The conquest of the unknown is the core of the American origin myth. What better place than the Midwestern desert to question it? In a place where there seems to be nothing but sand and stones, Sofie Benoot finds many and varied traces of humans: abandoned mines, sacred mountains, prehistoric drawings, empty towns still waiting for the run of residents, melted plane parts, secret military zones and even remains of World War II internment camps and nuclear waste warning signs. Some traces, like those of uranium mining or nuclear tests, are invisible. Like a branch of tumbleweed Benoot covers hundreds of kilometres. She meets sad Indians, Country music-yodelling Japanese, astronauts practicing for the settlement of Mars and Mormons in costume and with horses and carts (and a portable chemical toilet, too) following the pioneers’ trail. The camera captures immense panoramas of expanse and emptiness and then examines the structures of bizarre stone, soil and cloud formations in the next moment.
Benoot uncovers the myth layer by layer. The archaeology of the American Dream becomes a deep look into the abysses of civilisation; the history of the conquest of the West turns out to be a history of suppression. As merciless as the desert itself. Death rides a horse – it’s nothing if not a western.
Grit Lemke

An old car without tyres, propped up in front of a rural train station near Kinshasa – that recalls Bertolt Brecht’s “Tyre Change”. But the tyre change here is neither imminent nor impatiently expected. The owner of the car, a station master, is thinking in the most leisurely way about how to use the car to earn a little income on the side. At last he consults his colleague, who is usually the preferred object of his reflections. His thoughts are heard from off the screen like a commentary. This scene is only one of the film’s many brilliantly achieved metaphors for the stagnation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Beside the half-abandoned station, the central post office and the only fire station of the capital (three state-owned enterprises) are places where people are waiting for a change that is always announced with great fanfare by the politicians.
A land in a Rip-van-Winkle-like sleep, plundered by Europe, crushed by wars, with no working infrastructure. The film concentrates on that lucid present state, the dream of modernisation, in which it discovers surreal aspects. Above all, it is guided by great empathy for the employees portrayed here. Among them is Henriette, who has great hopes for the new electronic money transfer at the post office, even though she senses that once again it will be more form than content.
Lars Meyer

Einst verzauberten afrikanische Klänge den Alltag am Flussufer. Die Hommage von Frank Mukunday und Trésor Tshibangu Tshamala an ihre Stadt Lubumbashi entfaltet sich zu einer kritischen Reise und offenbart die fatalen Zusammenhänge der Weltökonomie. Auch wir im Norden spielen eine gewisse Rolle, wie die Schlusspointe aufrüttelnd anprangert. Mit recycelten rostigen Materialien, Steinen und Kreide positioniert sich das kongeniale Duo und widersetzt sich dem „Schwarzmarkt der Geschichte“ inhaltlich wie formal.

Nadja Rademacher

Marona-Sara-Ana-the-Ninth may be of noble descent from her father’s side, graceful and beautiful, but she is no princess. She braves many an adventure in her short life: She learns acrobatics and magic tricks, temporarily ends up on the streets and even becomes a saviour in need. She is a bitch. Her names were given to her by a number of masters and mistresses. Anca Damian tells a touching story with imagination and humour.

An original, surrealist and childlike aesthetics, the combination of different animation techniques, strong stylisation and the gay colour palette make the protagonists particularly expressive. The striking backgrounds resemble witty and artistic wimmelbook pictures. The unusual angles make us discover the urban hustle and bustle from many perspectives simultaneously – with all senses. At the heart of the film, a realistic and critical portrait of urban society emerges that does not shy away from questioning our relationship to animals and thus to our values. Joy and sadness, farewells and beginnings are mutually dependent – even death is sensitively addressed. Damian’s modern fairytale is about identity and belonging. Full of musical and visual poetry and philosophical esprit, it celebrates – equally simply and extravagantly – the complexity of existence and the simplicity of happiness.

Nadja Rademacher

Life is a chanson. Alain Resnais is not the only one who knows this; so do the operators of the “Puisaleine” community radio in rural Picardie. We see for the most part elderly people at the controls, struggling with the computer (occasionally the wrong song will be played), accepting music requests, telling jokes and giggling hysterically into the microphone, or dispensing esoteric to hands-on life counselling (“Leave the house!”). Their listeners sit in interiors that will soon be history, filmed with sociological precision: heart-shaped cushions, pictures of cats, teddy bears, artificial flowers, tassels and baroque curlicues. They sit alone on fully automated beds in rooms that are far too big for them and in which only the photos on the windowsill recall the families that once existed. And they listen to the radio: the song about the white roses, or the one about the love that lasted fifty years. We learn a story with every song, about nights of bombings and burning airplanes, about great love, or the child who died before the parents. And at some point they start to sing.
The elegant arrangements and meaningful montage of this tender film, imbued with loss and loneliness, but also with a quiet kind of humour, keep it firmly on the thin line between kitsch and great drama. A film for the heart, whose needs cannot be overestimated.

Grit Lemke

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Honorary Mention in the Young Cinema Competition 2013