Film Archive

Kids DOK 2020
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The Little Bird and the Bees
Lena von Döhren
What’s this? The little bird wonders about its buzzing neighbour and stumbles after the bee across the meadows. But watch out, the fox is already lurking behind a tree!
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The Little Bird and the Bees

Der kleine Vogel und die Bienen
Lena von Döhren
Kids DOK 2020
Animated Film
Switzerland
2020
4 minutes
without dialogue
Subtitles: 
None

It’s spring and the little bird discovers the first leaves on his tree. Already the buds open and the bee comes buzzing. Curious, the little bird stumbles after it and almost overlooks the fox who is growling hungrily again. After the farting caterpillar last year, the bird can now be happy about a new companion.

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Lena von Döhren
Script
Lena von Döhren
Editor
Fee Liechti
Producer
Gerd Gockell
Co-Producer
SRF Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen
Score
Martin Waespe
Animation
Lena von Döhren
World Sales
Georg Gruber
German Competition Documentary Film 2023
Filmstill The Children of Korntal
The Children of Korntal
Julia Charakter
A sensitive examination of an abuse scandal in an evangelical children’s home in Baden-Württemberg. Victims’ testimonies are confronted with the shameful relativisations of the church.
Filmstill The Children of Korntal

The Children of Korntal

Die Kinder aus Korntal
Julia Charakter
German Competition Documentary Film 2023
Documentary Film
Germany
2023
90 minutes
German
Subtitles: 
English

In Korntal, a small town of 9,000 souls in Baden-Württemberg, hundreds of children were abused in the homes of the Evangelical Brethren since the 1950s. Forced labour, physical punishment and sexualised violence were the order of the day. To date, more than 150 former children have broken their silence, more than 80 perpetrators have been identified. Because the latter covered for each other and the neighbours looked away, the children were defenceless against the abuse for decades. When the scandal was exposed in 2013, the community and the village were hostile at first: That which must not be cannot be. It was only when the pressure from the outside grew that the community initiated a process of dealing with the scandal. But it is controversial: victims are re-traumatised, their statements doubted. To this day the children from Korntal are fighting for investigation and compensation.

The film focuses on the victims and avoids all dramatisation. What happened was dramatic enough, after all. When testimonies are only played as audio-recordings to protect the speakers, a simple animation fills the visual gaps. When those responsible today speak, the camera stays restrained and does not judge. That is not necessary anyway, because the inconceivable relativisation of the crimes speaks loudly enough – in Korntal as elsewhere.

Luc-Carolin Ziemann

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Julia Charakter
Script
Julia Charakter
Cinematographer
Jonas Eckert
Editor
Jonas Eckert, Julia Charakter
Producer
Birgit Schulz
Sound Design
Volker Ambruster
Score
Leonard Küßner
Animation
Mick Mahler
Broadcaster
ZDF Das kleine Fernsehspiel, GeoTelevision
Funder
Film- und Medienstiftung NRW GmbH
Winner of: DEFA Sponsoring Prize
Retrospective 2022
Filmstill Kollwitz and Her Children
Kollwitz and Her Children
Christa Mühl
What to think of children playing on the Kollwitz sculpture? An exchange of letters with its sculptor inspired Christa Mühl to a shrewd and subtle miniature.
Filmstill Kollwitz and Her Children

Kollwitz and Her Children

Die Kollwitz und ihre Kinder
Christa Mühl
Retrospective 2022
Documentary Film
GDR
1971
10 minutes
German
Subtitles: 
None

Kollwitzplatz, Prenzlauer Berg: Children are playing and climbing all over the monument to Käthe Kollwitz, frowning adults are watching them. What would Gustav Seitz, the creator of the sculpture, say? Christa Mühl has asked him but reveals his answer only when the adults have finally disappeared. Until then, she constructs explosive matter as light as a feather, set to Belgian cembalo jazz and with the perky montage style that characterises her early documentary work. After Karl-Eduard von Schnitzler himself had the most controversial scene cut, the film could be broadcast on television and triggered a lively discussion about the practical value of art.

