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Zeitgeist Films and Kino Lorber have acquired all US rights to Ido Fluk’s German drama Koln 75 from Bankside Films.

Zeitgeist will release the film theatrically in New York this autumn with a national rollout to follow.

Premiered at this year’s Berlinale, the film tells the real life story of jazz pianist Keith Jarrett’s 1975 concert in Cologne and the teenage promoter who organised the event, which resulted in the best-selling solo album in jazz history.

Mala Emde, John Magaro and Michael Chernus star for writer-director Fluk. Sol Bondy and Fred Burle produced, with Oren Moverman, Lillian Lasalle,...

Exclusive: Zeitgeist Films, in association with Kino Lorber, has acquired from Bankside Films all U.S. rights to Ido Fluk’s Köln 75, which tells the inside story behind Keith Jarrett’s fabled record-breaking 1975 concert in Cologne, Germany.

Zeitgeist Films will release the film theatrically at the IFC Center in New York this fall with a national rollout to follow.

Starring Mala Emde, John Magaro, and Michael Chernus, the film received four Lola Award nominations in Germany including Best Picture and has crossed one million dollars at the German box office with more than 100,000 admissions.

The film sold to multiple territories following its Special Gala premiere at the 2025 Berlinale in February and is scheduled to open internationally in the coming months.

Keith Jarrett’s legendary performance in January 1975 nearly didn’t happen. Based on a true story, Köln 75 follows how the concert was conceived and orchestrated by the efforts...

Ido Fluk’s Köln 75 unfolds the night when an 18-year-old promoter named Vera Brandes risked everything to bring Keith Jarrett’s improvised solo concert to life at the Cologne Opera House in January 1975. Directed and written by Fluk, the film stars John Magaro as the moody, perfectionist Jarrett; Mala Emde and Susanne Wolff as Vera in youth and midlife, respectively; Michael Chernus as the wry jazz critic Michael Watts; and Alexander Scheer as Ecm founder Manfred Eicher.

At once a coming-of-age comedy, a backstage drama, and a self-aware historical pageant, the film weaves voice-over commentary into its storytelling, reminding us that sometimes the scaffold matters as much as the masterpiece it supports.

What feels vital here is the collision of spontaneous artistry and resourceful spirit—two forces that almost let the show be canceled. As jazz fascinates me for its leap into the unknown, Köln 75 feels like a...

Oscar contenders September 5 and The Seed of the Sacred Fig, and Andreas Dresen’s historic drama From Hilde, With Love are the frontrunners for this year’s German Film Awards, also called the Lolas, Germany’s equivalent of the Oscars.

September 5, Tim Fehlbaum’s real-life thriller based on the terrorist attacks on the 1972 Munich Olympics, picked up 10 nominations, including for best film and best director, as well as a supporting actress nom for Leonie Benesch, who plays a translator for the U.S. television network broadcasting the attacks live to the world.

Second and third in the running are Dresen’s From Hilde, With Love, which picked up seven Lola nominations, including for best film and best director, with Mohammad Rasoulof’s Iranian drama The Seed of the Sacred Fig right behind with six.

Rasoulof’s depiction of an Iranian family torn apart by conflicting loyalties to an increasingly oppressive Tehran regime,...

Exclusive: Bankside has inked a slew of sales on Ido Fluk’s Köln 75 following its Special Gala premiere at the Berlinale this month.

The largely well-received film has sold to Bulgaria (Beta), Canada (Level Film), Czech/Slovak (Aqs), Eastern Europe excluding Poland (HBO), Former Yugoslavia (Discovery), France (Metopolitan), Hungary (Budapest Film), Israel (Naschon/Red Cape), Italy (Lucky Red), Middle East (Front Row), Scandinavia (Sf Studios), South Korea (The Coup) and Spain (Selecta Vision).

Alamode Film holds distribution rights for German-speaking Europe and will be releasing the film in March on more than 200 screens, September Film for Benelux and Madness for Poland. Discussions are ongoing for distribution in both UK and U.S.

The English and German-language pic tells the story behind one of the best-selling jazz records of all time, Keith Jarrett’s 1975 Köln Concert, how it almost didn’t happen, and how one formidable German teenager, Vera Brandes,...

On January 24, 1975, Keith Jarrett gave a solo piano performance at the Opera House in Cologne, Germany. The concert lasted a little over an hour, it was entirely improvised, and it was recorded and turned into a double album, “The Köln Concert,” released later that year. It became the best-selling solo album in jazz history, as well as the best-selling piano album. And when you listen to it you can hear why.

The 1970s were a piano-man age. Think Billy Joel and Elton John, and also Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock and Jan Hammer and Jarrett. There are Keith Jarrett albums that have more pyrotechnical dazzle than “The Köln Concert”. But “The Köln Concert,” for all its joyful tumult, exudes a vibe that’s very much of its mellowed-out era. It’s exultant but soothing. At times it evokes the pastoral moods that would make the New Age pianist George Winston so popular,...

2025 is shaping up to be a significant year in the life of Berlin-based production company One Two Films, run by Sol Bondy and Fred Burle.

