Film Archive

Doc Alliance Selection 2021
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Gabi, Between Ages 8 and 13
Engeli Broberg
Five years with Gabi, who doesn’t believe that there are any material differences between boys and girls. A sensitive portrait about the challenge of being oneself.
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Gabi, Between Ages 8 and 13

Gabi, mellan åren 8 till 13
Engeli Broberg
Doc Alliance Selection 2021
Documentary Film
Sweden
2021
75 minutes
Swedish,
English
Subtitles: 
English

Gabi, eight years old, isn’t interested in “girl stuff”, but in Lego and football. Many months later, little has changed about this. Nevertheless, Gabi, now in cap and shorts, stands out more. The onset of puberty stirs up fears, raises new questions. Once again Gabi sits at the hairdresser’s and her hair gets a little shorter. The “hairstyle” problem comes up regularly, for her mother would like her daughter to look a little more feminine from time to time. No such luck. Gabi is convinced that there is no difference between boys and girls, apart from a few hormones. Sensitively, Engeli Broberg observes this young person over a period of five years as they try to stay true to themselves.

Carolin Weidner

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Engeli Broberg
Cinematographer
Tommy Olsson
Editor
Kalle Lindberg, Engeli Broberg
Producer
Anna J Ljungmark
Co-Producer
Kari Anne Moe, Gudmundur Gunnarsson
Score
Sofia Hallgren, Kjetil Schjanderluhr
Filmstill Gambling, Gods and LSD

Gambling, Gods and LSD

Gambling, Gods and LSD
Peter Mettler
Hommage Peter Mettler 2023
Documentary Film
Switzerland,
Canada
2002
180 minutes
English,
Swiss German,
Hindi
Subtitles: 
English

The motif of movement in film is a core element of Peter Mettler’s award-winning body of work: His journey here takes us from Canada via the USA to Switzerland and as far as India, the filmed moments associatively unfolding a tableau about different people. They are all, each in their own way, looking for transcendence and ecstasy. In this hypnotic trip about time and transience, the director is always ready to engage with the unexpected. His attitude is marked by curiosity and impartiality. Well over a hundred hours of footage feed into a brilliant montage in which transition and rapture also find visual and acoustic correspondences.

Annina Wettstein

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Peter Mettler
Script
Peter Mettler
Cinematographer
Peter Mettler
Editor
Roland Schlimme, Peter Mettler
Producer
Cornelia Seitler, Alexandra Gill, Ingrid Veninger
Sound Design
Peter Bräker, Peter Mettler
Score
Fred Frith
German Distributor
GMfilms
Audience Award Competition 2021
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Garage, Engines & Men
Claire Simon
In the local garage, two mechanics – one trained and one apprentice superhero of everyday life – keep the engines of a Provençal village community running.
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Garage, Engines & Men

Garage, des moteurs et des hommes
Claire Simon
Competition for the Audience Award 2021
Documentary Film
France
2021
71 minutes
French
Subtitles: 
German Subtitles for deaf and hard-of-hearing, English

Life without a car has become unthinkable in the country. This also goes for the sleepy village of Claviers in Provence, where Claire Simon went to school and her daughter experienced her first love with the baker’s son. Pensioners and tourists dominate the place today, and the bakery has long since given up. But the heart of the village continues to beat: in the garage. This is where the day-to-day dramas take place, where the weal and woe of its citizens are decided.

Christophe Scalia’s empire is one of men who accept women only as bystanders. Nevertheless, the mechanic and his apprentice, Romaric Rousselle, are quite willing to allow Claire Simon to watch their every move as they handle shock absorbers, spark plugs and brake pads, to listen to their every bantering conversation. They are completely absorbed in their role, turning into superheroes responsible not just for the proper functioning of all the two- and four-wheel vehicles that are so important in the country, but also of the entire village. This is where local politics and family planning, generational conflicts and the economy are discussed, occasionally accompanied by music from Coppola’s “The Godfather” which Christophe has set as his mobile phone ringtone. To make everyday life look more exciting than any fiction through patient observation, that is the miracle of Claire Simon’s documentary work.
Christoph Terhechte

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Claire Simon
Script
Claire Simon
Cinematographer
Claire Simon
Editor
Luc Forveille
Producer
Rebecca Houzel
Sound
Frédéric Buy
Score
Nicolas Repac
Time to Act! 2022
Filmstill Geographies of Solitude
Geographies of Solitude
Jacquelyn Mills
Forty years ago, the environmental activist and scientist Zoe Lucas settled on Sable Island, a strip of sand in the Atlantic. The place became her home and life’s work.
Filmstill Geographies of Solitude