Felix Mende

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Director
Christa Mühl
Script
Werner Hecht, Christa Mühl
Cinematographer
Christiane Kunow
Editor
Karin Döring
Producer
Hochschule für Film und Fernsehen der DDR
Sound
Wolfgang Hasse
Kids DOK 2021
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Little Karl and the Elephants
Friedrich Kießling
A journey back in time to 1915 Dresden. Karlchen wants to see the famous elephants of the Sarrasani Circus one day. When his dream comes within reach, everything turns out different than expected.
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Little Karl and the Elephants

Karlchen und die Elefanten
Friedrich Kießling
Kids DOK 2021
Animated Film
Germany
2021
8 minutes
without dialogue
Subtitles: 
None

A journey back in time to 1915 Dresden, where Karlchen lives, who dreams of seeing the famous elephants of the Sarrasani Circus one day. To earn the ticket, he delivers potatoes. But his few coins are not enough for the visit. When Karlchen’s dream at last comes within reach, everything turns out different than expected.

Lina Dinkla

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Director
Friedrich Kießling
Script
Friedrich Kießling
Producer
Jana Krämer, youngfilms GmbH & Co. KG
Co-Producer
Filmuniversität Babelsberg KONRAD WOLF
Sound
Oscar Zöllner
Score
Gary Hirche
Animation
Friedrich Kießling
Filmstill Karpotrotter

Karpotrotter

Karpopotnik
Matjaž Ivanišin
Focus: Post-1991 Slovenian Documentary Films 2023
Documentary Film
Slovenia
2013
48 minutes
Slovenian
Subtitles: 
English

In 1971, Karpo Godina, then 28 years old, took his camera on a trip through the flatlands of Vojvodina and shot an unusual road movie. Only fragments of that footage have survived to this day. Forty years later, another camera undertakes the same journey, retracing the paths of the young Godina and imagining his impressions of the lives of ordinary people in this rural region. A new unusual road movie emerges. It is about places, times and memories. It is also paying homage to Karpo Godina, whose work flourished during the so-called Black Wave period of Yugoslav cinema.

Simon Popek

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Matjaž Ivanišin
Cinematographer
Marko Brdar
Editor
Uja Irgolič
Producer
Djordje Legen
Co-Producer
RTV
Sound Design
Branko Rožman, Tom Lemajič, Julij Zornik
German Competition Documentary Film 2023
Filmstill Weeding
Weeding
Amelie Vierbuchen, Lea Sprenger, Franca Pape
Three filmmakers research the history of a chemical factory in Cologne-Kalk. Off- and online archives teach them the art of weeding out and throwing away, the art of daring the gap.
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Filmstill Weeding
Filmstill Weeding

Weeding

Kassieren
Amelie Vierbuchen, Lea Sprenger, Franca Pape
German Competition Documentary Film 2023
Documentary Film
Germany
2023
9 minutes
German
Subtitles: 
English

Three directors prepare a film about the chemical factory in the Cologne district of Kalk, on whose former grounds a shopping mall has been built. With some self-mockery they talk about their investigation and search for sources, their capitulation to the resistance of the material. Meanwhile, an archivist struggles with a mis-spooled 16mm film. Historical images splutter across the monitor of his analogue editing table. The silhouette of the factory with its towering chimneys is discernible. Site plans are shown, chemicals are blithely mixed. In an album, the filmmakers discover faded photos of female forced labourers. Suddenly, questions arise: Which stories are kept, which forgotten? Throwing away is part of his job, after all, the archivist explains in the finest Rhenish accent. What does this statement mean for the directing trio?

Anke Leweke

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Director
Amelie Vierbuchen, Lea Sprenger, Franca Pape
Cinematographer
Amelie Vierbuchen, Lea Sprenger, Franca Pape
Editor
Lea Sprenger, Franca Pape
Producer
Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln
Sound Design
Lea Sprenger, Franca Pape
Filmstill Kathy and Teresa

Kathy and Teresa

Kathy and Teresa
Marie Zrenner
German Competition Documentary Film 2023
Documentary Film
Germany,
Canada
2023
14 minutes
English,
Inuktitut
Subtitles: 
German, English

Two young girls are drifting in the water of a public swimming pool. The film adopts this drifting attitude as it follows them through nocturnal Montreal and their daily life. Sometimes the two speak English, sometimes Inuktitut. Kathy and Teresa come from a small Inuit settlement in northern Canada. They show each other smartphone pictures of seals and bears they killed themselves. They read about the special relationship between the Inuit and their sledge dogs, which has lost its importance today. Home assignments are done in a park – the scent of the trees reminds them a little of home. They close their eyes. With great tenderness, the camera captures the deep bond between the two best friends who share the same heritage and language. Kathy has written a moving song in Inuktitut. In simple, clear words, she sings of the feelings and yearnings of a young Indigenous woman.

