Filmverlag der Autoren

''Filmverlag der Autoren'' is a German film distributor that was founded in 1971 to help finance and distribute independent films by German ''Autorenfilm'' directors, that is directors who are renowned for predominantly adapting their own screenplays. Many directors of the ''New German Cinema'' movement were associated with it such as Werner Herzog, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Wim Wenders, Percy Adlon, and Alexander Kluge; whose films were produced and distributed by the ''Filmverlag'' and many of whom were members of the ''Filmverlags board.

History

1970s

Efforts to found the ''Filmverlag'' had resulted from recurring frustrations the directors had faced in acquiring funding for their politically and aesthetically ambitious films. They had felt that in the established system which was partly commercially oriented, partly stately-funded, the usual means of achieving funding were too limiting, gave them little control over their own work, or just did not allow for issues as challenging as they were having in mind to tackle, so they started the ''Filmverlag'' as an independent association to have complete control over their projects, from funding through to pre-production, production, post-production, and distribution. The model which the founders of the ''Filmverlag'' were styling their association after was the ''Verlag der Autoren'' in Frankfurt, an independent association of stage writers publishing their own works. The first film produced by ''Filmverlag der Autoren'' was ''Furchtlose Flieger'' by and Martin Müller.

Throughout the 1970s, the films put out by the ''Filmverlag'' had a high reputation among critics and intellectuals, but the association often bordered bankruptcy. Notable productions of this era included Herzog's ''Aguirre, the Wrath of God'' (1972), ''The Enigma of Kaspar Hauser'' (1974), Wenders's '' The Goalkeeper's Fear of the Penalty'' (1972), ''Alice in the Cities'' (1974), ''Kings of the Road'' (1976), ''The American Friend'' (1977), Fassbinder's ''The Merchant of Four Seasons'' (1971), ''The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant'' (1972), '' Ali: Fear Eats the Soul'' (1974), ''Fox and His Friends'' (1974), Kluge's '' In Danger and Deep Distress, the Middleway Spells Certain Death'' (1974), and the collaborative work ''Germany in Autumn'' (1977/'78) about German society's reaction to the terrorism of the Red Army Faction and the state's counter-measures during the German Autumn events of 1977.

Augstein era

The ''Filmverlags orientation shifted towards a more mainstream program throughout the 1980s after ''Der Spiegel''-publisher Rudolf Augstein with the help of Bohm had bought himself into the venture in 1977, an event which prompted many of its founding members to leave and start their own production and distribution companies, such as ''Pro-ject Filmproduktion'' (started for Kluge's documentary ''Der Kandidat'' on Franz-Josef Strauß's 1980 campaign running for German chancellor) and Theo Hinz's ''Futura-Film'' (founded in 1983).

While the ''Filmverlag'' during Augstein's era scored impressive commercial successes such as ' (1980, starring Marius Müller-Westernhagen) and ''Men…'' (1985), it also began German distribution of less ambitious films such as ''The Terminator'' (1984) and '' Up the creek'' (1984), and in the eyes of many of its founders its original political and intellectual credibility suffered.

After Augstein

In 1986, Augstein sold his interests in the ''Filmverlag'' to ''Futura-Film''. In 1989, ''Futura-Film'' founded the subsidiary distributor ''Felix-Film'' with an emphasis upon films from the Soviet Union.

In 1999, all home video distribution rights to the ''Filmverlags films and all rights to its label were acquired by ''Arthaus'', a subsidiary of '' Kinowelt AG''. In the following years, ''Arthaus'' published many of the ''Filmverlag'' films for the first time on VHS and DVD, and in 2009, ''Arthaus'' published all ''Filmverlag'' films in a large, 50-disc DVD box, half of which had not been published on home video before.

Since the re-organization of ''Kinowelt'' in 2003, the original ''Filmverlag'' is officially known today as ''Filmverlag der Autoren und Futura Film GmbH & Co. Verleih Vertriebsgesellschaft KG''. It has three subsidiaries:

*''Futura Film Weltvertrieb im Filmverlag der Autoren GmbH''
*''Pro-ject Filmproduktion im Filmverlag der Autoren GmbH''
*''Felix Film GmbH''

Founding members

On April 18, 1971 in Munich, thirteen filmmakers signed the founding papers of ''Filmverlag der Autoren''. They are:
* Hark Bohm
* Michael Fengler
* Peter Lilienthal
* Hans Noever
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* Wim Wenders
* Hans W. Geissendörfer
* Volker Vogeler

Documentary

In 2008, Dominik Wessely and Laurens Straub published the 120-minute documentary ''Gegenschuß - Aufbruch der Filmemacher'' ("Countershot: Dawn of the filmmakers") on the ''Filmverlag''.

External links

Official website

Deutsches Filminstitut

{{Authority control

Film distributors of Germany
Wim Wenders