Exciting, promising and young - The festival of newcomers

We discover young talents - new film directors who are at the beginning of their career and who are highly talented. Newcomers - for us this means: directors who at best made themselves a name in their own country but who are internationally unknown. Young cinema authors who deserve discovery. We present a rigorous selection, strictly reserved to quality - without compromises. Our films are genuine premieres. We do not screen any films which have already been seen at other big festivals such as Cannes, Berlin, Venice, Locarno or at any German festival - not a single one. And the selection process is a radical one: these have to be really outstanding new arthouse films by newcomer-directors. Even here we do not make compromises. We manage to present some 40 new feature films (mainly fiction films (75%) but also cinematographically interesting documentaries and short films) - films which are to a large extent unknown to the international film industry.
Radical and brave selection

Each year we comb very carefully - and it is quite a large comb - through the entire new production of arthouse films by newcomers. Some 2,500 of these films are viewed and judged by our scouts and staff, numerous tips are gathered, resulting in an overview that an individual film buyer, for example, cannot acquire or organise due to restrictions of both time and human resources. In a very careful final selection we then choose, from a pool of some 700 feature films, those 35 to 40 films that we present to you - in the"International Competition"and in the"International Discoveries"programme.


TEAM
Festival Director (Programmme & Management)
Michael Koetz, PhD
phone: +49-(0)621-10 29 43

Programme Manager
Daniela Koetz
phone: +49-(0)621-15 60 154
email: daniela.koetz@iffmh.de

Press and Public Relations
Marija Capek
phone: +49-(0)621-15 60 153
email: press@iffmh.de

Organisation Management
Adriana Alder
phone: +49 (0)621-156 99 036
email: adriana.alder@iffmh.de
Mario Wolf
phone: +49 (0)621-156 01 58
email: mario.wolf@iffmh.de

Programme Assistant
Susanne König
email: programm@iffmh.de

MANNHEIM MEETINGS Manager
Gudula Meinzolt
phone: +49-(0)621-156 99 033
email: mm@iffmh.de

Guest services
phone: +49 (0)621 1786572
email: guests@iffmh.de

Selection Committee
Günter Minas, Mainz
Dr. Michael Koetz, Lautertal i. Odw.
Dr. Josef Schnelle, Cologne
Jan Heijs, Amsterdam (1952-2006)
Rüdiger Suchsland, Berlin
Julia Teichmann, Munich

Programme Correspondents
André Bennet, Canada
Michiel Berkel, South Africa
Teresa de Almeida Prado, Brazil
Paulo de Carvalho, Germany
Gönül Dönmez-Colin, France
Mary Glucksman, USA
Wolfgang Hamdorf, Germany
Hans-Joachim Schlegel, Germany
Alissa Simon, USA
Diane Sippl PhD, USA
Stefan Uhrik, Czech Republic

MANNHEIM MEETINGS Consultants
Stefan Kaspar, Lima
Stefan Uhrik, Prague
Elizabeth Yake, Vancouver