59 funds a writer based in Germany can apply to: 25 at home and 34 from Europe and the world. 22 take an application from the writer alone.
59 listed.
Nothing matches. Try another stage, or leave the country on "any country": international funds are listed under every country they are open to.
National and regional funds, broadcasters and foundations at home.
FFA, Filmförderungsanstalt (German Federal Film Board)
Federal production grants for culturally ambitious fiction, documentary, children's and animated features, decided by a jury rather than by reference points.
FFA, Filmförderungsanstalt (German Federal Film Board)
Development money for the stage after the script: rights, further drafts, casting, budgeting. A production company applies, except in documentary, where writers and directors may come alone.
FFA, Filmförderungsanstalt (German Federal Film Board), running the federal jury-based cultural film funding since 2025
The federal screenplay grant that writers apply for alone, since the 2025 film law moved the BKM's cultural funding into the FFA.
Kuratorium junger deutscher Film (foundation for young German film)
Germany's talent fund pays a writer up to EUR 25,000 to develop an original idea from research to script over ten months, with a dramaturg attached.
Kuratorium junger deutscher Film (foundation for young German film)
Where first and second films by German writers, directors and producers go for development and production money since the FFA handed talent films to the Kuratorium in January 2026.
FFA, Filmförderungsanstalt (German Federal Film Board)
New under the 2025 film law: when a German feature scores reference points, its writer and director get their own pot to spend on the next script, from a first idea to a finished…
Film- und Medienstiftung NRW (North Rhine-Westphalia film and media foundation)
A ladder of grants from a five-thousand-euro exposé to a twenty-thousand-euro screenplay, with the first rung open to NRW writers on their own and no producer required.
nordmedia, Film- und Mediengesellschaft Niedersachsen/Bremen
Lower Saxony and Bremen's fund lets a writer apply for script development money alone, up to EUR 30,000, though the sum is a loan due if the film gets made.
MFG Baden-Württemberg, Filmförderung (Baden-Württemberg film fund)
Baden-Württemberg's script line takes a writer's own application for a fiction feature, while documentaries and series need a company.
Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg
A separate door for first and second features in Berlin-Brandenburg, with smaller sums and a grant option for low budgets.
Film- und Medienstiftung NRW (North Rhine-Westphalia film and media foundation)
Since 2002 this NRW stipend has paid young documentary makers to develop a cinema feature before any producer is attached: a treatment, research trips, a visual concept.
MOIN Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein
NEST replaced the treatment and screenplay schemes in Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein in favor of a residency plus tools model: EUR 7,500 for the idea, a week with Le Groupe Ouest, then a…
FFF Bayern, FilmFernsehFonds Bayern (Bavarian film and television fund)
Bavaria's main production loan, up to three million euros, sitting behind the fund's script and development lines.
Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg
The production loan behind many Berlin-shot features and documentaries. The script, a recoupment plan and proof of exploitation go in with the producer's application.
MFG Baden-Württemberg, Filmförderung (Baden-Württemberg film fund)
Stuttgart's production loan for cinema and television films, with a pre-production line beside it. The fund's news names its films, from an animated NEINhorn to the Emmy-nominated Lenas Hof.
HessenFilm und Medien (Hessen film and media fund)
Everything after the script in Hessen: pre-production grants, a Setzkasten that bundles treatment, development and preparation, slate funding for small companies, and a production loan…
MOIN Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein
Two committees split Hamburg's production money by budget, Director's Cut below EUR 2.5 million and High End above, with project development and completion lines alongside.
FFF Bayern, FilmFernsehFonds Bayern (Bavarian film and television fund)
The step between a finished Bavarian screenplay and the shoot: a loan to the producer for casting, budgeting and further drafts, with recent awards between EUR 30,000 and EUR 85,000 per…
Film- und Medienstiftung NRW (North Rhine-Westphalia film and media foundation)
The production line of Germany's biggest regional fund, covering pre-production, the shoot, post, distribution and world sales.
Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg
Berlin-Brandenburg's script money goes to the producer developing your screenplay, as a loan that comes back only if the film happens.
FFF Bayern, FilmFernsehFonds Bayern (Bavarian film and television fund)
Bavaria pays a fixed EUR 30,000 for a feature or series screenplay, and a writer can apply directly as long as a Bavarian producer signs a letter of intent.
MDM, Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung (central German media fund for Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia)
Central Germany funds a writer's screenplay, series concept or storyworld with a loan of up to EUR 25,000, rising to EUR 30,000 through a company, then project development and production…
MV Filmförderung (Mecklenburg-Vorpommern film fund)
A small northeastern fund with an unusual perk: script development is an outright grant of up to EUR 20,000, and a writer can apply with just a producer's letter.
HessenFilm und Medien (Hessen film and media fund)
Hessen hands writers a grant for a treatment on a rolling basis and up to EUR 30,000 for a screenplay three times a year, with the writer applying alone if they live in the state.
World Cinema Fund, Berlin International Film Festival, with Creative Europe MEDIA
WCF money for European producers, including those in Eastern Europe and the Balkans with little co-production funding at home, who partner with a filmmaker from the fund's regions.
European and international funds, and funds from other countries that take applications from here.
ÖFI, Österreichisches Filminstitut (Austrian Film Institute)
Austria's national script grant for cinema features and documentary concepts, paid directly to the writer and exempt from income tax.
