Fox production Germany taps Gabriela Bacher

COLOGNE, Germany -- Twentieth Century Fox International Pictures (FIP) has picked former Studio Babelsberg boss Gabriela Bacher to run its new German production division.

Bacher, who briefly ran Babelsberg back in 2002, operates a consulting firm, Primary Pictures, which has often advised Fox in the past.

Bacher has a number of German projects in development, among them an adaptation of Robin Wasserman's teen thriller trilogy "Chasing Yesterday," about a girl who wakes up in a hospital with no idea who she is or how she got there.

Genre experts Peter Thorwarth and Stefan Holtz ("Bang Boom Bang") are co-writing a script that moves the action of the novels to modern-day Berlin. Thorwarth is in negotiations to direct.

Fox is also planning the simultaneous production of seven foreign-language remakes of wine tasting buddy movie "Sideways," with adaptations for Germany, Russia, Japan, India, Korea, Spain and Brazil.

FIP's German division also plans to acquire rights to German material or act as a co-production partner, in cooperation with Fox Germany and its general manager Vincent de la Tour.

FIP was launched last year under president Sanford Panitch and has been quick to follow the model set up by Sony Pictures Entertainment to make local-language films for local markets in major territories around the world.