Geographies of Solitude

Geographies of Solitude
Jacquelyn Mills
Time to Act! 2022
Documentary Film
Canada
2022
103 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
German

Sable Island, a good 43 kilometres long, less than two kilometres wide, a crescent-shaped sand bank in the Atlantic, about 160 kilometres off the coast of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia. This inhospitable looking place, permanently changed and moved by the weather, has been the home of Zoe Lucas for more than forty years. She once came for a brief visit as an art student, fascinated by the semi-wild horses on the island. She stayed, became an environmental activist, self-taught scientist and esteemed expert on biodiversity. Jacquelyn Mills’ enchanting 16mm images not only convey the enormous richness of the lonely landscapes. They also depict nature conservation as a fulfilling life’s work.

Lina Dinkla

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Jacquelyn Mills
Cinematographer
Jacquelyn Mills
Editor
Jacquelyn Mills
Producer
Jacquelyn Mills, Rosalie Chicoine Perreault
Sound
Jacquelyn Mills
Sound Design
Jacquelyn Mills, Andreas Mendritzki
Filmstill

getty abortions

getty abortions
Franzis Kabisch
German Competition Documentary Film 2023
Documentary Film
Germany,
Austria
2023
22 minutes
German
Subtitles: 
English

What images do we associate with abortion and why? Where do these images and the emotional scripts in our head come from? How do they influence women who (want to) have an abortion, how do they shape the general discussion? Franzis Kabisch’s personal desktop documentary investigates these questions with great precision, clarity and humour (yes, humour, too!).

In the process, she moves from early 2000s girls’ magazines to the late 19th century, sifts through troves of feminist knowledge and checks alleged cultural-historical facts (such as the discovery of hysteria in women) that haunt conventional wisdom to this day. At the end of the film, we have not only seen an exemplary examination of image politics and how they contributed to pushing the issue of abortion to the social sidelines and linking it with shame and guilt. Franzis Kabisch manages, almost “in the same breath,” to break up the false hubris of the documentary and demonstrate that the evidential value of filmic and photographic “testimonies” must always and implicitly be scrutinised. Ultimately, “cui bono?” – the question who profits, must be considered in every media-critical reflection – not just in the age of stock photos, editing software and AI but, strictly speaking, at the start of every documentary image production.

Luc-Carolin Ziemann

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Franzis Kabisch
Script
Franzis Kabisch
Cinematographer
Franzis Kabisch
Editor
Franzis Kabisch
Producer
Franzis Kabisch
Sound Design
Franzis Kabisch, Katharina Pelosi, Laura Schick
Winner of: Golden Dove Short Film (German Competition)
Extended Reality: DOK Neuland 2020
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Gimme One
Montague FitzGerald
A subculture opens up: the ballroom scene reflects its reality, its ideas of cultural appropriation and self-empowerment far from the social norms of the majority.

UK

UK
2020
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Gimme One

Gimme One
Montague FitzGerald
Extended Reality 2020
-
UK
2020
14 minutes
English

This insight into an international subculture shows that the ballroom scene is more than just extravagant competitions. Five ballroom dancers describe a reality in which white-dominated, heteronormative patterns have no place. They talk about ideas of cultural appropriation, about safe spaces, community and mutual support, about identity and self-expression.

Lars Rummel

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Harry Silverlock
Co-Producer
Karteer Miyake-Mugler
Production Company
FitzFilmz
Editor
Montague FitzGerald
Creative Technologist
Joshua Pawlowski, George Jasper Stone
Sound
Becky Street
Score
Vjuan Allure, MikeQ, Joseph Summers
Key Collaborator
Kenzo Miyake-Mugler, Karteer Miyake-Mugler, Diva Miyake-Mugler, Brandon Okeke, Aysha Chamberlain
Director
Montague FitzGerald
Cinematographer
Harrison Willmott
Animation Night 2023
Filmstill Ginevra
Ginevra
Tess Martin
A young woman is strangled. The mother’s moving dirge – based on a poem by Percy Shelley – accompanies us as her daughter Ginevra is laid out and resurrects.
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Ginevra

Ginevra
Tess Martin
Animation Night 2023
Animated Film
USA,
Netherlands
2017
4 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
English

The rising sun reveals a gruesome crime. In the orange-red dawn, between the dunes and the rippling sea, a young woman is strangled to death. The victim’s neck is marked by the deep imprints of her murderer’s hands. The mother’s moving dirge – based on a poem by Percy Shelley – accompanies us as her daughter Ginevra is laid out and resurrects.