The pair produced Ido Fluk’s well-received jazz tale Köln 75, which world premiered over the weekend as a Berlinale Special.

Burle also co-produced Ira Sach’s Peter Hujar’s Day, starring Ben Whishaw and Rebecca Hall, which had its international premiere at the Berlinale following its debut at Sundance last month.

They followArmandfrom Norwegian filmmaker Halfdan Ullmann Tøndel, which premiered in Cannes Un Certain Regard last May winning the Camera d’Or for best debut feature,...

Crowds of filmmakers, producers and actors braved the frigid temperatures on Saturday to attend the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg’s annual outdoor soiree at the riverside Holzmark venue to celebrate Germany’s most successful regional funder and bid farewell to outgoing CEO Kirsten Niehuus, who is stepping down later this year after two decades at the helm.

Among the throngs of warmly dressed guests were Volker Schlöndorff, Martin Moszkowicz, Tom Tykwer, Lana Wachowski, Sam Riley, Matthias Schweighöfer, Aaron Altaras, Leo Altaras, Florence Kasumba, Sunnyi Melles, Lars Eidinger, Nicolette Krebitz, Helena Zengel, Kida Khodr Ramadan, Karoline Herfurth, Julia von Heinz, Heike Makatsch, Philippe Bober, Albrecht Schuch, Helena Zengel and Annabelle Mandeng.

Kirsten Niehuus, Volker Schlöndorff

“It’s been a fun ride,” Niehuus told Variety.

“I think we really had it all. When I started 20 years ago, the capital region of Berlin was not the place to be for film in Germany. That developed over the past 20 years,...

by Elisa Giudici

Three more reviews for you from the 75th edition of the Berlin Film Festival, all of them successful films, too.

KÖLN 75 by Ido Fluk (Belgium/Poland/Germany)

The word that best describes this film is energetic. While it firmly belongs to a well-trodden genre, Köln 75 immediately stands out for the sheer force and irresistible vitality of its young protagonist. That energy pulses through this fast-paced, sharp-witted musical biopic, which engages directly with its audience, frequently breaking the fourth wall to recount a remarkable yet nearly unthinkable chapter of 1970s music history.

The film centers on the legendary Köln Concert, Keith Jarrett’s solo performance that would later become an iconic album. What makes the story feel so fresh, though, is its unexpected perspective...

Keith Jarrett’s 1975 double album, The Köln Concert, recorded at the Cologne Opera House earlier that year, sold over four million copies. If you flipped through the album stacks of just about anyone who considered themselves a collector of cool vinyl in the ‘70s, you were likely to come across the famous black-and-white cover shot of the American jazz pianist, eyes closed, hunched over the keys. The live recording of improvised solo piano composition is music to lose yourself in, swirling and transporting, spiritual and transcendent. Jarrett plays with intense feeling, which makes his free-flowing keyboard magic unexpectedly moving.

Ido Fluk’s Köln 75 tells the story of how the landmark concert threatened to fall apart, right up until a half-hour before the 11 p.m. show was scheduled to start. John Magaro is terrific as Jarrett, a once-in-a-generation talent who was sleep-deprived, suffering from acute back pain and disdainful of the...

In 1975, Vera Brandes, then an 18-year-old student and part-time promoter, organized a concert for Keith Jarrett in Cologne, a recording of which became “The Köln Concert,” the best-selling solo jazz album ever.

Half a century later, director Ido Fluk is in Berlin premiering “Köln 75” about the woman behind this monumental moment in jazz history. One that, ironically, Jarrett has no desire to revive. Fluk speaks to Variety about the fun film – starring John Magaro, recently seen in “September 5,” as Keith Jarrett and rising German star Mala Emde as Vera Brandes – and why it was important “to give Vera the attention, the limelight that she deserves.”

How did the project germinate?

I read a story somewhere in which Vera was mentioned. And I was like: “That’s kind of interesting: she really made this happen, and she’s not getting much attention for it.” I thought it would make a really interesting film.

John Magaro is the kind of actor you discover, like a personal secret. Maybe he first caught your eye in The Big Short, as the geeky stand out among a pack of slick, self-interested traders; grabbed you as Yael Stone’s dreamy prison pen pal in Orange Is the New Black love story, or won you over as Arthur, in Celine Song’s Past Lives, as the husband on the outside looking in as his wife Nora (Greta Lee) reunites and rekindles with her childhood friend from Korea. I first spotted him playing a New Jersey drummer desperate to make it big in David Chase’s Not Fade Away (2012), but my come-to-Magaro moment was his performance as Cookie in Kelly Reichardt’s First Cow. His quietly devastating depiction of male friendship and quiet yearning was the on-screen standout of 2019.

More recently, Magaro has been getting attention for Oscar contender September 5, where he plays a U.

Germany’s film industry may have been hit hard by the economic slowdown, resulting in an overall gloomy outlook, but it’s still celebrating the biggest number ever of local films and co-productions at this year’s Berlinale and looking forward to a diverse lineup of 2025 releases, among them a number of high-profile sequels.