Centre du Cinéma et de l'Audiovisuel de la Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles
French-speaking Belgium's writing aid for features pays a screenwriter up to EUR 15,000 and takes the application from the writer directly, with EEA nationals eligible alongside Belgians.
CNC, Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée (French national film center)
Not a project grant but time: EUR 20,000 for an author with a track record to think before writing the next thing, with no synopsis or producer required.
Région Île-de-France
The region around Paris puts more than EUR 16 million a year into features and a similar effort into series, as grants rather than advances.
Film Commission Torino Piemonte
The oldest Italian fund for documentary, running since 2007, with a development line that covers research, writing and a promo, and a production line for shooting and post in Piedmont.
Film Commission Torino Piemonte, with Fondazione CRT
Production money for fiction, animated and experimental shorts up to 30 minutes shot in Piedmont, with at least four of six key crew roles filled locally and a stated plan for getting the…
Hubert Bals Fund, International Film Festival Rotterdam, with Creative Europe MEDIA
Production money that follows a European producer into a co-production with the global South. Only 25 percent of the grant needs spending in Europe; the rest can go where the film is made.
Hubert Bals Fund, International Film Festival Rotterdam, with Creative Europe MEDIA
Finishing money for co-productions that reached the edit, from the Rotterdam fund's European strand. Thirteen films since 2023, one of them the Tiger Award winner of 2026.
IDFA Bertha Fund, International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, with Creative Europe MEDIA
The European side of the IDFA Bertha Fund: a minority producer in Europe brings a documentary from the global South to the finish.
Kulturdirektoratet (Arts Council Norway) on behalf of Fond for lyd og bilde
A rights holders' fund, financed as compensation for private copying, that pays for short films, documentaries, music videos, art film and text work tied to film projects.
Basque Government, Department of Culture and Language Policy
Development money for features and series that puts the script first: at least 45 percent of the grant must go to writing the screenplay, 35 percent for animation and documentary.
Creative Europe MEDIA, European Commission
Money for one project developed jointly by producers in two or more European countries, so a writer whose story crosses a border can be paid while two companies share the work.
Creative Europe MEDIA, European Commission
The smaller sibling of slate development: two or three projects on one grant, which suits a young company with a couple of writers attached rather than a studio.
Creative Europe MEDIA, European Commission
The largest development pot in Europe, paid to production companies rather than writers: a company develops three to five projects at once on one grant, which keeps writers employed across…
Creative Europe MEDIA, European Commission
Development money for interactive storytelling rather than film: narrative video games and immersive experiences with a story at their core.
Creative Europe MEDIA, European Commission
Series and television films draw their EU production money here, paid to the producer once broadcasters in more than one country are on board.
Eurimages, the Council of Europe's cultural support fund
Forty member states, Canada, Turkey, Ukraine and Switzerland among them, pay into this Council of Europe fund for co-produced features.
Catapult Film Fund
Seed money for documentaries at the point where nobody else will pay: a grant to shoot and cut the sample that raises the rest.
Perspective Fund
A private documentary funder that reads inquiries all year and writes checks of USD 25,000 to 150,000 without taking rights or credits below USD 150,000.
International Documentary Association, with the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
A production fund for documentaries built on reporting, created in 2017 as an answer to misinformation.
Ford Foundation
The foundation behind much of American social-issue documentary takes direct proposals from filmmakers through a periodic open call, scored on fit with Ford's justice themes…
the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
The best known paid year of writing in American film: a USD 35,000 stipend to finish a new feature screenplay, open to unproduced writers anywhere in the world.
Chicken & Egg Films
Paid thinking time for women and gender-expansive documentary directors between films: a USD 10,000 research grant or a USD 20,000 development grant, with the stage chosen by the applicant.
From the Heart Productions
Small cash, large bundle: the winner takes USD 3,500 and a package of donated post, music and consulting worth several times that, for a film meant to do some good.
Post-production money for feature documentaries that are shot but not cut, from the San Francisco festival's foundation arm.
SFFILM, with the Kenneth Rainin Foundation
One of the few American grants that pays a screenwriter directly to write, and it can also fund packaging or the edit of the same film later.
CNC, Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée, with the Institut français
The French door for filmmakers from anywhere else: a grant of up to EUR 300,000 for a feature co-produced with a French company, and a smaller sum to finish a film already shot.
Association Beaumarchais-SACD
A writer alone, writing in French from anywhere in the world, can win EUR 5,000 for a first or second fiction feature.
Association Beaumarchais-SACD
The television twin of the Beaumarchais feature bursary: EUR 5,000 to an emerging writer for an original series or single drama in French, with web series welcome.
Trentino Film Commission, Trentino Sviluppo (Provincia autonoma di Trento)
A production fund for works shot in Trentino, with the committee meeting about every three months and approved projects listed on the portal back to 2011.
Regione Autonoma della Sardegna and Fondazione Sardegna Film Commission
Money for bigger films that bring a shoot to Sardinia, in three categories by budget size, with a documentary strand. The round was reopened in autumn 2026 for the remaining funds.
Regione Friuli Venezia Giulia, through Friuli Venezia Giulia Film Commission
A production fund scored on how much of the film happens in the region, with three closing dates a year and a ranking issued within 30 days of each.
IDM Südtirol Alto Adige, Film Fund and Commission
Open to producers from any country, which is rare for a regional fund, as long as the shoot touches South Tyrol.
A rare worldwide grant for a first or second feature at the development stage, with real money behind it: up to USD 20,000 to write and package a narrative feature, more later for…