Franka Sachse

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Tess Martin
Producer
Max Rothman
Sound Design
Jeremy Lloyd-Styles
Score
Jeremy Lloyd-Styles
Animation
Tess Martin
International Competition 2020
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Girls/Museum
Shelly Silver
Girls in an exhibition: visitors aged between seven and nineteen contemplate individual works in the Leipzig Museum of Fine Arts and offer spontaneous interpretations.
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Girls/Museum

Girls/Museum
Shelly Silver
International Competition 2020
Documentary Film
Germany
2020
74 minutes
Dari,
German
Subtitles: 
English, German

Art is in the eye of the beholder, they say. Shelly Silver’s beholders range in age from seven to nineteen years. They focus their attention on artworks in the Leipzig Museum of Fine Arts. Their spontaneous interpretations of the works allow for resonances: both, the paintings as well as their young reviewers, reveal different things about themselves, depending on the point of view.

“Shit that I’m not a boy”, a teenager exclaims as she stands in front of the painting of a rich young man who lived centuries before her, perhaps in the Netherlands. Because boys are allowed much more, she says. Playing basketball outside, for example. Shelly Silver’s hypothesis is as simple as it is fruitful: The outside perspective will always lead back to one’s own perspective. The director’s questions and suggestions are not revealed. But she picks out details of the paintings to substantiate and illustrate statements – or put them up for discussion again. Silver’s finesse lies in the montage. Meanwhile, the timeline of the exploration runs from the past to the present, from the pierced feet of Jesus Christ via a reclining naked nymph by Lucas Cranach the Elder to the more recent photography of the Swedish artist Arvida Byström.
Carolin Weidner

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Shelly Silver
Cinematographer
Shelly Silver
Editor
Shelly Silver
Producer
Shelly Silver
Sound
Richard Schnupp
Score
Oranotha Erway, Johanna M. Beyer
DOK Education 2021
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Girls/Museum
Shelly Silver
Girls in an exhibition: visitors aged between seven and nineteen contemplate individual works in the Leipzig Museum of Fine Arts and offer spontaneous interpretations.
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Girls/Museum

Girls/Museum
Shelly Silver
DOK Education 2021
Documentary Film
Germany
2020
74 minutes
German,
Dari
Subtitles: 
German, English

Who decides what is art and what is not? What does the picture on the wall tells about the society in which it was created? Shelly Silver looks at the collection of the Museum der bildenden Künste Leipzig through the eyes of some young girls and makes visible how role models have changed over time - and what art has to do with it.

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Shelly Silver
Cinematographer
Shelly Silver
Editor
Shelly Silver
Producer
Shelly Silver
Sound
Richard Schnupp
Score
Oranotha Erway, Johanna M. Beyer
Kids DOK 2022
Filmstill Goals
Goals
Florinda Ciucio
Husna and Charlotte live in a high-rise estate in Antwerp. It’s not natural to make big plans here. But the two want to become professional soccer players.
Filmstill Goals

Goals

Goals
Florinda Ciucio
Kids DOK 2022
Documentary Film
Belgium
2021
15 minutes
Dutch

Husna and Charlotte live in a high-rise estate on the outskirts of Antwerp. They live in the same house, play in the same soccer team and spend every free minute together. Where they grow up, it’s not natural to make big plans. But that doesn’t stop these two girls from pursuing their dream to become professional soccer players.

Lina Dinkla

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Florinda Ciucio
Cinematographer
Dries Dries Vanderaerden
Editor
Louis Deruddere
Producer
Ilse Schooneknaep
Sound
Gillis Van der Wee
Score
Arthur Brouns
Kids DOK 2021
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Goodbye Tornio
Emilia Hernesniemi
The film follows Vilma on her last weekend in her hometown of Tornio, a small place in Lapland. Very soon she will move far away to the big city of Helsinki.
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Goodbye Tornio

Hei hei Tornio
Emilia Hernesniemi
Kids DOK 2021
Documentary Film
Finland
2021
15 minutes
Finnish
Subtitles: 
German Subtitles for deaf and hard-of-hearing

The film follows Vilma on her last weekend in her hometown of Tornio, a small place in Lapland. She celebrates her graduation, has a great time with her family and friends in the lightheartedness of summer and says goodbye to her old life. Very soon she will be far away. Her new home is the big city of Helsinki, a ten-hour drive from Tornio.

