The East-West Co-production market Connecting Cottbus took place for the 11th time from 12 - 13 November, 2009 during the FilmFestival Cottbus. As a meeting place for an active producers' network from more than 22 countries, Connecting Cottbus has concentrated on the initiation of co-productions between Eastern and Western Europe. You can find an overview of the programme structures and events of past years at the archive. A programme of Connecting Cottbus 2009 can be found here:

10 November 2009

11 November 2009

12 November 2009

13 November 2009

13 projects from 12 countries were selected for the pitching 2009, but the session was opened on November 12, 2009 by a 14th project: the winner of the CoCo Special Pitch Award 2008, a prize underscoring the synergies between the film festival and the co-production market by enabling the main prize-winner of the FilmFestival Cottbus to pitch their next project at Connecting Cottbus the following year. This year saw Kira Saksaganskaya (producer) and Alexey Uchitel (director) presenting the idea for a lyrical comedy with "Lilliputians".

projects selected

This year was the 11th time that the invitation went out again to Come and pitch it! A total of 14 promising projects were pitched to an audience of European professionals in order to find partners for their realisation. 150 visitors from 20 countries followed the varied presentations. This edition of Connecting Cottbus was, above all, one dominated by the directors. more

CoCo 2009 participants.pdf

The 19th FilmFestival Cottbus closed. In addition to thousands of cinema guests there were more than 600 guests of the international film scene attending the festival. Parallel to the film festival the East West Co-production market Connecting Cottbus took place. „Also in this year a high professionality and a personal atmosphere were combined“, concludes artistic director Gabriele Brunnenmeyer. „The 14 presented ideas for feature films showed an astonishing variety of personal handwritings. Accordingly high was the interest of producers and financeers. This gives us reason to hope, that also from this year’s market many projects will be realized.” More than 100 One2One-meetings took place between producers, financiers and world sales.

The pitching session was opened on November 12, 2009 by the winner of the CoCo Special Pitch Award 2008, a prize underscoring the synergies between the film festival and the co-production market by enabling the main prize-winner of the FilmFestival Cottbus to pitch their newest project at Connecting Cottbus the following year. This year saw see the Kira Saksaganskaya (producer) and Alexey Uchitel (director) presenting the idea for a lyrical comedy with "Lilliputians".

2009 once again saw the participants of Connecting Cottbus competing for the CoCo Best Pitch Award. All of the 14 projects presented in Cottbus were automatically in the running for this prize. The best pitch was voted on by the professional audience following the event, and the winner of the Award is announced during an evening reception by Medienboard and MDM at the restaurant "Zelig" in Cottbus.

The CoCo Best Pitch Award 2009 went to the Croatian project NIGHT BOATS, a romantic melodrama about the last amorous adventures of two residents from an old people's home. The professional and moving presentation by the producer Darija Kulenović Gudan and her colleague Petar Milic from the company Studio dim and the award-winning documentary filmmaker Igor Mirković, who had developed his feature film project further at ScripTeast, convinced the audience. The Award includes a voucher for script doctoring to the value of 3,000 €. The prize was donated by EastWest Filmdistribution.

For the first time Connecting Cottbus was a partner of the Moscow Co-production Forum which took place from 20 to 22 of June 2009 within the Moscow International Film Festival. Foreign producers, financiers, distributors and other companies, investing in the film industry, were offered Russian projects and Russian producers had an opportunity to assess the options of participation in the implementation of international projects. 12 film projects participated in the pitching, about half of them from Russia. Pre-scheduled meetings with potential partners took place after the pitching.

Moscow 2009 Programme.pdf

This year also saw participants of Connecting Cottbus represented in the programme of FilmFestival Cottbus with new film productions: further information can also be found on the film festival's website. more

The FilmFestival Cottbus has organised a series of interesting events connected with the festival films, guests and topics. We offer you a small overview of the range of events during our market. If this has made you curious, please inform yourself at www.filmfestivalcottbus.de as well. more

The FilmFestival Cottbus and Connecting Cottbus invited journalists to a joint press conference at the Polish Institute in Berlin on 22.10.2009 to give advance information about the programme, guests and the submitted projects. Festival director Roland Rust and Gabriele Brunnenmeyer, artistic director of Connecting Cottbus answered questions about the programme, organisation and guests of the planned events. Connecting Cottbus is being held this year for the 11th time. The 13 interesting projects from 12 countries were selected from over 50 submissions. The FilmFestival Cottbus is internationally the most well-known festival for East European cinema and described as the second largest film festival in Germany. With a programe of 140 films from 30 countries, it presents a best of current filmmaking from Eastern Europe.