Compounding the sector’s overall predicament was the collapse of the federal government in November, forcing snap elections scheduled for Feb. 23. The political crisis left an ambitious reform of the country’s federal film funding system only partially implemented and a matter to be tackled by the next government.

The industry nevertheless welcomed the current government’s last-minute extension and increase of two key funding incentives in December that has ensured planning security for producers, studio operators and production service providers.

In the meantime, the local film community is cheering the strong showing of German titles at the Berlin Film Festival.

When she was 16, Mala Emde liked to hang out in jazz bars and talk to strange men.

“I was a weird teenager,” says the German actress, now 28. “I think I was just scared of everything people my age were doing. There was something comforting for me in going to a jazz bar and talking to older, more experienced people about this music I knew nothing about.”

These days, when it comes to jazz, Emde can hold her own. In Köln 75, which has its world premiere on Feb.16 at the Berlin Film Festival as part of the Berlinale Special lineup, she plays the real-life Vera Brandes, another weird teenager with a taste for jazz bars. At 18, Brandes organized a concert in Cologne for jazz pianist Keith Jarrett. The recording of Jarrett’s totally improvised performance became the best-selling solo jazz album of all time and the best-selling piano recording ever.

The...

Carla Simon’sRomerïa andIldiko Enyedi’sSilent Friendare among the 15 features to have received grants fromEurimages’ inaugural Film Marketing & Audience Development Support Programme.

The recipients also include two Berlinale films: Ameer Fakher Eldin’s Competition titleYunan andIdo Fluk’s Köln 75, which will have its world premiere as a Berlinale Special title.

Scroll down for the full list

The films will each receive a non-repayable grant of up to€50,000. Films must have signed a deal memo or contract with an international sales agent to be eligible for the yearly programme.

In total, the 15 features will receive €729,900.

The programme aims to encourage...

Carla Simon’sRomerïa andIldiko Enyedi’sSilent Friendare among the 15 features to have received grants fromEurimages’ inaugural Film Marketing & Audience Development Support Programme.

The recipients also include two Berlinale films: Ameer Fakher Eldin’s Competition titleYunan andIdo Fluk’s Köln 75, which will have its world premiere as a Berlinale Special title..

Scroll down for the full list

The films will each receive a non-repayable grant of up to€50,000.Films must have signed a deal memo or contract with an international sales to be eligible for the yearly programme.

In total, the 15 features will receive €729,900.

The programme aims to encourage the...

Fifty years ago today, 18-year-old Vera Brandes organized a concert for jazz pianist Keith Jarrett in Cologne, West Germany, which went on to make music history: a recording of the concert became the best-selling solo jazz album ever as well as the best-selling piano recording ever. Now director Ido Fluk and producers Sol Bondy and Fred Burle from One Two Films have made a film, titled “Köln 75,” that dramatizes the events leading up to the concert, with its world premiere to be held at the Berlinale next month. Variety spoke to Brandes about her memories of the night. Bankside is handling the international sales on the film, whose poster is exclusively revealed below.

“Köln 75” starts with Brandes meeting Ronnie Scott, a British jazz musician and owner of a London jazz club. Scott asks Brandes to arrange some concerts for him in Germany and so, from that chance encounter,...

The competition line-up for the 2025 Berlin International Film Festival is being announced at a press conference at 11am Cet (10am GMT).

Scroll down for line-up

New festival director Tricia Tuttle is revealing the titles for the Competition and new Perspectives strand alongside co-directors of film programming Jacqueline Lyanga and Michael Stütz.

The announcement is being live-streamed on the festival’s social channels. Watch it live above.

Screen will update this page with the titles as they are announced. Refresh the page for latest updates.

As previously announced, the festival will open with Tom Tykwer’s Special Gala out of competition selection The Light.

Ahead of the Berlinale 2025 taking place February 13-23, they’ve unveiled their lineups for Berlinale Special, Panorama, Generation and Forum sections. Highlights include confirmation of Bong Joon Ho’s Mickey 17 alongside Ira Sachs’ Peter Hujar’s Day, Ancestral Visions of the Future from This Is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection director Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese, a documentary on the making of Shoah, a new Jacob Elordi-led series from Justin Kurzel, and more.

See the lineup below via Deadline and check back for the competition lineup next week.

Berlinale Special

Ancestral Visions of the Future

by Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese | with Siphiwe Nzima, Sobo Bernard, Zaman Mathejane, Mochesane Edwin Kotsoane, Rehauhetsoe Ernest Kotsoane

France / Lesotho / Germany / Saudi Arabia 2025

Berlinale Special | World premiere | Documentary form

A poetic allegory of the filmmaker Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese’s childhood, an ode to cinema and an inner nod to his mother. Through fragmented narratives and mythic imagery,...

Aussie filmmaker Justin Kurzel’s series adaptation of Richard Flanagan’s Booker Prize-winning novel The Narrow Road to the Deep North, starring Jacob Elordi, will screen at this year’s Berlin Film Festival.

The Narrow Road to the Deep North was among several titles added to Berlin’s lineup this morning.

