05/07/2005

The maudlin camel filmed by Byambasuren Davaa does not have only ungrateful children. Indeed, the director has just been granted the Audience Award in Munich for his latest film, Die Höhle des gelben Hundes ('the den of the yellow dog'), which closed the German festival. The film, which depicts a nomadic family in Mongolia, a country where modernity and tradition coexist, received 30,000 euros. This Schesch Film production, already sold to 25 countries by Weltvertrieb Telepool, will be released in Germany on the 28th of July.

The Story of the Weeping Camel has obviouly awakened a wide interest in Mongolia. So, Mongol - The Early Years of Genghis Khan, a $10M project by Sergei Bodrov (nominated three times for the American Oscars) produced by Russia (CTB), co-produced by Germany (X-Filme Creative Pool) and supported by Filmförderung Hamburg and the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, has already completed an impressive number of pre-sales, confirming the film's success at the Cannes Film Market. The German company Beta Cinema (Downfall) has just closed the deal, not only with the main Anglo-Saxon partners (such as the United States) and Brazil, but also, in Europe, with Benelux (Lumiere), thereby completing a long list of European distributors (such as X-Verleih for Germany) even before the first take, since the film starts shooting this month, with the award-winning actor Tadanobu Asano (Zatoichi) in the role of Genghis Khan.
Sergei Bodrov wrote the script of Mongol... with Arif Aliev. Their previous collaboration, for Prisoner of the Mountains (nominated for an Oscar), led to a European Film Award. Their new film clearly has every reason to expect success, since, after discovering the Mongolian steppes with a baby camel, the public will surely want to go back there to follow a great hero.

(Translated from French)