Connecting Cottbus includes a pitching preparation training for the selected projects, the public pitching session followed by Q&A, One2One meetings as well as an accompanying programme addressing current topics of the film industry. Furthermore the FilmFestival Cottbus offers delegates the opportunity to get a comprehensive overview of new films from Eastern Europe.

As a meeting place for an active producers' network from more than 22 countries, Connecting Cottbus has concentrated on the initiation of co-productions between Eastern and Western Europe. 13 promising projects were selected in September out of more than 50 submissions from 21 countries to be presented in November to an audience of European professionals in order to find partners for a successful realisation. A 14th project will be presented as a Special Pitch. more

The internationally award-winning film "The World is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner" by Stephan Komandarev, based on the novel by Ilija Trojanow, comes to German cinema. The co-production of Bulgaria, Germany, Slovenia and Hungary celebrated premiere on the 1st of october in the presence of the actress Dorka Gryllus and the producers Karl Baumgartner and Thanassis Karathanos in LUX.PUSCHKINO in Halle.

The meeting of the jury to select projects for the pitching session within the scope of Connecting Cottbus took place in Potsdam on the 9 September 2009. Members of the jury include: Connecting Cottbus, Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk/MDR, Nipkow Programme, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, MEDIA Antenna Berlin Brandenburg, Rundfunk Berlin Brandenburg/RBB, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung/MDM and German Films. The pitching session will be on 12 November 2009. 13 projects were selected and will be presented together with the 14th project: the CoCo Special Pitch Award.

Filip Gabracz gets for his Role as Tomek in the film „Piggies“ a Special Jury Mention at the 44th Karlovy Vary International Filmfestival. In the german-polish Coproduction Garbacz plays the 15 years old Tomek, who slip into the prostitute scene. The film from Widark Ltd. (Warschau) und 42film GmbH (Halle/S.) was financially supported by Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung and the Polish filminstitute.

Among the many events at the 44th Film Festival in Karlovy Vary, the East European brunch by now is a fixed point. About 250 guests from film industry and media used the opportunity for networking and discussing upcoming projects while enjoying the buffet at Grand Hotel Pupp. Among them Czech director Bohdan Slama, whose drama THE VILLAGE TEACHER will start in German cinemas in late August. The movie won the audience prize last year at the Cottbus FilmFestival. Also among the guests were Russian director Sergej Dwortsewoj (TULPAN), and his compatriot director Vera Storoschewa (TRAVELLING WITH PETS).

A special highlight for German cineasts, director Andreas Dresen attended the event together with actors Henry Huebchen and Markus Hering as well as script author Wolfgang Kohlhaase – all of them part of the film crew of WHISKY WITH VODKA, Dresen´s new movie which is running in the main competition at the Czech Festival. The Cottbus reception, however, was all about Dresen´s latest hit CLOUD 9: Due to the movie´s success, Senator Entertainment AG was able to refund part of the financial support to Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg GmbH. Medienboard supports film productions, if the movie hits a certain amount of viewers, the producers return the funding, thereby also showing the success of their work. The refund cheque was presented to Medienboard managing director Kirsten Niehuus.

“The increasing interest in our reception in Karlovy Vary underlines quite impressively the importance of this East-West get-together”, FilmFestival Cottbus director Roland Rust pointed out. He also called upon the already established networks to find strategies againt the global economy crisis affecting film business.

It was therefore with great satisfacton that Connecting Cottbus, the East-West-Coproduction market, presented their latest success. Because it was Connecting Cottbus who made PIGGIES possible, a Polish-German co-production directed by Robert Glinski. The concept had been presented at Connecting Cottbus in 2005 by the Polish Production Company Widark Film&Television. During the workshop, they made contact with 42 Film GmbH of Germany in order to produce. The movie now runs in the main competition at the Film Festival in Karlovy Vary.