The festival describes the series as a “riveting new Australian drama” about a WWII hero haunted by his past. The show will screen as a Berlinale Special Gala. Also in Specials strand is The Thing with Feathers starring Benedict Cumberbatch. The pic screens at Berlin following a debut bow at Sundance and is from filmmaker Dylan Southern. The pic is an adaption of Max Porter’s novel about a grieving father wrestling with the sudden death of his wife while also raising their young children. As previously reported, Bong Joon Ho’s Mickey 17 will also screen. Scroll down...

The Berlin International Film Festival has unveiled the first wave of titles for its 75th edition, including features in its Panorama, Berlinale Special and Generation strands.

An initial 12 titles have been revealed for Panorama, of which eight are world premieres. These include Paul, a documentary by Canadian filmmaker Denis Cote, who has played in competition at Berlin four times with titles including Vic + Flo Saw A Bear and That Kind Of Summer. His latest follows a man struggling with social anxiety who finds refuge in serving women who invite him to clean their homes.

Scroll down for full list of...

The Berlin Film Festival forges a new path next year with the first year under new artistic director Tricia Tuttle, who succeeds Carlo Chatrian and brings a background as a journalist and curator to the annual German showcase. This year’s festival runs February 13-23, and also in new positions this year are Jacqueline Lyanga and Michael Stütz, both serving as co-directors of programming.

With bigger announcements to come, the Berlinale unveiled its first wave of titles across the Panorama and Berlinale Special gala lineups on Tuesday. As previously announced, Tom Tykwer’s “The Light” is opening this coming 75th edition. Filmmakers getting a boost from today’s announcement include Denis Côté, Michel Gondry, and Ira Sachs, all bringing new films to the festival.

In the Berlinale Special lineup, German director Jan-Ole Gerster debuts the neo-noir thriller “Islands,” starring Sam Riley and Stacy Martin. Per the festival synopsis, in the film,...

Michel Gondry and Ira Sachs are among the headline filmmakers set to debut new feature works within the sidebar competitions at next year’s Berlin Film Festival.

The German festival announced the pair this afternoon as part of its first crop of confirmed titles.

Gondry will screen Maya, Give Me a Title in Berlin’s Generation sidebar. The festival’s website describes the film as Gondry’s “stop-motion love letter to his daughter Maya brings to life a poetic and amusing journey that invites you to dream and laugh.”

Also set for the Generation competition is Our Wildest Days (I Agries Meres Mas) by Greek filmmaker Vasilis Kekatos who is best known for his 2019 short film The Distance Between Us and the Sky, which won the Short Film Palme d’Or at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival. He also created the popular Greek series Milky Way.

Related:...

The Belin Film Festival has unveiled its Panorama lineup, including new works by Denis Côté, Ira Sachs, Michel Gondry and Shatara Michelle Ford, among others.

Sachs’ movie, “Peter Hujar’s Day,” stars Ben Wishaw and Rebecca Hall. Set for an international premiere in Berlin, the film portrays a 1974 conversation between photographer Peter Hujar and his friend Linda Rosenkrantz, set against the backdrop of the New York art scene of the time.

Côté’s film, “Paul,” is a documentary about a man struggling with depression and social anxiety who found refuge in serving women who invite him to clean their homes.

Gondry’s “Maya, Give Me a Title” is described by the festival as a “stop-motion love letter to his daughter Maya brings to life a poetic and amusing journey that invites you to dream and laugh.” It features the voice of “The Count of Monte-Cristo” star Pierre Niney.

Ford’s “Dreams in Nightmares,...

John Magaro, Kate Dickie and Jason Isaacs will be heading to the chilly streets of Berlin. The Berlin Film Festival unveiled the first gala screenings for its 2025 edition, which runs Feb. 13-23.

Islands, the new feature from German director Jan-Ole Gerster (Lara, A Coffee in Berlin), is among the gala highlights. The thriller stars British actor Sam Riley (Control, Maleficent) as a once-promising tennis professional now working as a tennis coach for holidaymakers on a resort island, filling his time with alcohol and brief affairs. Stacy Martin, Jack Farthing, and Dylan Torrell co-star.

Köln 75 from director Ido Fluk, follows the true story of Vera Brandes, teenage patron saint of the 1970s Cologne music scene, who risked everything to organize Keith Jarrett’s legendary Köln Concert, considered by many to be the greatest solo concert in music history. German actress Mala Emde play Fluk with John Magaro, Michael Chernus and Alexander Scheer co-starring.

UK sales outfit Bankside Films has unveiled a first look image of Mala Emde in the role of Vera Brandes in Ido Fluk’s The Girl From Köln, as well as a slew of key deals on the film as the company heads into the European Film Market (EFM).

The feature, currently in post-production, tells the little-known story of one of the best-selling jazz records of all time, US pianist Keith Jarrett’s 1975 Köln Concert, and how one formidable German teenager, Vera Brandes, was instrumental in its creation. Bankside will be showing a sales promo to buyers at the EFM.

