Bavaria Film GmbH is a German film production and distribution company located in Grünwald, Bavaria at the district of Munich. It is one of Europe's largest film production companies and one of the leading production and distribution companies in the German film and television industry service, with some 30 subsidiaries.[1][2]
History
Bavaria Film and their studios goes back to where it all started to were the company was founded in 1919, when Munich-raised film producer Peter Ostermayr converted the private film company he had founded in 1907, Münchener Lichtspielkunst GmbH, to the public company Münchener Lichtspielkunst AG (Emelka), and acquired a large area (ca. 356.000 m2) for the studios in Geiselgasteig, a district of Munich's southern suburb Grünwald. The company was a direct competitor to UFA, which had begun operations in Berlin in 1917, and quickly absorbed several other film industry companies in the region.
From the year 1920 onwards as a reaction to Berlin's film monopoly position and in order to be independent, the company's former name counterparted the founding of UFA and Emilika was expanded to become the Emilika Group. One year later in 1921, the group announced that they've acquired its own copying facility, Süddeutsche Filmwerke Geyer in order to expand their operations outside of film making.