Anke Leweke

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Director
Marie Zrenner
Script
Marie Zrenner, Kathy Snowball
Cinematographer
Youssef Nassar
Editor
Ulrike Tortora
Producer
Sabrina Kleder
Co-Producer
Caroline Bergoin
Sound
Teresa Annanack, Sabrina Kleder, Youssef Nassar
Sound Design
Cornelia Böhm
Score
Kathy Snowball
German Distributor
Hochschule für Fernsehen und Film München
German Competition Short Film 2022
Filmstill Kayu Besi
Kayu Besi
Max Sänger, Andrianus “Oetjoe” Merdhi
Visually powerful and yet tranquil observation of the work of illegal woodcutters, who live in and off the jungle and yet destroy it bit by bit every day.
Filmstill Kayu Besi

Kayu Besi

Kayu Besi
Max Sänger, Andrianus “Oetjoe” Merdhi
German Competition Short Film 2022
Documentary Film
Germany
2022
28 minutes
Indonesian,
Javanese
Subtitles: 
English

Men are felling trees in the rain forest, barefoot, using chainsaws to cut through the huge trunks. They live in nature, off nature and against nature. Illegal wood selling seems to be their only chance to feed their families. At the same time, they are destroying – tree by tree – their own livelihood. This quiet observation ends with the arduous transport of the wood out of the forest. Anyone who thinks ahead knows that it will end up in our apartments, too, as a mahogany table or Bangkirai floor.

Luc-Carolin Ziemann

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Max Sänger, Andrianus “Oetjoe” Merdhi
Cinematographer
Max Sänger
Editor
Max Sänger
Producer
Max Sänger
Sound
Francesca Bertin
Sound Design
Max Gausepohl, Niklas Wienböker, Hadi Abilmona
Score
Max Gausepohl, Niklas Wienböker, Hadi Abilmona
Kids DOK 2023
Filmstill Keep
Keep
Andrei Câmpan, Ramona Kristo
Countless chunks of stone are lying around. A red-haired boy assembles them to build many impressive towers. One by one, the towers are made to shine again.
Filmstill Keep

Keep

Hou
Andrei Câmpan, Ramona Kristo
Kids DOK 2023
Animated Film
Romania,
Belgium
2023
9 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
None

So many stones are lying around. They used to belong to something whole that was broken. A red-haired boy sets about sorting, joining and stacking them. Little by little, the countless chunks turn into many impressive towers. We follow the boy’s path as he makes one tower after the other shine again.

Lina Dinkla

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Andrei Câmpan, Ramona Kristo
Script
Ramona Kristo
Cinematographer
Andrei Câmpan
Editor
Adèle Coulloudon, Horia Manolache
Producer
Anca Elena Manolache
Co-Producer
Ramona Kristo
Sound
Victor Mihailescu
Sound Design
Victor Mihailescu
Score
Victor Mihailescu
Animation
Adèle Coulloudon, Andrei Câmpan, Andrei Berculescu, Ana-Maria Trăistaru, Geo Dibu
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Kelasi

Kelasi
Fransix Tenda Lomba
International Competition Short Film 2021
Animated Film
Belgium
2021
10 minutes
French
Subtitles: 
French, English

The first animated film by visual artist Fransix Tenda Lomba is a kind of parcours through Congo’s historical education systems – and an analysis of the ideological function of the institution of the school. Using impressive collages and an always ironic commentary, the film – tellingly produced in Belgium – confronts its Western audience with their own ignorance about the region, challenging both their aesthetic and political thinking.