New projects from Cherien Dabis, Anders Thomas Jensen and Ameer Fakher Eldin have also been awarded

Ariane Labed’s feature-directing debut Sisters is among the 33 projects to receive funding from Eurimages second wave of 2023 co-production funding.

The French-Greek actor’s feature directing debut received €350,000 from the €9.7m pot. The Ireland, UK, Germany and Greece co-production is produced by Ireland’s Element Pictures. An English-language adaptation of Daisy Johnson’s gothic novel of the same name it follows two sisters who move to the countryside with their maniac depressive mother. Labed previously directed short film Olla which won three awards at...

Exclusive: New indie film financier Mizzel Media is launching in Cannes with what we understand to be a healthy six-figure investment in feature The Girl From Köln, the next film from Holy Spider and The Tale outfit One Two Films.

The movie, which is due to shoot later this year, will star Mala Emde (And Tomorrow The Entire World) and John Magaro (Past Lives) in the lead roles.

Bankside is handling world sales in Cannes on the project, which will tell the little-known backstory of how a maverick German teenager named Vera Brandes was instrumental in the creation of the best-selling solo piano record of all time, U.S. pianist Keith Jarrett’s 1975 Köln Concert. Ido Fluk (The Ticket) directs from his own script.

The investment is U.S. outfit Mizzel’s first to date. The New York-based company is run by producer and veteran manager Lillian Lasalle, whose clients...

I have been tracking producer Sol Bondy since 2016 when co-production The Happiest Day in the Life of Ölli Mäki won the Un Certain Regard Grand Prize and the European Film Award for Best Debut. He and Fred Burle have been developing The Girl from Köln (aka Köln 75) with writer-director Ido Fluk, the filmmaker behind 2016 Tribeca selection The Ticket since 2019. "This project has been very close to our hearts in the last few years and we're very excited with the way it's been shaped so far," said Bondy, a Variety Producer to Watch in 2018. "It's been such a joy working with Ido on this exciting story and we're thrilled to have put an amazing team together," added Burle, Brazilian born producer who was just made a partner in One Two Films, alongside co-founders Sol Bondy and Christoph Lange. Burle joined One Two in January 2017, having graduated from the German Film and Television Academy (dffb) the previous year. He has previously worked as a film critic, at The Match Factory, and as curator of the inaugural dffb film festival. One Two Films has produced and co-produced award-winning films such as Holy Spider (Read my blog about it here), Vadim Perelman's Persian Lessons (Read my blog about it here), Jennifer Fox's Sundance breakout The Tale, Isabel Coixet's The Bookshop and Juho Kuosmanen's The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Mäki.Other titles in the pipeline include Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurdsson's dark comedy Northern Comfort, which premieres in SXSW later this month, Annemarie Jacir's survival drama The Oblivion Theory, Sarah Arnold's debut feature Wild Encounters and Michiel ten Horn's romantic comedy Any Other Night. In Berlin this year it was announced that Bankside would be The Girl from Köln's international sales agent and was launching sales. Alamode Film already has German-speaking territories and is a coproducer, who have very recently secured funding through the Fff, the local fund in Bavaria. It is in early pre-production and will shoot this year in Poland and Germany. The Girl from Köln tells the little-known story of Vera Brandes, who, in 1975, at the age of 17, staged the famous Köln Concert by jazz musician Keith Jarrett, which became the top-selling jazz solo album of all time. With Polish Film Institute backing, Oscar-winning Polish producer Ewa Puszczynska (Ida, Cold War) of Extreme Emotions is co-producing along with Annegret Weitkämper-Krug of Germany's Gretchenfilm (Seneca). Oscar nominee and Emmy winner Oren Moverman (Love & Mercy, Bad Education) serves as executive producer. Moverman also produced Fluk's previous feature, The Ticket. The Tale writer-director Jennifer Fox also serves as executive producer. Stephen Kelliher and Sophie Green executive produce for Bankside. It stars Mala Emde (Skin Deep, And Tomorrow the Entire World) in the lead role, alongside John Magaro (Past Lives) as Jarrett. Magaro was also in Cannes last year with Kelly Reichardt's competition title Showing Up.Other cast attached include Alexander Scheer (Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush), Ulrich Tukur (The Life of Others), Susanne Wolff (Sisi & I, Styx), Jördis Triebel (Dark), Jan Bülow (Lindenberg) and Marie-Lou Sellem (Tar, Exit Marrakesh). The NYU-graduate Fluk was dubbed "a talent to watch" by Variety following his feature debut Never Too Late, the first crowd-sourced Israeli film ever made. His American debut, the Tribeca competition selection, The Ticket, starred Dan Stevens and Malin Akerman. Upcoming projects include 24 Hours in June, a retelling of the final day in the life of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg who were convicted of spying on behalf of the Soviet Union, to be produced by Academy Award winner James Schamus (Brokeback Mountain) and Joe Pirro (Driveways). Fluk is repped by Amotz Zakai, Amy Schiffman, and Kegan Schell at Echo Lake Entertainment. He is also created the recently-announced HBO series Empty Mansions for Fremantle with director Joe Wright (Atonement, Darkest Hour) attached to direct the pilot. "From the moment I heard Vera's story, about how as a high school teenager she organized one of the greatest concerts in history, I knew her story had to be told," said Fluk. "We were immediately exhilarated by Vera Brandes' remarkable female empowerment story. Her strength, courage and sheer belief in herself and the music of Keith Jarrett will entertain and inspire audiences around the world," added Kelliher.

