Jeremy Strong Starrer "The Passenger" and Rasoulof's "Grey Matter" Win German Funding

Mohammad Rasoulof's "Grey Matter", his first film made entirely outside Iran, about Kimia, a German-raised neurosurgeon of Iranian origin who operates on a patient who resembles her father, and Magnus von Horn's "The Passenger", adapted from Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz's novel "Der Reisende" with Jeremy Strong as Otto Silbermann, a Berlin businessman who becomes a refugee overnight in November 1938, lead eight projects backed by the feature film jury of the FFA, Germany's federal film board. Detailfilm gets €650,000 (roughly $760,000) for "Grey Matter" and Port au Prince Film & Kultur Produktion €600,000 (~$700,000) for "The Passenger"; both directors' previous films were Oscar-nominated for Best International Feature in 2025. The €2,947,000 (~$3.4 million) round also funds Florian Cossen's "Everything I Am", the true story of 14-year-old solo sailor Laura Dekker, Visar Morina's "Wherever You Are, I Leave You The Keys" and Veit Helmer's "Alpha Juliet Tango", plus development of Sibel Kekilli's directing debut "Letzte Reise".