Borjana Gaković

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Director
Fransix Tenda Lomba
Script
Fransix Tenda Lomba
Editor
Caroline Nugues-Bourchat
Producer
Ellen Meiresonne
Sound
Cyril Mossé
Animation
Caroline Nugues-Bourchat, Fransix Tenda Lomba
Retrospective 2022
Filmstill Having Babies?
Having Babies?
Sibylle Schönemann
Starting from different life situations and private circumstances, Sibylle Schönemann addresses the complex issue of abortion in an aesthetically ambitious collage.
Filmstill Having Babies?

Having Babies?

Kinder kriegen?
Sibylle Schönemann
Retrospective 2022
Documentary Film
GDR
1976
18 minutes
German
Subtitles: 
None

Sibylle Schönemann’s film about abortion lets young and older women speak; women who were forced to abort by their partners or who chose to carry the baby to term despite predicted difficulties. Assembled as a kind of collage, a round table alternates with stylised passages, while the camera also shows moments in a clinic right before and after the procedure. The attitude vacillates between drama and affirmation of life. Liberal perspectives, with one exception, are left out. Schönemann, together with Tamara Trampe, almost managed to take up the complex issue in a feature film.

Felix Mende

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Sibylle Schönemann
Cinematographer
Klemens Peisker
Editor
Silvia Roeser
Producer
Hochschule für Film und Fernsehen der DDR
Sound
Andreas Walter
Animation Perspectives 2020
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Kinect Particles
Aaron Jablonski
The fascinating virtual sculptures of a deep scan are moulded and pulverized to electronic beats: waves of millions of luminescent coloured microbodies.
2020
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Kinect Particles

Kinect Particles
Aaron Jablonski
Animation Perspectives 2020
Animated Film
Germany
2020
1 minute
without dialogue
Subtitles: 
None

An infrared dot pattern scans body shapes to supply system information for fascinating volume images. The space casts are virtual sculptures, mouldable, with unstable aggregate states. DJ Dixon’s “Transmoderna” performance is pulverized to the beats of Mëhill’s track “Through Withdrawals”: waves of millions of luminescent coloured microbodies against a black infinity.

André Eckardt

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Director
Aaron Jablonski
Cinematographer
Tim Scherret
Producer
Steffen Berkhahn
Sound
Bjorn Debergh
Artistic Design
Tim Novikov
Creative Technologist
Aaron Jablonski, Tim Novikov
Coding
Aaron Jablonski, Giusy Amoroso
Slowenian Animation 2022
Filmstill Kiss Me Gentle Rubber
Kiss Me Gentle Rubber
Zvonko Čoh
A milestone of Slovenian animation film history, drawn entirely on paper: Cartoon heroes are replaced by their movement patterns and silhouettes.
Filmstill Kiss Me Gentle Rubber

Kiss Me Gentle Rubber

Poljubi mehka me radirka
Zvonko Čoh
Slowenian Animation 2022
Animated Film
Yugoslavia
1984
6 minutes
without dialogue
Subtitles: 
None

Drawn entirely on paper, Zvonko Čoh has created a milestone of recent Slovenian animation history. A combination of figurative outline, surface and spatial development and a story feeding on associative elements and bordering the surreal. Classic cartoon heroes are replaced by their animated movement patterns and silhouettes.

Lina Dinkla

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Director
Zvonko Čoh
Script
Zvonko Čoh
Cinematographer
Bojan Jurc
Editor
Janez Bricelj
Producer
Viba film
Animation
Zvonko Čoh
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kitchen.blend

cuisine.blend
Nataliya Ilchuk
International Competition Short Film 2021
Animated Film
France,
Ukraine
2021
15 minutes
French,
Ukrainian
Subtitles: 
English, German Subtitles for deaf and hard-of-hearing

Click, click, she virtually recreates a cluttered, narrow kitchen on her computer. Lady Di smiles with creased photo edges from the refrigerator, a half-opened chocolate bar lies on the table. The technical-looking, detailed digital reconstruction runs like a fingertip along remembered images, tracing their nicks. The images feed off a blurred video in which the grandparents and their kitchen-cum-living-room live on – a nostalgic place in the distant Ukraine of childhood.