Lina Dinkla

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Emilia Hernesniemi
Script
Emilia Hernesniemi
Cinematographer
Iris Heikka
Editor
Maija Karhula
Producer
Eveliina Mauno
Sound
Saku Anttila
Score
Rolf Gustavson
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Granny’s Sexual Life

Babičino seksualno življenje
Urška Djukić, Émilie Pigeard
Focus: Post-1991 Slovenian Documentary Films 2023
Animated Film
Slovenia,
France
2021
13 minutes
Slovenian
Subtitles: 
English

In this animation-documentary hybrid, four older women reflect on their memories of the old times when they were young and relations between the sexes were completely different. Their many voices merge into one: Grandmother Vera speaks. She tells her story in precise detail, gives insight into the turbulence of her youth and shares memories of her intimate life. She speaks as a representative of Slovenian women in the first half of the 20th century and illustrates their status in the gender and social hierarchies of that era.

Simon Popek

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Urška Djukić, Émilie Pigeard
Script
Maria Bohr, Urška Djukić
Editor
Urška Djukić
Producer
Edwina Liard, Nidia Santiago, Olivier Catherin
Sound Design
Julij Zornik
Score
Tomaž Grom
Animation
Émilie Pigeard
Extended Reality: DOK Neuland 2020
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Gravity VR
Fabito Rychter, Amir Admoni
Osario and Benedito live in a space where gravity doesn’t seem to exist. Their cosmos knows neither up nor down. But is all this lightness just an illusion after all?
2020
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Gravity VR

Gravity VR
Fabito Rychter, Amir Admoni
Extended Reality 2020
-
Brazil,
Peru
2020
16 minutes
English,
Portuguese (Brazil)

Osario and Benedito, two brothers, lead a quiet and isolated life. Gravity doesn’t seem to exist in their cosmos. Objects float around – no up, no down, no points of orientation. The two have never known anything else than this floating in space. We float along and are irritated: is all this lightness just an illusion?

Lars Rummel

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Production Company
Delirium XR
VR Developer
Owen Svelmoe
Motion Capture
Fabito Rychter
Script
Fabito Rychter, Amir Admoni
Narrator
Peter Baker, Mauro Rychter
Key Collaborator
Owen Svelmoe
Director
Fabito Rychter, Amir Admoni
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Green Turns Brown

Green Turns Brown
Joie Estrella Horwitz
International Competition Short Film 2021
Documentary Film
USA
2021
6 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
Spanish, English

A visual artist all her life, Luchita Hurtado only reluctantly experienced her breakthrough at the age of 97. “Green Turns Brown” is a minimalist eulogy to the publicity-shy painter. Shot on Super 8 film stock during the last months of her life, this film, which revels in autumn colours, paints the portrait of a woman in tune with nature who sees death not as the end but as the crossing of a border. “Life goes on.”

Christoph Terhechte

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Joie Estrella Horwitz
Cinematographer
Joie Estrella Horwitz
Editor
Joie Estrella Horwitz
Producer
Joie Estrella Horwitz
Sound
Sarah Ibrahim
Score
Sarah Ibrahim
Performer
Luchita Hurtado
Filmstill Gudow Nord

Gudow Nord

Gudow Nord
Sophia Schachtner
German Competition Documentary Film 2023
Documentary Film
Germany
2023
20 minutes
Ukrainian,
Spanish
Subtitles: 
English

The motorway roars in the background, darkness lies over the service area. One truck driver smokes; another turns on the light in his sleeper cab. A summer Sunday is dawning, everything is standing still. Precisely designed detail shots induce in us a state of waiting. This is what life on the road can also look like. Cooking, dozing, staring into space. Hair is shorn short, words are exchanged. Polish pop songs resound from one of the cabs.

Life seems to have been tuned out. And yet it is happening. One of the men roams the forest, calls home. Suddenly a family is present in the images: The man remembers a swimming trip when the children were small. A strangely beautiful sight. He holds his mobile up in the air so the person on the other end of the line can hear the woodpecker.

Anke Leweke

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Sophia Schachtner
Cinematographer
Marlon Weber
Editor
Sophia Schachtner
Producer
Sophia Schachtner
Sound Design
Patrick Dadaczynski
Nominated for: Gedanken Aufschluss Prize