The film follows a grieving widower and his son whose lives are uplifted by the arrival of a Bulgarian au pair.

UK sales outfit Bankside Films has boarded Rebekah Fortune’s Learning To Breathe Under Water with Rory Kinnear and Maria Bakalova attached

Bankside is handling worldwide sales and will introduce the title to buyers at next week’s European Film Market.

Currently in pre-production, the film follows a grieving widower and his son whose lives are uplifted by the arrival of a Bulgarian au pair. It is based on a screenplay from Richard Brabin.

Jack Tarling at UK production company Shudder Films,...

The film follows a grieving widower and his son whose lives are uplifted by the arrival of a Bulgarian au pair.

UK sales outfit Bankside Films has boarded Rebekah Fortune’s Learning To Breathe Underwater starring Rory Kinnear and Maria Bakalova.

Bankside is handling worldwide sales and will introduce the title to buyers at next week’s European Film Market.

Currently in pre-production, the film follows a grieving widower and his son whose lives are uplifted by the arrival of a Bulgarian au pair. It is based on a screenplay from Richard Brabin.

Jack Tarling at UK production company Shudder Films,...

Parks, experiences and products division reported 21 climb in revenues over last quarter.

The number of global Disney+ subscribers fell by 2.4m to 161.8m to mark the first membership drop since the service launched in November 2019, while revenues at The Walt Disney Company for the first quarter of 2023 beat analysts’ forecasts.

Revenue rose 8 to 23.5bn, powered by the ongoing strong performance of the company’s parks division. Diluted earnings per share excluding certain items reached 99 cents following a decline of 7 cents, also beating Wall Street expectations.

The parks, experiences and products division reported a 21 climb in revenues over last quarter to 8.7bn,...

Germany’s Mala Emde and US actor John Magaro are set to star.

UK sales outfit Bankside Films has boarded worldwide sales on director Ido Fluk’s feature Köln 75, that tells the little-known story of one of the best-selling jazz records of all time, US pianist Keith Jarrett’s 1975 Köln Concert, and how one maverick German teenager was instrumental in its creation.

The film meets teenager Vera Brandes while she is still in high school and starts producing and promoting music concerts in Cologne, and risks everything to put on what will become Jarrett’s legendary show.

German star of...

Exclusive: HBO is developing a series adaptation of nonfiction book Empty Mansions, about a wealthy recluse.

The Warner Bros. Discovery-owned premium network is working on the project with The Ticket filmmaker Ido Fluk, Atonement and Darkest Hour director Joe Wright and The Mosquito Coast producer Fremantle.

The story follows Huguette Clark, an elderly, fabulously wealthy recluse who is hospitalized for a number of seemingly minor ailments and a series of events is set into motion regarding her fortune and an unsigned will.

Fluk will write and exec produce, Wright will direct the potential pilot and exec produce alongside Fremantle.

At the Rtl-owned producer and distributor, the project comes from Dante Di Loreto, President of Scripted Programming in the U.S. Di Loreto, in fact, previously worked closely with Ryan Murphy, exec producing series including Glee and American Horror Story. Murphy had optioned the book back in 2014, a year after it was published.

Alamode to co-produce Ido Fluk’s jazz feature ’Köln 75’

Munich-based distributor Alamode Film is set to make its first foray into production as a co-producer of Köln 75 with Holy Spider’s German producer One Two Films.

The feature by New-York-based Israeli filmmaker Ido Fluk centres on Vera Brandes who staged jazz musician Keith Jarrett’s legendary Köln Concert in 1975 at the tender age of 17.

She has subsequently run her own record label and become an award-winning music producer as well as one of the world’s leading authorities on music medicine research.

Speaking exclusively to Screen Daily at Holy Spider...

Alamode to co-produce Ido Fluk’s jazz feature ’Köln 75’

Munich-based distributor Alamode Film is set to make its first foray into production as a co-producer of Köln 75 with Holy Spider’s German producer One Two Films.

The feature, by New-York-based Israeli filmmaker Ido Fluk, centres on Vera Brandes who staged jazz musician Keith Jarrett’s legendary Köln Concert in 1975 at the tender age of 17.

Since then, she has subsequently run her own record label and become an award-winning music producer as well as one of the world’s leading authorities on music medicine research.

Speaking exclusively to Screen Daily at...

Berlin-based One Two Films, in Cannes this week with Ali Abbasi’s competition title “Holy Spider,” is prepping a new feature from writer-director Ido Fluk, the filmmaker behind 2016 Tribeca selection “The Ticket.”

