it is able to
evaluate their needs and then discuss with its shareholders and
suppliers how best to place the product. ”That’s our strength,“
says Spahr.
This two way communication is the key to the company’s
continued success, as Spahr is also able to tell her shareholders,
for example, ”This particular customer is looking for action-oriented
programming“ and if it’s not in the pipeline or the archives
german united can then acquire it, ”either from producers or
by entering into co-production.“ And Studio Hamburg and
Bavaria Film have themselves been involved in co-productions
for years.
For independent producers, german united evaluates the program,
turning it over to whichever genre department is most relevant;
Fiction, Children’s, Documentaries, Wildlife or Music.
”We’ve invested once or twice in production,“ says Spahr, ”and
we still do. But it’s basic. Producers should contact us once the
financing is in place. We’ll talk as long as there aren’t any large
financial holes to be filled. Then we’re happy to say what we think
it could fetch and where it could be sold. But we prefer to invest
our money in sales, not production, and rarely make presales.“
World Sales Portrait Progress Film-Verleih
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Specific production responsibilities are shared between the four
partners: NDR for wildlife and music, WDR for documentaries,
both Studio Hamburg and Bavaria Media for fiction. In
fact, of Germany’s ten most successful fiction productions last
year, five came from Bavaria Film and Studio Hamburg. The
threads all come together under the roof of german united.
”As a brand,“ says Spahr, ”german united sells very well.
German programming enjoys a reputation for very high production
values and a way for skillfully conveying difficult material.
That’s something the public broadcasters are especially proud of;
excellent research on contemporary subjects.“
With regard to new media and new ways of selling, while the
Internet is the way of the future, ”the technology is a long way
off. It’s no substitute for everyday distribution activities, visiting a
client and showing them tapes, making personal contact.“
Spahr, who grew up and studied law in Hamburg, started her
distribution career at Studio Hamburg. How she came to
german united was merely a matter of ”being in the right
place at the right time! It was a great experience to watch this
joint vision unfold. It was great fun to watch it work and, thank
God, it has worked!“
THE PROGRESS
REPORT
Last August, Progress Film-Verleih celebrated its fiftieth
birthday, making it Germany’s oldest and still active film
distributor.
“Progress’ history is a rich one,” says managing director Prof.
Jürgen Haase. “Our original owners were the DEFA-
Filmverleih and Sovexport and, in 1950, Progress took over all
DEFA film rights for the then German Democratic Republic
(GDR), as well as distributing them internationally.”
In November 1989 the Berlin Wall fell. Progress was taken
over by the Treuhand, the government privatization body, and
faced an uncertain future.
“I represented one of the negotiating companies, Tellux.” says
Haase. “Together with Drefa GmbH and Kinowelt, we
formed the DEFA-Foundation, which cleared the way for
privatization. The foundation has the rights and we have a
long-term contract to exploit them. I became managing director
in 1997.”
Born in 1945, Haase studied at the German Film & Television
Academy (dffb) in Berlin. He is especially proud of his writerdirector-producer
credit on the German-Turkish co-production,
Gülibek which won, among others, the first prize at the 1984
Berlin Children’s Film Festival. He has also directed and written
TV-movies such as Lieferung nach Hause for ZDF and coauthored
the three-part Tanz auf dem Vulkan for ARD.
Very much coming from the creative side, Haase also produced
such films as Das Spinnennetz, Johannes Passion,
Nikolaikirche, Pinky und der Millionenmops,
Feuerreiter and Mario und der Zauberer. And the professor
title? He is a visiting lecturer at the ”Konrad Wolf“ Academy
of Film & Television in Babelsberg and Bulgaria’s Film Academy and
School of Art in Sofia.
Fifty-one years on, Progress is involved in the world-wide sales,
theatrical and excerpt distribution of some 10,000 films, comprising
800 DEFA features, 3,000 features from Eastern Europe,
and several thousand animated and documentary films; an
extensive archive with the emphasis on the GDR; “forty-four years
of this country and its social system,” says Haase. Two years ago,
Progress signed a long-term exclusive contract for the worldwide
rights to Vietnam’s film archives.
Handling a treasure trove of film history calls
for skilled marketing
“The contemporary factor always plays a role,” says Haase.
“For example, ten years after the fall of the Wall or reunification.
SK