What do "Metropolis", "The Blue Angel", "Jakob the Liar" --the only GDR production ever nominated for an Oscar--, "Inglourious Basterds", and "Monuments Men" have in common? All have been shot, since its doors opened in 1912, at the Babelsberg Studios just outside Berlin. Tom Hanks and Tom Tykwer just went back there to shoot their latest mega project "Hologram for a King", further putting the location on the map as
Europe's Hollywood.
One of Germany's most celebrated auteurs,
Oscar winner Volker Schlöndorff, was recently honoured for transitioning Babelsberg from centralized communist film production to Western market economy as its director from 1992 to1997.
100+ years of (nearly) uninterrupted film production from Weimar to Nazi Gemany to the East German DEFA to a unified Germany have included many economic and artistic ups-and-downs. At the Berlinale 2014, the "Filmstudios Babelsberg" were more present than ever with three major films.
Europe's larget film factory has become an international brand with big plans for the future, as Berlin's Tagesspiegel reports:
Continue reading "Europe's Hollywood: Studio Babelsberg" »