This is Germany, this touches German filmmakers. From the 500 or so German productions submitted, the 12 best have been selected. They allow a unique insight into hitherto unknown worlds right at your doorstep and elsewhere: clink and migration, football and boxing, resistance during the Third Reich, Dostoevsky and "Heavenly Creatures", the life in Shanghai, Srebrenica and in the Lusatia as well as, finally, the journeys of socialist cosmonauts to the vast galaxy.

Where no man has gone before – exclusively premieres in the competition for the Golden Dove!

The best new German Documentary film will be honored with a Golden Dove, connected with 10.000 EUR. The decision is made by the German Jury for Documentary Film.

The films:

Anne Perry – Interiors by Dana Linkiewicz | Germany 2009 | 70:00 min.
We know her story from "Heavenly Creatures"; we know her from her best-selling Victorian crime novels. A perceptive portrait of a writer and an observation of a life carrying the burden of a murder.


Cato by Dagmar Brendecke | Germany, France, Poland 2009 | 90:00 min.
A girl’s road from a happy childhood in the artists’ colony of Fischerhude to Schulze-Boysens side and into death. A poetic portrait of an age and a free spirit.


The Pack (Das Rudel) by Alexander Schimpke | Germany 2009 | 47:00 min.
The ultras of the 1. FC Union Berlin football club. We are right in the middle of the fan curve and follow the choreography of the masses. Raised fists, rhythmic clapping, goose bumps. Let the dance begin.


The Conquest of Inner Freedom (Die Eroberung der inneren Freiheit) by Aleksandra Kumorek and Silvia Kaiser | Germany 2009 | 85:00 min.
Socratic conversations in a Berlin prison. Criminals discuss guilt, the kick of the forbidden, inner and outer freedom with philosophers. An unusual insight into a world behind bars.


The Woman with the 5 Elephants (Die Frau mit den 5 Elefanten) by Vadim Jendreyko | Germany, Switzerland 2009 | 93:00 min.
A portrait of Svetlana Geier, the most brilliant translator of Dostoyevskiy. A subtle interweaving of biography, history, literary creation and the mystery of language.


Dreams of the Lausitz (Träume der Lausitz) by Bernhard Sallmann | Germany 2009 | 90:00 min.
A post-industrial region, devastated and empty, and the people who re-invent themselves and the countryside. Futuristic images in a science fiction film set at home about visionaries and dreamers.


Being Kohl (Kennzeichen Kohl) by Jean Boué (based on an idea by Burkhard von Harder)| Germany 2009 | 87:00 min.
Not the Chancellor of reunification, but five Helmut Kohls: young and old, East and West German or Upper Silesian, bockwurst and caviar. Five average men – and the stories behind them.


Space Sailors (Fliegerkosmonauten) by Marian Kiss | Germany, Poland 2009 | 88:00 min.
From 1976, the Soviet Union launched ten cosmonauts – one for each socialist state – into space. What became of the former heroes? Political backgrounds and a search for their traces.


Rich Brother by Insa Onken | Germany 2009 | 99:00 min.
Ben from Cameroon tries his luck as a professional boxer in Germany – driven by the larger-than-life expectations of his family at home. The desperate struggle of a man who has no choice but to succeed.


Shanghai Fiction by Julia Albrecht and Busso von Mueller | Germany 2009 | 133:00 min.
A migrant worker, a businesswoman, a university professor and a German architect in the Chinese Babylon of the 21st century. A forced march through contemporary urban madness on film.


Versatzstücke by Elisa Purfürst | Germany 2008 | 30:30 min.
They came from East Prussia, the GDR, Turkey and Sierra Leone: four stories of escape and migration to Germany, united by an associative montage.


Anywhere but Here (Überall nur nicht hier) by Tamara Milosevic | Germany 2009 | 72:00 min.
Srebrenica in Bosnia, 15 years after the massacre. A young woman home after she fled, the Muslim mayor, the Serbian pope. Old wounds, new problems and everyday life.