André Eckardt

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Nataliya Ilchuk
Producer
Nataliya Ilchuk, Le Fresnoy – Studio national des arts contemporains
Sound
Yannick Delmaire
Animation
Paul Guilbert
International Competition Animated Film 2023
Filmstill Knit’s Island
Knit’s Island
Ekiem Barbier, Guilhem Causse, Quentin L’helgoualc’h
A documentary film crew spends 963 hours in a video game interviewing gamers. Little by little, they drop their masks and give insights into their “real” lives.
Filmstill Knit’s Island

Knit’s Island

Knit’s Island
Ekiem Barbier, Guilhem Causse, Quentin L’helgoualc’h
International Competition Animated Film 2023
Animated Film
France
2023
95 minutes
French,
English
Subtitles: 
English

Running. Rapid breathing. A shot in the silence. The opening strikes the keynotes: caution, curiosity, thrills. A documentary film team spend 963 hours on the adventure playground of the video game DayZ. Online gamers explore the territory of a post-Soviet disaster province, permanently exposing themselves to the risk of being killed by hostile gamers. Despite their “press” badges, Guilhem, Ekiem and Quentin, as avatars, are subject to the same rules when they interview the gamers in their virtual world. The community is heterogenous: marauding gangs, cowboys with Samaritan ethics, curious wanderers.

Reality is never far away. The gamer “Feesh” is torn from her console during the interview because her IRL (in real life) child is crying. In the course of their conversation, “Iris” shoots her “toy”, a prisoner, before the eyes of the shocked documentary team – a conflict of documentary work opens up. “Knit’s Island” is a disturbing, melancholy to heartwarming tour of chance meetings and friendships of sleepless persons in the artificial world. Some avatars constantly twitch nervously and grotesquely because they act out darkest desires. Others “trick the game” and enter fascinating techno-psychedelic spheres. Game-playing and role-playing persona – sometimes they are one, sometimes two.

André Eckardt

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Director
Ekiem Barbier, Guilhem Causse, Quentin L’helgoualc’h
Script
Ekiem Barbier, Guilhem Causse, Quentin L’helgoualc’h
Cinematographer
Ekiem Barbier, Guilhem Causse, Quentin L’helgoualc’h
Editor
Nicolas Bancilhon
Producer
Boris Garavini
Sound Design
Mathieu Farnarier
Score
Ekiem Barbier, Guilhem Causse, Marc Siffert
World Sales
Wouter Jansen
German Competition 2022
Filmstill Pastor Lothar Stops
Pastor Lothar Stops
Tilman König
A personal, enjoyably critical homage to the Jena pastor and left-wing activist Lothar König that accompanies the cantankerous original during his last months in church office.
Filmstill Pastor Lothar Stops

Pastor Lothar Stops

König hört auf
Tilman König
German Competition 2022
Documentary Film
Germany
2022
85 minutes
German
Subtitles: 
English

Lothar König is an original. The long-term youth pastor from Jena doesn’t fit into any system. In the GDR he was under state surveillance, after reunification he was one of the most tireless warning voices against the growing right-wing radicalism. To this day, he takes to the barricades against the extreme right, often on the frontline. Nevertheless, this film portrait by his son Tilman is not an homage but a critical tribute to an outspoken character forced by retirement to re-invent himself.

Pastor König is not only regarded as one of the figureheads of the left-wing scene that organises punk concerts, rallies and football tournaments with young refugees. He also has a reputation as a fairly challenging personality. Tilman König shows his father only marginally in his role as a church official. Most of all, he introduces a man who can be courageous and determined, but also stubborn and unfair. His film is enjoyably interested above all in the here and now of this man, the things that Lothar still has to come to terms with. How will he manage the transition to retirement after a restless life between community work and political activism? How can the old rhetorical warhorse hold his own among people who really agree with him but seem to move away from him in thought, speech and action? The border-crosser is entering unknown terrain.
Luc-Carolin Ziemann

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Tilman König
Cinematographer
Tilman König
Editor
Denise Lipfert, Tilman König
Producer
Dietmar Güntsche, Martin Rohé
Co-Producer
MDR, Tilman König
Sound
Frank Schubert
Sound Design
Frank Schubert
Score
Christian Walter
World Sales
Nadine Trapp
Commissioning Editor
Thomas Beyer
Funder
MDM
Winner of: Leipziger Ring, ver.di Prize for Solidarity, Humanity and Fairness