Press Voices (Selection)

This festival runs full on the power of newcomer filmmakers (...) I say it's more the raw surprise of an early Euro-Sundance. Or tag it by the neo-hippest Euro buzzword for "hip" - "chav".
Variety International, L.M. Kit Carson, 13 December 2004

It's not for nothing that directors like Jim Jarmusch and Rainer Werner Fassbinder, who is honoured with a retrospective this year, began their international career at the festival Mannheim. Beside a look at the borders of society, at people who cross borders and live on the margin of society many films dealt with the process of becoming an adult and of self-identification. The Swiss-Romanian co-production "Ryna" for example tells the story of a 16-year-old girl from the Romanian danube delta that is raised like a boy by her despotic father and that has to pay hard for her femininity. (...) "Ryna" was already shown at the festival for Eastern Europe in Cottbus and therefore almost was disqualified for competition in Mannheim. Apparently the screening in Cottbus was not officially allowed by the director nor the producres though. The filmmakers preferred to show the film at the Mannheim festival which is more interesting for distributors. This tug-of-war proves how hard competition between the 90 German films is. Having a strong sense for new talents and interesting stories Mannheim-Heidelberg has so far managed to sustain its position.
Julia Macher, 29. November 2005

(...) Barbe’s film was exemplary for this festival of premieres. A forum for debut filmmakers, it is always good for a surprise (...) The focus in competition films was clearly on this grey area between fake documentaries ad half-documentary feature films.
More and more directors are not afraid anymore to approach reality with a concrete script in their pockets.
Andreas Rosenfelder, 24. November 2005

Film-makers to pitch 55 projects at Mannheim Meetings
New feature projects by Ireland’s Johnny Gogan, Georgia’s Nana Djordjadze, Poland’s Robert Glisnki and Nigeria’s Balufu Bakupa-Kanyinda are among 55 films from Europe, Canada, Latin America and Africa with a total production volume of 84m being pitched at this year’s Mannheim Meetings co-production market. From November 21 - 25, 600 pre-arranged one-to-one meetings will be held with potential co-production or co-financing partners, and another 200 informal discussions are likely.
Dr. Martin Blaney, 17. November 2005

Festival director Michael Koetz and his team present mostly international newcomer talents this year, too, films that have not yet been screened at big festivals. Mannheim can therefore be recommended to German and international industry professionals
who can also attend the MANNHEIM MEETINGS for International Coproduction and for European Sales&Distribution where exchanges between producers,
editors, film buyers and sales agents are fostered.
Stefanie Zimmermann, 14. November 2005

This year’s MANNHEIM MEETINGS focus on efficient marketing. Over 150 producers are expected to come. According to the organisers more projects have been submitted to the coproduction meetings than in 2004. Yet, the number of participating projects has been reduced to improve the match making aspect of the meetings.
Reinhard Kleber, 15. Oktober 2005

The adventure of a debut film is in the centre: often rough, unpolished, always witful stories with a defiant will for improvisation. During the first four days Mannheim-Heidelberg showed a versatile face. Not only in competition and in the International Discoveries section. There was a workshop an „ethics in film journalism“, a conference on consequences of digital film and at the MANNHEIM MEETINGS international co-productions were negotiated (...) This versatile mixture of low budget productions and whimsical originality makes Mannheim interesting for distributors, too.
Wolf Hamdorf, 21. November 2005