“Köln 75” tells the true story of Vera Brandes, who, in 1975 and at the age of 17, staged the famous Köln Concert by jazz musician Keith Jarrett, which became the top-selling jazz solo album of all time. It stars Mala Emde (“And Tomorrow the Entire World”) in the lead role, alongside John Magaro (“First Cow”) as Jarrett. Magaro is also in Cannes with Kelly Reichardt’s competition title “Showing Up.”

Oscar-winning Polish producer Ewa Puszczynska of Extreme Emotions will co-produce, with Oscar nominee and Emmy winner Oren Moverman serving as executive producer. Moverman also produced Fluk’s previous feature, “The Ticket.”

Other cast attached include Alexander Scheer (“Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush”), Ulrich Tukur (“The Life of Others”), Susanne Wolff...

Harvey Keitel has accepted an offer he can’t refuse to take on the role of notorious gangster Meyer Lansky in the Eytan Rockaway directed untitled biopic.

Keitel will be joined by Sam Worthington, Emory Cohen and Austin Stowell on the cast while Alexandra Daddario and Tony Danza are still currently in talks.

The story follows an ageing Lansky living quietly in Miami Beach after being investigated and pursued for decades by the FBI. He enlists a young journalist named David Stone (Sam Worthington) to tell his story, but the Feds use the young man as a pawn to track the hundreds of millions the mobster is suspected of stashing.

Also in news – Michael Fassbender and Peter Dinklage in talks to star in Mel Gibson’s ‘The Wild Bunch’ remake

Stone finds himself caught in the middle of a game of cat and mouse, uncovering the hidden truth about the...

Harvey Keitel will star as notorious gangster Meyer Lansky, a contemporary of Bugsy Siegel, in a biopic directed by Eytan Rockaway. Sam Worthington, Emory Cohen and Austin Stowell are also set to star in the picture, with Alexandra Daddario and Tony Danza in talks to join.

Voltage Pictures has boarded the project and hopes to spark international sales at Cannes. Rockaway wrote the script from a story by Ido Fluk and Sharon Mashihi, partially based on interviews with the real-life Lansky conducted by Rockaway’s father, history professor Robert Rockaway.

The film centers on an aging Lansky living in anonymity in Miami Beach after being investigated and pursued for decades by the FBI. When he enlists a young journalist named David Stone (Worthington) to tell his story, the Feds use him as a pawn to track down the hundreds of millions of dollars that the mobster has been suspected of stashing.

Filmmaker Oren Moverman has never shied away from tackling difficult, seemingly impossible material to adapt to film with some of his writing work including the screenplays for Todd Haynes’ I’m Not There and the equally intriguing Brian Wilson biopic, Love and Mercy.

As a director and producer he’s followed suit with his 2nd film Rampart starring Woody Harrelson as an L.A. police officer with questionable motives, followed by a meditative look at homelessness with Richard Gere in Time Out of Mind.

For his latest movie, The Dinner, Moverman adapts Dutch author Herman Koch’s novel, which on the surface is about a dinner between two related couples with all the requisite food porn. As it progresses, it explores a variety of topics including mental illness and the battle of Gettysburg.

At the core of the film is Steve Coogan and Richard Gere playing brothers, the former a history professor,...

The Dan Stevens takeover of 2017 continues with Ido Fluk’s “The Ticket,” a new film where he plays a blind man who suddenly regains his vision. It doesn’t go as well as you might think.

Stevens plays James, whose contented existence with his wife and son is disrupted when, after inexplicably gaining his sight back, he grows possessed by a drive to make a better life for himself. When his relationships begin to falter under the strain of his ambition, it becomes uncertain whether he will be able to save them, or himself.

Read More: ‘The Ticket’ Trailer: Dan Stevens Returns From Darkness in Ido Fluk Drama — Watch

In addition to Stevens, Malin Åkerman, Oliver Platt, and Kerry Bishé also star in the morality tale.

“The Ticket” opens in theaters and will be released on VOD today, April 7. Check out our exclusive clip below.

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Welcome back to the Weekend Warrior, your weekly look at the new movies hitting theaters this weekend, as well as other cool events and things to check out.

Three New Movies May Have Trouble Making Much of a Mark

After a couple impressive March weekends with one new box office record, and a couple impressive openings, we’re now into April, and of the new movies, there just doesn’t seem like anything can defeat last week’s powerful duo of DreamWorks Animation’s The Boss Baby--which exceeded all predictions with $49 million, taking the top spot from Beauty and the Beast. Ghost in the Shell didn’t even do as well as I thought it may, opening with just $19 million, those late reviews helping to kill its weekend.

Sony Pictures Animation are giving the loveable blue Smurfs a third go at American audiences with The Smurfs: The Lost Village (Sony), after two previous movies,...

Murmured words are shared between a man and woman in the intimate opening moments of Ido Fluk's character drama, accompanied by indistinct images in motion. What emerges clearly is the man relating a tale about a lottery ticket and God, followed by the same man's sincere prayer to God. It's easy to imagine that the man finds comfort in the familiar, perhaps opt-repeated words. In the morning, the man awakens and finds that he can see for the first time in his life. A visit to a doctor reveals that a tumor that was pressing on the man's optic nerve since birth suddenly and unexpectedly moved, and now he can see. The kindly James (Dan Stevens) and his devoted wife Sam (Malin Akerman) are elated,...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

What happened if one day, you woke up, and the biggest obstacle in your life — a physical ailment, financial woes — were removed. What you would change? How would you live differently? And would you like the person that you became? That’s the question at the core of “The Ticket,” and today we have an exclusive clip from the clip.

