Wim Wenders uses his duties as guest professor of the Munich film school (HFF) to provide his students with as much practical training as possible by just making films with them. But what started out as an ordinary task making a short about the famous Skladanowsky brothers and their Bioskop projector turned into a feature-length film.
The first part, Die Gebrüder Skladanowsky, Act One, was soon accompanied by Act 2 and Act 3. Considering the neglect shorts suffer in German cinemas, even with Act 1 earning a German film award and being theatrically released with Wenders' Lisbon Story, the filmmakers decided to re-edit the material and create a semi-documentary feature held together by the narration of Lucie Hürtgen-Skladanowsky, the daughter of Max Skladanowsky.
The result is a charming, unusual portrait of the ingenious brothers Skladanowsky and their poetic, endearing, rather un-German way of co-inventing moving pictures in 1895, along with the Brothers Lumière in France and Edison in America.
Shooting took place in Berlin over three years. A wonderful experience for everybody involved in the project, says Jolanda Darbyshire of Wim Wenders Filmproduktion. With Jürgen Jürges behind an original camera from the Skladanowsky time and Peter Prszygodda, one of Germany's most acclaimed cutters, the technical credits are remarkable. The film has been sold to France and Italy, negotiations with Germany and Japan are in progress. Wenders, by the way, is not limited to his directorial co-credits, he also appears in the cast. Watch out for the milkman! Silke Schütze
Prod cos: Wim Wenders Produktion, Berlin; Hochschule für Fernsehen und Film, München; Veit Helmer Filmproduktion, Berlin
Prods: Wim Wenders, Veit Helmer, Wolfgang Längsfeld (HFF)
Dir/scr: Wim Wenders with students of HFF München
Ph: Jürgen Jürges
Prod des: Michael Willadt, Andreas H Schroll
Cos: Katrin Kath, Inez Raatzke
Mus: Laurent Petitgand
Ed: Peter Prszygodda
Cast: Udo Kier, Nadine Büttner, Christoph Merg, Lucie Hürtgen-Skladanowsky
Running time: 79 minutes
Int'l sales: Road Sales GmbH
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