What is the significance of second- and third-tier film festivals? PanelJune 28, 2026, 10:00 a.m. in Munich

In addition to the so-called “A-list” film festivals—such as the Cannes Film Festival, the Venice Film Festival, the Berlinale, and the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF)—film festivals at the regional level, ranging from the Munich Film Festival to the Neisse Film Festival, are also of great importance to films and their creators:While the former serve as key industry platforms that provide global visibility and market presence, regional festivals often offer

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Save the date 2nd Munich Film Summit on May 7, 2026

Following the 1st Munich Film Summit in July 2025, which focused on the question of how to revitalize Munich’s dwindling cinema culture, the 2nd Munich Film Summit is now set to take place on Thursday, May 7, as part of DOK.fest München, offering innovative solutions under the title “Outside the Box: New (Thought) Spaces for Film Culture.” It will be interesting to see what ideas, insights, and best-practice examples the

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FIAPF Strengthens the Global Film Festival Ecosystem Through a Comprehensive Overhaul of Its Accreditation System

The goal of this far-reaching overhaul of the accreditation process was to reflect the growing role of film festivals in the film industry. The most significant changes include: To ensure transparency and to serve as a useful resource, the key facts and figures for all accredited festivals are made publicly available on the FIAPF website. On this basis, six new film festivals have been added to the list of accredited

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The Berlinale and its Ministers of State for Culture

While Minister of State for Culture Monika Grütters had opted for a dual leadership structure at the Berlinale—and thus against Dieter Kosslick—and Minister of State for Culture Claudia Roth had questioned the value of such a structure and consequently declined to renew Carlo Chatrian’s contract in favor of a single-director model, the Berlinale’s current leadership, Tricia Tuttle, came now under fire from the Minister of State for Culture Wolfram Weimer

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“I started getting anxious about the stories that I wanted to tell“

This is how Robert Redford described his reaction to the developments he observed in his early years in the film business in an interview with Indiewire in 2013. And this prompted him to found the Sundance Institute and establish the Sundance Film Festival to showcase all the exciting new voices in the world. There is certainly no other place in the world that has since become as relevant to independent

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BKM partially cuts funding for the 20 most important film festivals in Germany

As announced at the press conference of the Max Ophüls Prize film festival on January 15, contrary to his agenda of politically recognizing and supporting film culture and the film industry in all its diversity, Minister of State for Media Wolfram Weimer has significantly reduced BKM funding for a select group of German film festivals by 2026. This decision stands in direct contrast to the increase in federal funding for

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Film festivals between influence and responsibility

With the statement “It is important that they leave the cinema different from when they entered,” Christoph Terhechte expresses one of his core concerns as a long-time director of various film festivals in an interview, describing an essential characteristic of film festivals: their impact. The entire interview can be found in issue 4/2025 of Communicatio Socialis and is available to read free of charge in German here.

Baden-Württemberg expands its film festival funding to include smaller film festivals

While some federal states are being forced to significantly reduce, if not eliminate, funding for their own film festival landscape, Baden-Württemberg is introducing its own funding guidelines for smaller film festivals in order to support both access to film culture and the film industry. In addition, with this measure, the federal state is pursuing the goal of contributing to the professionalization of film festivals and thus strengthening their future viability

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Cinema connects East & West

The Federal Association of Municipal Film Work (BkF) invites you to Dresden for its annual congress from November 20 to 23 2025. Under the motto “Growing Together – Cinema Culture in East & West,” the event will focus on differences and similarities, historical developments, and Needs of cinema culture in the eastern and western German states and create space for exchange.The congress program can be found here

FFA presents figures, data, and facts on the development of arthouse cinemas in 2024 at the 25th Filmkunstmesse Leipzig

The figures show a welcome upward trend not only in terms of the number of arthouse cinema tickets sold, which rose by 1 million compared to the previous year, but also in terms of the importance of arthouse cinemas in the German cinema market. In 2024, the share of arthouse cinema tickets in the overall market rose to 15 percent, and there was also an increase in the share of

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