Starring Dan Stevens, Malin Akerman, Kerry Bishé and Oliver Platt, and directed by Ido Fluk, the story follows James, blind since childhood, who one day miraculously has his sight restored.

Continue reading Exclusive: Dan Stevens Reinvents Himself In Clip From ‘The Ticket’ at The Playlist.

Dan Stevens is having a bit of a moment. In February, you could see him in Legion, FX's stellar, must-see Marvel TV series in which the 34-year-old English actor plays a troubled young man who, despite having lived in a mental institution since his teens, discovers that he's not really schizophrenic. (The bad news: He's actually an all-powerful mutant, wanted by the government and controlled by a vicious parasite living inside his mind.) A month later, you might waltz down to your local multiplex and detect Stevens under lots of fur,...

A favorite sermon you might hear on a Sunday is based on the saying, “I once was blind, but now I see.” People who were once metaphorically blind and now can “see” are assumed to go from a materialistic, devil-may-care attitude to a respect for spirituality. British-born director and co-writer Ido Fluk upends the metaphoric […]

The post The Ticket Review: Dan Stevens delivers a strong performance appeared first on Shockya.com.

Ana Lily Amirpour made one of the most attention-grabbing debuts in recent memory with “A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night,” and now the writer/director is back with “The Bad Batch.” The newly launched Neon is set to release the film this summer, and to commemorate the occasion they’ve also put out a new trailer. Watch below.

Read More: ‘The Bad Batch’ Review: Jim Carrey and Keanu Reeves’ Thriller Is ‘Mad Max’ Meets ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ — Venice Film Festival

Amirpour, whose debut is regarded as the first (and, to date, only) Iranian vampire Western, appears to be back in genre-bending mode: “The Bad Batch” has been described as a post-apocalyptic melding of “Mad Max” and “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.” Neon’s growing slate also includes the Anne Hathaway–starring “Colossal” and Eliza Hittman’s “Beach Rats,” which won a directing prize at Sundance.

Read More: ‘The Bad Batch...

“The Case for Christ” is an upcoming film that is based on Lee Strobel’s 1998 best-selling book of the same name. Ahead of its April release, USA Today shared the first look at the big screen adaptation.

The true story follows Strobel (Mike Vogel) as a Chicago Tribune investigative reporter in 1980, as he tries to disprove the newfound Christian faith of his wife Leslie (Erika Christensen). The search then leads him to life-altering results.

“I spent my entire career as a journalist uncovering the truth until my wife presented me with the biggest story of my life,” says Vogel in the trailer. “What happened next, changed me forever.”

Read More: ‘Avengers: Infinity War’: First Footage Teases Marvel’s Biggest All-Star Team-Up Yet — Watch

Directed by Jon Gunn, the film also co-stars Faye Dunaway as the skeptic Dr. Roberta Walters, Robert Forster as Strobel’s father Walter, Frankie Faison and Mike Pniewski.

Good news for “Billions” fans: Showtime is letting viewers watch the Season 2 premiere episode for free, ahead of its Sunday, February 19 debut.

Starting today, those who don’t have a Showtime subscription can watch the episode for free on YouTube (see video below) and Sho.com.

Network subscribers can watch the second season premiere on Showtime on Demand and Showtime Anytime now. The episode is also available on the Showtime stand-alone streaming service through Amazon, Apple, Google and Roku, as well as through Amazon Channels, Hulu, Sony PlayStation Vue and Samsung TVs, and TV providers’ authenticated online services.

Additionally, right after the on-air premiere on the 19th, Showtime will make the second episode available early only to subscribers starting at 11 p.m. Et on Showtime Anytime and at midnight on Showtime On Demand.

Read More: ’Billions’ Season 2 Behind the Scenes Video: Damian Lewis and Paul Giamatti Square off in War...

From the studio that brought you “The Monster” and “The Witch,” comes an even scarier horror film than any other: “Breitbart.”

A24 released a fake trailer for its new “avant-garde horror thriller,” which actually is a video that pokes fun at the disastrous White House interview between Breitbart News journalist Charlie Spiering and Trump press secretary Sean Spicer about Trump’s travel ban.

Read More: Watch: Australian Comedian Jim Jeffries Fires Back at Trump Fan Piers Morgan on Explosive ‘Bill Maher’ Episode

The video begins with the two suited men sitting awkwardly at a table and waiting for the cameras to start rolling. Then the cringe-worthy interview begins with Spiering introducing Spicer, who looks less-than-thrilled to be there.

The trailer includes the unforgettable moment of awkward silence, the strange camera angles and adds spooky sound effects to give this painful interview an entertaining twist. Check it out below.

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