Archive notice: This article was originally published on April 7, 2008. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
Ahead of the German Film Awards 2008, the jury announced its decision to honour producer and director Alexander Kluge with the lifetime achievement award: “In the 1960s and 1970s, Alexander Kluge was one of the protagonists of ‘New German Cinema’, a movement that took German cinema from the depths of mediocrity to international recognition. With his essayistically structured films, he described the social currents of those years sharply, critically and precisely. In particular, his multi-award-winning film YESTERDAY GIRL created a milestone in German film history, comparable to the role played by Godard’s BREATHLESS in France.
Beyond his artistic work, Alexander Kluge was also active in film policy. German filmmakers still owe significant initiatives in state funding to him today. For some time, Kluge has concentrated his impressive creativity on television. Yet he has remained unchanged in what he was from the outset: a passionate filmmaker,” says Günter Rohrbach, chairman of the “Honorary Award” jury and president of the German Film Academy, about the 2008 honorary award recipient.
Strictly speaking, Alexander Kluge is receiving this high honour for the second time. As early as 1982, as one of the co-authors of the Oberhausen Manifesto of 1962, regarded as the birth of “New German Cinema”, he received the Filmband in Gold, the predecessor of the LOLA, for “many years of outstanding work in German film”. His name is equally closely associated with German cinema and German television.
In 1958, by then already a doctor of law and a student of Adorno, he entered film as an assistant to none other than Fritz Lang. His debut film, YESTERDAY GIRL,
already brings him the Silver Lion at the Venice Film Festival in 1966, making him the first German in the post-war period to receive the award. Between 1967 and 1982 alone, Kluge received the Filmband seven times (six in gold and once in silver); he won the coveted Lion at the Venice Film Festival a total of three times. His work as a filmmaker comprises 14 feature-length films and around 30 documentaries and short films.
Throughout his work, he has always placed the greatest importance on close cooperation between cinema and television, which was reflected in his engagement in film policy (for example, in the 1974 Film/Television Framework Agreement).
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Since 1988, Alexander KLuge has devoted himself entirely to German television, where, among other things, he realises his idea of “publisher television” through the DCTP formats and preserves a demanding cultural window in commercial television without regard for ratings-driven visual language.
Kluge is also active as a literary and socio-philosophical author and has been honoured with numerous important awards. The Federal Republic of Germany’s highest state honour, the Grand Cross of Merit, was awarded to Alexander Kluge in 2007.
The Honorary Award is the only category at the German Film Awards in which not all members of the German Film Academy vote by secret ballot. The honorary award recipient is chosen by a ten-member selection committee appointed by the board from the members, supporting members and circle of friends of the German Film Academy.
Das ERSTE will broadcast the German Film Awards 2008 ceremony on April 25, 2008, from 9:45 p.m., live but time-delayed, with a duration of 120 minutes. A repeat will be shown on rbb on April 27 at 8:15 p.m.
Barbara Schöneberger has taken on hosting duties for the evening.
Further Links:
- German Film Academy
German Film Awards
