Press Release  -  June 2010

8th Tegernsee Mountain Film Festival
High standards and great diversity

The Tegernsee Mountain Film Festival’s organizing team as always sticks firmly to its principles: the 2010 programme will once more be limited to high quality films with a distinct mountain theme. A pre-selection jury has chosen 70 eligible productions where the subject and its artistic representation comply with the festival’s high standards. This guarantees a sophisticated as well as varied selection of films on show.

‘The mountain film genre is so diverse and grants such vast scope that despite our explicit mountain theme, we are able to present a broad spectrum of productions,’ states Michael Pause (Bavarian Broadcasting), the festival’s art director. The pre-selection jury was chaired by Sigi Menzel (Bavarian Broadcasting) and included Manja Evers (film editor), Alfons Hausler (arts editor), Klaus Wiendl (journalist) and Heino Brunner (film maker, Videoclub Tegernsee). They took their time evaluating 139 submitted films as fairly as possible, on the lookout for productions whose plot as well as cinematographic quality entitle them to be presented to viewers and the competition jury in October. One intention behind the mountain film festival’s high standards is to create a counterpoint to the surge of unfiltered images online, where the most poorly produced videos are presented to millions of viewers.
This distinction is not only popular with the festival’s visitors, but also with participating producers. ‘The film scene takes our festival quite serious and observes carefully, which films are put on view in Tegernsee, as they will have reached the finals, so to speak,’ explains Pause. Renowned film makers keep submitting their latest films. Less experienced producers and directors who were turned down previously work at improving their standards. ‘You do notice the improvement, and some of their films have by now been accepted for competition,’ says Sigi Menzel. Not because little strokes fell big oaks, but ‘because the films deserve it.’

The strict mountain theme has helped the Tegernsee festival to set itself apart from numerous travel, nature and adventure film festivals and to strengthen its profile – ‘without losing out on diversity’, according to Pause. He explains: ‘We are not solely committed to classical mountain films, but to life in the mountains as such with all its many facets and variants.’ At times, classic alpinism will be the central focus, as was the case with Joseph Vilsmaier’s lavish silver screen production ‘Nanga Parbat’, at others natural landscapes, for instance in many stunning documentaries about the Himalayas. Other films focus on interesting people, Tibetan child-monks for example, who will be central to two films this October: one production impresses with its cinematography, the other with its empathetic intimacy with one child. It is amazing, the way this boy opens up in front of the camera,’ Menzel enthuses.
More excitement is to be expected this autumn in the Special Category ‘Trend Sports in the Mountains’. This classification will help evaluate whether adrenalin rush and artistic integrity can truly unite. ‘It will be interesting to see how producers negotiate this balancing act – and ultimately, how the jury will assess the results,’ Michael Pause states.
Diversion linked to the mountains is on offer during the fringe programme, for instance at a screening of Luis Trenker’s cinematic opera ‘Kampf ums Matterhorn’ (Battle for Mount Matterhorn) und at Georg Koeniger’s mountain and climbing cabaret skit ‘Mach zu’ (Hurry Up).

Information: the 8th Tegernsee Mountain Film Festival will take place from 20 to 24 October 2010. The programme will be available from mid-August. For further information contact:
Bergfilm-Festival Tegernsee, Rathausplatz 1, 83684 Tegernsee, Germany, Tel. +49(0)8022-1801 53, www.bergfilm-festival-tegernsee.de
Ticket sales (starting end of August): Tourist-Information Tegernsee, Hauptstr. 2, 83684 Tegernsee, Germany, Tel. +49(0)8022-180162, oder online www.tegernsee.de, www.bergfilm-festival-tegernsee.de, www.muenchenticket.de, as well as at all Tourist Information Centres in the Tegernsee Valley and from Munich ticket vendors.