18/03/2011

Berlin is currently hosting the shoot for Russendisko by Oliver Schmitz, who directed Life, Above All [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and a segment of Paris, Je T'Aime. The film, scripted by Oliver Ziegenbalg (who wrote Markus Goller’s Friendship! [+see also:
trailer
film profile]), is based on writer, TV and radio commentator Wladimir Kaminer’s eponymous best-seller, published ten years ago. This collection of amusing short stories about the integration difficulties experienced in Germany by Russian immigrants like him sold more than a million copies.

The film stars Matthias Schweighöfer, Friedrich Mücke (the two East-German buddies in Friendship!) and Christian Friedel (the teacher in Michael Haneke’s The White Ribbon [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Michael Haneke
film profile]) as three young Russians: Wladimir, Mischa and Andrej. They decide to emigrate to Germany in the summer of 1990 and arrive in East Berlin at a time of musical and cultural ferment with a handful of roubles and some big dreams.

Russendisko is produced by Christoph Hahnheiser and Arthur Cohn for Black Forest Films, in co-production with Seven Pictures Film for the SAT 1 network. It has backing from regional fund Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, the DFFF and FFA on a national level, and the MEDIA Programme.

Shooting will continue until mid-May. The film will be released in theatres by Paramount Pictures in spring 2012.

(Translated from French)