Film Archive

Kids DOK 2023
Filmstill Planet B
Planet B
Pieter Van Eecke
How do you grow up on a planet that is being destroyed by humanity? The two friends Bo and Luca are enthusiastic climate activists whom the film follows for four years.
Filmstill Planet B

Planet B

Planet B
Pieter Van Eecke
Kids DOK 2023
Documentary Film
Belgium,
Netherlands
2023
78 minutes
Dutch
Subtitles: 
German Subtitles for deaf and hard-of-hearing

How do you grow up on a planet that is being destroyed by humanity? This film looks for answers to this urgent question and introduces us to Bo and Luca. The close friends are enthusiastic climate activists, connected by their commitment. We follow the two teenagers for four years on their contradictory and surprising path to adulthood.

Lina Dinkla

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Pieter Van Eecke
Cinematographer
Johan Legraie
Editor
Sandrine Deegen
Producer
Hanne Phlypo
Co-Producer
Katja Draaijer
Sound
Olmo van Straalen, Mark Glynne
Score
David Poltrock
World Sales
Marcella Jelić
Filmstill Silver Bird and Rainbow Fish

Silver Bird and Rainbow Fish

Silver Bird and Rainbow Fish
Lei Lei
Competition for the Audience Award 2022
Animated Film
USA,
Netherlands
2022
104 minutes
Chinese
Subtitles: 
English

The tumultuous 1960s in China as a collage of archival images, clay figures and interviews. Lei Lei lets his father and his grandfather talk, about bicycles and bank clerks, about life in the countryside, re-education and class enemies. Their memories generate a multicoloured surreal world that is an enchanting fantasy of the time before and during the Cultural Revolution.

In his second feature-length film, artist and animation filmmaker Lei Lei once more takes up experiences of family members and uncovers a piece of national history via private stories. For more than six years, he collected family photos, postcards, propaganda images and old films. On this backdrop he forms and moves his characters made of gum-like pastel modelling clay, whose colourful, almost childlike appearance supports the impression that this is where a grandson imagines the anecdotal memoirs of his ancestors. But this imaginative animation is anything but naïve: It takes the time to accommodate the detours and pauses in the narrative and takes us – by means of a restrained soundscape, too – deep into a universe where one can lose oneself.
Marie Kloos

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Lei Lei
Script
Lei Lei
Cinematographer
Lei Lei
Editor
Lei Lei, Patrick Minks
Producer
Isabelle Glachant, Lei Lei
Co-Producer
Bruno Felix, Janneke van de Kerkhof, Femke Wolting
Score
Tessa Rose Jackson, Darius Timmer
Animation
Lei Lei
World Sales
Lya Li
Animation Night 2023
Filmstill Still Life with Woman, Tea and Letter
Still Life with Woman, Tea and Letter
Tess Martin
A photo placed between several other objects on a kitchen table comes to life and opens a window through space and time to the outside.
Filmstill Still Life with Woman, Tea and Letter

Still Life with Woman, Tea and Letter

Still Life with Woman, Tea and Letter
Tess Martin
Animation Night 2023
Animated Film
Netherlands
2022
3 minutes
without dialogue
Subtitles: 
None

A kitchen table with several objects on it stands still. But time provides movement. A candle burns down rapidly, a photo draped on the table comes to life. It shows a young woman making a cup of tea. Old hands approach the table to touch the letter lying there. Life on the photo stands still.

Franka Sachse

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Tess Martin
Script
Tess Martin
Cinematographer
Matija Pekić
Producer
Denis Vaslin, Fleur Knopperts
Sound Design
Jorick Bronius
Score
Jorick Bronius
Animation
Tess Martin, Marike Verbiest
Kids DOK 2023
Filmstill Swimming with Wings
Swimming with Wings
Daphna Awadish Golan
Leaving home to live in a new country isn’t easy. Lyri talks about her experiences. It feels like learning to swim in street clothes.
Filmstill Swimming with Wings

Swimming with Wings

Swimming with Wings
Daphna Awadish Golan
Kids DOK 2023
Animated Film
Netherlands,
Israel
2023
10 minutes
Dutch,
Hebrew,
English
Subtitles: 
German (Overvoice)

Leaving home to live in a new country isn’t easy at all. Lyri moves to the Netherlands with her family and talks about her experiences. Given the choice, she would have preferred to stay in Israel. So many things are foreign and different now. What strikes her most, though, is that the children here learn to swim in their street clothes.

