The Euro-noir series Babylon – the first pan-European TV drama about fraud and corruption within the EU, backed by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU)– will be staged by Denmark’s Zentropa Entertainments. Scripts for the 24x50min programme will be ready in February, for shooting to commence later this year in collaboration with Danish and Swedish pubcasters DR and SVT, ARTE France and RTÉ Ireland. The show is internationally marketed by Denmark’s TrustNordisk.

”A truck driver smashes into a crowd at the historic Waterloo monument just a few miles outside Brussels, killing students, politicians, members of the press and security people,” is the EBU’s introduction to Babylon, which follows the investigation of Belgian police John van Martens and an Irish newly elected MEP who do not believe this was not just another drunk-drive accident. They eventually realise that ”like in The X-files, The Da Vinci Code and 24hrs, there is a conspiracy around the corner, and a dense concentration of power pulling the strings”.

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After the pre-Christmas announcement of the first five titles selected in competition at the 62nd Berlin International Film Festival (news) and the announcement, on January 4, of the Golden Bear contender set to open the event – Benoît Jacquot’s French/Spanish co-production Farewell, My Queen, adapted from a novel by Chantal Thomas, in which Diane Kruger plays Marie-Antoinette at the dawn of the French Revolution, starring alongside Léa Seydoux and Virginie Ledoyen –, ten more selected titles have been revealed, all representing Europe, in particular Germany.

Indeed, among the titles, all screening at Berlin in world avant-premiere, are Christian Petzold’s latest film, Barbara, starring his muse Nina Hoss (winner of Best Actress at Berlin in 2007 for his film Yella; Home For the Weekend by Hans-Christian Schmid (Storm); and Matthias Glasner’s new feature, Gnade, a Norwegian co-production starring Jürgen Vogel (who previously worked with Glasner on the film The Free Will) and Austrian actress Birgit Minichmayr (who won the Silver Bear for Best Actress in 2009).

Germany is also represented by the co-productions Meteora by Greece’s Spiros Stathoulopoulos, Just The Wind by Hungary’s Benedek Fliegauf and Tabu by Portugal’s Miguel Gomes (Our Beloved Month of August).

Meanwhile, the Taviani brothers will compete with Caesar Must Die, while Alain Gomis will present French/Senegalese co-production Aujourd'hui (“Today”, see news) and Ursula Meier the French/Swiss title L´enfant D´en Haut (“The Child From Above”). Finally, Billy Bob Thornton is in competition with Russian/US co-production Jayne Mansfield’s Car.

Another important selection has been revealed: the debut directorial film by US star Angelina Jolie, In The Land Of Blood And Honey, which will have a special screening in the Haus der Berliner Festspiele’s new cinema.

The 34th edition of the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival (January 27- February 4 2012), one the biggest events of its kind in Europe, will be featuring several German titles.

Three of them are to run in the International Competition, Philipp Käßbohrer's Armadingen, Isabel Prahl's Ausreichend (Adequate) and Olaf Held's Daheim (Home).

Four more German shorts will be screened within the ambit of the Lab Competition: Till Nowak's The Centrifuge Brain Project, Susann Maria Hempel's Die Fliegen (The Birds II), Anja Struck's How to Raise the Moon and Meteor, by Christoph Girardet and Matthias Müller.

One of the first Norwegian-German co-productions in 34 years, German director Georg Maas’s drama-thriller Two Lives, began principal photography on location in Bergen this week (December 6). Norwegian producer Axel Helgeland has worked with Mass for eight years to prepare the film, which will shoot in Norway until Christmas, then in Germany until January 31.

Scripted by Maas, with Ståle Stein Berg and Christoph Tölle, Two Lives is set shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall. A 45 year-old Norwegian-German woman, Katrine Evensen-Myrdal who's married and a successful photographer living in Norway, is summoned as a witness in a court case against the Norwegian state on behalf of the children of Norwegian mothers and Wehrmacht soldiers born during the Nazi occupation, 1940-1945.

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It was a glittering Sunday night at London’s Old Billingsgate and it shone brightest for actor turned director Paddy Considine as his Tyrannosaur walked away with three of the top awards at the 14th British Independent Film Awards (BIFAs).

Tyrannosaur won Best British Independent Film and the film’s leading lady Olivia Colman won Best Actress with Considine conferred The Douglas Hickox Award for Best Debut Director.

Lynne Ramsay won Best Director for We Need to Talk About Kevin, Michael Fassbender Best Actor for Shame, Vanessa Redgrave Best Supporting Actress for Coriolanus, Michael Smiley Best Supporting Actor for Kill List and Richard Ayoade Best Screenplay for Submarine.

BIFA Joint Directors Johanna von Fischer & Tessa Collinson said, “What a fantastic year for British film! This year’s nominees embodied a diverse range of genres and those walking away with awards tonight are representative of the high quality of outstanding talent we have in this country. Congratulations to them all.”

Complete list of winners: __ BEST BRITISH INDEPENDENT FILM__ Tyrannosaur BEST DIRECTOR Lynne Ramsay (We Need To Talk About Kevin) THE DOUGLAS HICKOX AWARD BEST DEBUT DIRECTOR Paddy Considine (Tyrannosaur) BEST SCREENPLAY Richard Ayoade (Submarine) BEST ACTRESS Olivia Colman (Tyrannosaur) BEST ACTOR Michael Fassbender (Shame) BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS Vanessa Redgrave (Coriolanus) BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR Michael Smiley (Kill List) MOST PROMISING NEWCOMER Tom Cullen (Weekend) BEST ACHIEVEMENT IN PRODUCTION Weekend THE RAINDANCE AWARD Leaving Baghdad BEST TECHNICAL ACHIEVEMENT Maria Djurkovic (Production Design: Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy) BEST DOCUMENTARY Senna BEST BRITISH SHORT Chalk BEST FOREIGN INDEPENDENT FILM A Separation THE RICHARD HARRIS AWARD (for outstanding contribution by an actor to British Film) Ralph Fiennes THE VARIETY AWARD Kenneth Branagh THE SPECIAL JURY PRIZE Graham Easton (CEO of completion bond company Film Finances)

Winner of the Golden Leopard in the Filmmakers of the Present section at the latest Locarno Film Festival, Alessandro Comodin’s debut feature Summer of Giacomo won the Grand Prize at the 26th EntreVues – Belfort International Film Festival on Saturday. Focusing on young directors and cinematic boldness, EntreVues has, since its creation, handed out awards to Laurent Cantet, Aldellatif Kechiche, Pascale Ferran, Michelangelo Frammartino, Albert Serra and Corneliu Porumboiu.

Co-produced by France (Les Films d’Ici and Wallpaper Productions), Italy (Faber Film) and Belgium (Les Films Nus), Summer of Giacomo is set in the north Italian countryside and centres on Giacomo, a young 19-year-old deaf man, who goes picnicking with his best female friend. But they get lost and discover a remote and heavenly place where during an afternoon, sensuality creeps into their childish games until they realise that these events are nothing more than the bittersweet memory of an already lost time.

Born in Frioul, Comodin, whose latest short film, Jagdfieber - The Hunting Fever was selected in the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight 2009, studied in Paris and at INSAS in Brussels.

At this edition of the Belfort fest, the Best French Film Award went to Laurent Achard’s fascinating Last Screening (see review), which was also unveiled at Locarno (in competition) and will be launched in French theatres on Wednesday by Epicentre Films. A Special Mention was awarded to directorial duo Rania Attieh and Daniel García’s Lebanese feature Ok, Enough, Goodbye. Finally, the Audience Award was bestowed on Cyril Mennegun’s harrowing Louise Wimmer, which won acclaim in Venice Critics’ Week (see review) and will be released in French theatres on January 4, 2012 by Haut et Court.

