Bavaria Film Studios

The Bavaria Film Studios in Geiselgasteig, a district of Munich's suburb Grünwald, Bavaria belongs to Europe's biggest and most famous movie production studios.

History

The studios were founded already in 1919 by the movie producer Peter Ostermayr, who established the Münchner Lichtspielkunst AG (Emelka) in competition to the UFA and acquired a large estate (ca. 356.000 m²) in Geiselgasteig for the studios. In 1932 the major shareholder Wilhelm Kraus founded the Bavaria Film. In 1938 the Bavaria Film was nationalised but privatised again in 1956.

Famous films shot at Bavaria Film Studios

Alfred Hitchcock made his first movie, "The Pleasure Garden", in Geiselgasteig in 1925. The studios have been used by numerous famous directors, such as Orson Welles ("Richard III", 1950), Max Ophüls ("Lola Montez", 1954), Stanley Kubrick ("Paths of Glory", 1957), John Huston ("Freud", 1960), Robert Siodmak ("L`Affaire Nina B", 1960), Billy Wilder ("One, Two, Three", 1961), John Sturges ("The Great Escape", 1963), Robert Wise ("The Sound of Music", 1965), Mel Stuart ("Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory", (1971), Bob Fosse ("Cabaret", 1972), Ingmar Bergman ("The Serpent's Egg", 1977), Robert Aldrich ("Twilight's Last Gleaming", 1977), Rainer Werner Fassbinder ("Berlin Alexanderplatz", 1980), Wolfgang Petersen ("Enemy Mine", 1985), Claude Chabrol and Wim Wenders. Also Monty Python worked in Geiselgasteig in 1971 and 1972 for "Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus", the specials for German and Austrian Television.

The Studios in Geiselgasteig are the reason why Munich has become a famous site of crime in TV fiction (in opposite to real life), with detectives like Derrick, The Old Fox, and Der Kommissar investigating.

The Bavaria Film GmbH is a film production company well known for their television films, but they have also produced successful cine films in Geiselgasteig, such as Wolfgang Petersen's "Das Boot" (1981).

Other production companies have also produced films in the Bavaria studios, including Constantin Film, for Petersen's "The Neverending Story" (1984) and Tom Tykwer's "" (2006).

Bavaria Film Tour

The Bavaria Film Tour is an attraction offered for tourists. Visitors taking the tour see sets and props from "The Neverending Story", "Das Boot", "Marienhof", and many more.

External links

* [http://www.bavaria-film.com Bavaria Film GmbH]
* [http://www.bavaria-studios.eu Bavaria Film- und Fernsehstudios GmbH]
* [http://www.filmstadt.de/index.php?id=139 Bavaria Film Tour]