Lina Dinkla

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Daphna Awadish Golan
Script
Daphna Awadish Golan
Cinematographer
Daphna Awadish Golan
Editor
Daphna Awadish Golan
Producer
Richard Valk
Co-Producer
Amit Russell Gicelter
Sound
Erez Eyni Shavit
Sound Design
Erez Eyni Shavit
Score
Ady Cohen
Animation
Daphna Awadish Golan, Gal Kinan, Yali Herbet, Amit Cohen
World Sales
Sydney Neter
Animation Night 2023
Filmstill The Lost Mariner
The Lost Mariner
Tess Martin
Jimmie, an aged sailor with impaired memory, has become unmoored in time. He gets lost in the waves of the decades between his former and present selves.
Filmstill The Lost Mariner

The Lost Mariner

The Lost Mariner
Tess Martin
Animation Night 2023
Animated Film
Netherlands
2014
6 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
English

Without a working memory, the former sailor Jimmie is unmoored in time. Fragments of his former life and his younger self appear like islands on the horizon, glide by, disappear in the depths. The older Jimmie does not recognise himself and is frightened by the “strangers.” He gets lost in space and sinks into the empty background.

Franka Sachse

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Tess Martin
Cinematographer
Thijs van Gasteren
Score
Jason Staczek
Animation
Tess Martin
Extended Reality 2022
Filmstill The Miracle Basket
The Miracle Basket
Abner Preis
This VR parable tells of a past in harmony with nature. We find not only devastation and destruction, but also hope.
Filmstill The Miracle Basket

The Miracle Basket

The Miracle Basket
Abner Preis
Extended Reality 2022
XR
Netherlands
2021
14 minutes
English,
Dutch

The carelessness of Western consumer society follows the absurd conviction that humans can live independently of nature. The earth’s resources are being used up without asking how they can be replenished. This VR parable tells of a past in harmony with what sustains, surrounds and nourishes us. We find not only devastation and destruction, but also hope.

Lars Rummel

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Richard Valk, Firat Sezgin
VR Developer
Frank Bosma
Sound
Pierre-Marie Blind
Score
Guillermo Celano
Narrator
Bibi Dumon Tak, Abner Preis
Director
Abner Preis
Extended Reality: DOK Neuland 2020
Media Name: f519bfb9-4810-46ea-8a8e-d291fa6ad18e.jpg
The Shape of Us
Anna Mauersberger, Niki Smit
Accompanied by Mother Nature we embark on a collective journey. In this multiplayer VR ritual, we get the chance to become reconciled with her and ourselves.
Media Name: f519bfb9-4810-46ea-8a8e-d291fa6ad18e.jpg

The Shape of Us

The Shape of Us
Anna Mauersberger, Niki Smit
Extended Reality 2020
-
Germany,
Netherlands
2020
45 minutes
German,
English

Welcome to the Anthropocene. Welcome to an age entirely shaped by humanity’s actions. This multiplayer VR ritual arranges a meeting with Mother Nature. We get the chance to become reconciled with her, re-establish lost connections to the world and re-achieve some harmony with the earth and ourselves.

Lars Rummel

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Concept
HeartWire
Production Company
Monobanda
VFX Artist
Charlotte Madelon
Coding
Wijnand van Tol, Niels van Duivenvoorden
Sound
Paradoxical Recording
Script
Anselm Maria Sellen
Score
Alex Simu
Key Collaborator
Robert Bosch Stiftung
Director
Anna Mauersberger, Niki Smit
Animation Night 2023
Filmstill The Whale Story
The Whale Story
Tess Martin
During a brief encounter, a real connection seems to develop between a whale and a diver. But then the whale disappears again in the depths of the ocean.
Filmstill The Whale Story

The Whale Story

The Whale Story
Tess Martin
Animation Night 2023
Animated Film
USA,
Netherlands
2012
4 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
English

A diver encounters an injured whale. He decides to help the animal and gets a friendly look of thanks. For the space of a few seconds, the border between the two species seems permeable. The whale disappears in the depths of the ocean and leaves the diver wondering whether this was all just a projection of human hopes.