The Belfort international competition also selected, among others, Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos’s Venice award-winner Alps (see interview); Éric Baudelaire’s The Anabasis of May and Fusako Shigenobu, Masao Adachi and 27 Years Without Images; Marie Voignier’s The Mokélé Mbembé Hypothesis; Valérie Massadian’s Nana; Davy Chou’s French/Cambodian co-production Golden Slumbers; and Anca Hirte’s French/Romanian feature Teodora Sinner. The “Films en Cours” section also screened Today by Alain Gomis.

Finally, the festival paid homage to Eric Rohmer and presented the complete works of Patricia Mazuy, including Of Women and Horses (unveiled at Locarno – to be released in France on January 25, 2012 by Le Pacte).

Valerie Donzelli’s French film Declaration of War was the top winner at the 49th Gijón International Film Festival, which closed on Saturday, November 26 with the screening of Pawel Pawlikowski’s French/Polish/UK co-production The Woman in the Fifth. Donzelli’s second feature won the awards for Best Film (shared with Santiago Mitre’s Argentinean film The Student), Best Actor (Jérémie Elkaïm) and Best Actress (for Donzelli).

Declaration of War is one of this year’s sensations in France, which has chosen the film as its entry for the 2012 Best Foreign Language Film Oscar (see news). After its triumphant screening in Cannes Critics’ Week in May (see review), the film was released in its country of origin on August 31 and attracted almost 800,000 viewers. The press welcomed the jury’s decision to award Best Director to Ruben Östlund for his Swedish film Play, one of the most acclaimed films at the festival. Meanwhile, the only Spanish representative, Gabriel Velázquez’s debut feature, Iceberg, received a special mention from the jury for “its honest and sharp look at the fragile world of adolescence”. The international jury, composed of film director Eduardo Chapero-Jackson, journalist Fernando Lara, screenwriter Lola Mayo, writer Alberto Fuguet and deputy director of the Sofia Film Festival, Mira Staleva, also wanted to express their support for the Asturian event on account of “its invaluable and much-needed work in defending independent cinema”. Recently, the festival’s director, José Luis Cienfuegos, wrote in Cineuropa about the worrying effects of the economic crisis on the world of culture, in particular film events (see Editorial).

Winner of nine gongs, including Best Film, at this year’s Goyas, Agustí Villaronga’s Black Bread will be presented on Monday, June 21 before a Parisian audience at a screening attended by the director and its producer Isona Passola, as part of Dífferent 4! L'Autre Cinéma Espagnol. The film will be released in France on August 24 by Alfama Films.

The event was set up to draw French distributors’ attention to around ten Spanish films previously unreleased in France. Having kicked off on Wednesday, its fourth edition has so far been very successful with many French professionals coming to meet with representatives of the selected Spanish films yesterday.

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Presented as a special screening at the Transylvania International Film Festival (TIFF), after screening at Tribeca in April, the documentary Our School certainly hit close to home.

Set in the Transylvanian town of Targu Lapus, the nonfiction film directed by Mona Nicoara and co-directed by Miruna Coca-Cozma follows three children from the Roma-dominated Dileu neighbourhood, far from the centre, who are asked to start attending school in the centre as part of a European plan to stop Roma children from being segregated in Romanian schools.

At the start of the film, which began shooting in 2006 and continued through this year, the protagonists are eight-year-old Alin, a mischievous little boy; rotund 12-year-old Beni and pretty 16-year-old Dana, a cow herder. As the story progresses, they grow older but not necessarily, despite going to school, much wiser.

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Revered British film and stage actress and Oscar winner Judi Dench will be presented with the Crystal Globe Award for Outstanding Artistic Contribution to World Cinema at the 46th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (July 1-19).

Ever since she played Ophelia in Hamlet on the London stage some 50 years ago, Dench has enjoyed both commercial success in an acting career where besides the Oscar, she has won 10 BAFTAs, three Lawrence Olivier awards, two Golden Globes and been honoured with an Order of the British Empire, a Dame of the British Empire and a Companion of Honour.

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