Archive notice: This article was originally published on March 22, 2008. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
He also wrote the screenplay together with Ulrich Limmer.
Under the direction of Lars Büchel (“Bis zum Ellenbogen”, “Erbsen auf halb sechs”), Anke Engelke, Moritz Bleibtreu and Christiane Paul appear before the camera. Uwe Ochsenknecht, Eva Mattes and Edgar Selge have been secured for guest appearances. The young leading roles are played by Karl Alexander Seidel (“Hände weg von Mississippi”), Amrita Cheema and Steve-Marvin Dwumah (“Neger, Neger, Schornsteinfeger”). Konstantin Wecker is composing the film music. “Lippels Traum” is produced by Ulrich Limmer, collina filmproduktion GmbH, Munich (“Das Sams”, “Räuber Hotzenplotz”, “Herr Bello”). Following Morocco, filming will continue in Munich and Passau until May 29.
The hero of the new children’s and family feature film is eleven-year-old Philipp (Karl Alexander Seidel), known as Lippel. Because his father, celebrated chef Otto Mattenheim (Moritz Bleibtreu), is going on a business trip, the new housekeeper, Mrs Jakob (Anke Engelke), is to look after Lippel. But she turns out to be a dreadful person in every respect. Even the book of stories from “One Thousand and One Nights” that his father left him as consolation cannot help Lippel, because the humourless Mrs Jakob has taken it away from him. While the domestic skirmishes between him and Mrs Jakob rage during the day, at night Lippel escapes into an Oriental dream world in which his father, Mrs Jakob and his two new classmates Hamide (Amrita Cheema) and Arslan (Steve-Marvin Dwumah) also appear in a strange way. With them, Lippel experiences the most fantastic adventures in the Orient. His dreams give him the strength to drive the unbearable Mrs Jakob out of the house together with Hamide and Arslan and rescue his new friend, the stray dog Muck. Above all, however, Lippel has gained confidence in himself along the way…
“Lippels Traum” is a production of collina filmproduktion GmbH Munich and is being made in co-production with Bayerischer Rundfunk (commissioning editor Dr. Friederike Euler), Universum Film, B.A. Produktion and Hamburg production company element -e. The production is supported by FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, the Filmförderungsanstalt Berlin, Filmförderung Hamburg / Schleswig-Holstein and the Deutscher Filmförderfond.
Paul Maar’s children’s classic was first published by Oetinger Verlag in 1984; the paperback was reissued by Random House in 2007.
The cinema release of “Lippels Traum” is planned for spring 2009. Afterwards, “Lippels Traum” will be presented by BR on Das Erste, the ARD regional channels and KIKA.