Franka Sachse

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Tess Martin
Score
Spencer Thun
Animation
Tess Martin, Webster Crowell, Stefan Gruber, Britta Johnson, Amanda Moore
Filmstill Three Windows on South West

Three Windows on South West

Three Windows on South West
Mariia Ponomarova
International Competition Documentary Film 2023
Documentary Film
Ukraine,
Netherlands
2023
8 minutes
Ukrainian,
Russian
Subtitles: 
English

In 2002, the filmmaker moved into an apartment on the 15th floor of a Kyiv high-rise. She was twelve at the time. Today, from the safe distance of another country, she talks to people who remember the flat and the time spent together. Coming-of-Age, the love of cinema, a sense of community and the erotic charge of individual moments combine to create an image of missing home and intimacy. With every memory, we zoom a little out of the still image on screen: three windows facing southwest, a balcony facing southeast, a rooftop protected from view, a high-rise panorama. The warm and personal gaze at the sky and houses of Kyiv is mirrored in the cold attentiveness of international war reporting.

Jan Künemund

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Mariia Ponomarova
Script
Mariia Ponomarova
Editor
Mariia Ponomarova
Producer
Mariia Ponomarova
Sound Design
Sergio González Cuervo
World Sales
Lucila Riggio
-
Oleksii Isakov
Filmstill Tropic Fever

Tropic Fever

Tropic Fever
Mahardika Yudha, Robin Hartanto Honggare, Perdana Roswaldy
International Competition 2022
Documentary Film
Indonesia,
Netherlands
2022
59 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
English

The semi-autobiographical account of a European plantation manager on Sumatra during Dutch colonial rule becomes a starting point for reflections on the structure of the plantation itself. An essay about local tobacco and rubber cultivation, the construction of skin colour as a social category and the "tropic fever” which rises slowly but inexorably, edited from archive material dating from 1890 to 1930.

Very few films have made use of the extensive material shot by the colonists in the Dutch East Indies, now Indonesia. Those who took up the task, like “Mother Dao” or recently “They Call Me Babu”, did so from a Dutch perspective. “Tropic Fever” is the first feature-length film from Indonesia that appropriates that stock, using photos, documentary silent film footage, home movies and feature films as well as development plans from the archives of the former colonial power, along with the report of a Hungarian who managed a plantation on Sumatra in the 1920s. Mahardika Yudha, Robin Hartanto Honggare and Perdana Roswaldy impressively demonstrate how forests and swamps turned into rigidly organised agricultural areas and how the plantation and its structure became the foundation of the colonial project as such. Suddenly the assumption that “tropic fever” arises from the heat seems doubtful.
Marie Kloos

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Mahardika Yudha, Robin Hartanto Honggare, Perdana Roswaldy
Script
Perdana Roswaldy, Robin Hartanto Honggare
Cinematographer
Mahardika Yudha, Syaiful Anwar
Editor
Mahardika Yudha
Producer
Robin Hartanto Honggare
Sound
Mahardika Yudha
Score
Mahardika Yudha
Key Collaborator
Het Nieuwe Instituut, EYE Filmmuseum, Marinus Plantema Foundation
Nominated for: Prize of the Interreligious Jury, FIPRESCI Prize
Animation Night 2023
Filmstill Voice
Voice
Tess Martin
A dull underwater world floods a bright white hospital corridor. In this scenario, the main character tells the story of her rape and how she lost her voice.
Filmstill Voice

Voice

Voice
Tess Martin
Animation Night 2023
Animated Film
Netherlands
2019
3 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
English

A dull underwater world filled with eerie creatures floods a bright white hospital corridor. This scenario sets the stage for a tale about an abused woman. After the rape, she finds herself not only confronted with the standardised examinations, her boyfriend’s horror and the alienation from herself: She has also lost her voice.

Franka Sachse

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Tess Martin
Producer
Tess Martin
Score
Jason Staczek
Animation
Tess Martin
Filmstill Why My Mum Loves Russell Crowe

Why My Mum Loves Russell Crowe

Why My Mum Loves Russell Crowe
Emma van den Berg
International Competition Short Film 2022
Documentary Film
UK,
Netherlands
2022
25 minutes
Dutch
Subtitles: 
English

“Sex does strange things to people!” This sentence reverberates from her childhood. What did her mother mean? What fears did she pass on to Emma? The budding filmmaker sets up the camera in her mother’s apartment, invites mum’s friends, creates an open atmosphere. Coby opens up more and more, talks about a repressed topic. At the same time, she gets to show a wholly different side of herself, performing song and dance numbers in front of her daughter’s lens.

Anke Leweke

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Emma van den Berg
Cinematographer
Emma van den Berg
Editor
Emma van den Berg
Producer
Emma van den Berg
Co-Producer
Imoje Aikhoje
Sound
Jack Evans, Peter Sant
Score
Joel Whitaker
Funder
Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds