Archive notice: This article was originally published on February 13, 2009. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
But certainly not of a documentary. Yet exactly such a film has recently written an incredible success story, leaving all simultaneously screened Hollywood blockbusters such as “Valkyrie” and “Madagascar 2” far behind. The documentary “On a Knife’s Edge” by Sören Lauinger and Ephraim Broschkowski, produced by fechnerMedia, is now in its third week at the Scala multiplex cinema in Tuttlingen. Every screening is sold out. More than 2,500 visitors have already seen the film—not counting 800 premiere guests—in a single city and a single auditorium. Other cinemas now want to add the film to their programs.
Considering that films released nationwide can rank among the top 100 German cinema productions with just under 13,000 visitors, according to 2008 FFA statistics, it becomes clear that this is far more than a respectable success for fechnerMedia.
It should not be concealed that the film is of particular regional interest. After all, it focuses on Tuttlingen’s medical-technology industry and the changes globalization brings to it. Nevertheless, fechnerMedia has achieved something industry experts had previously described more as a cinematic utopia.
The cinema in Tuttlingen has become a center of social debate: a region exchanges opinions through the film, aligns perspectives and defines common ground.
fechnerMedia has done pioneering work for theatrical documentaries in the region. Many people in Tuttlingen leave the cinema with the realization that a cinema visit is worthwhile even—or perhaps especially—when a documentary is being shown.
Ralph Hauptmann, manager of Tuttlingen’s Scala cinema, also emphasized other positive effects beyond the film itself. Alongside the pleasure of a well-filled box office, he finds encouragement in the fact that the film attracts many people who had not previously visited his cinema and who now again consider cinema-going a leisure option.
It can be said that Filmförderung Baden-Württemberg, which supported the production with €70,000, got everything right: fechnerMedia GmbH is headquartered in Baden-Württemberg; the film’s subject is regional; key crew members such as cinematographer Alecs P. Heiduschka and editor Sylvia Seuboth-Radtke come from Stuttgart; equipment was also rented locally; and filming and the associated expenditure took place largely in Tuttlingen. A Swabian cinema benefits in particular: attendance is unprecedented in the venue’s history. Regional film funding at its best.
Producer and director Carl-A. Fechner has long enjoyed success with films addressing socially relevant topics. His Arte documentary “Ocean Energy,” for example, won the 2008 German Television Journalism Prize from the Renewable Energy Information Campaign; his film “The Fourth Revolution” received awards at several international festivals; and the 2008 German-French cinema production “Amour, Sexe et Mobylette,” co-produced by Fechner, competed at the long-established Festival dei Popoli documentary festival and screened at numerous other festivals, including the International Documentary Film Festival, the Festival International du Film d’Amour de Mons and the Montreal World Film Festival. The film will receive a nationwide cinema release this year.
With his latest project, on which he serves as director and producer, Carl-A. Fechner aims to surpass his previous successes many times over and has filmed in eleven countries. The elaborate international cinema documentary “Energyautonomy,” currently in post-production, examines how and with what consequences energy is produced and consumed, and what alternatives exist.
