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International Competition Animadoc 2015
Animated Minds: Stories of Post-Natal Depression – Katie's Story Lucy Izzard

The multiple award winning series “Animated Minds”, launched in 2003, visualises the interior worlds of mentally disordered people.

UK

UK
2015

Animated Minds: Stories of Post-Natal Depression – Katie's Story

Animadoc
UK
2015
3 minutes
Subtitles: 
No

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Andy Glynne
Director
Lucy Izzard
Music
Alexander Parsons
Animation
Lucy Izzard
Sound
Alexander Parsons
The multiple award winning series “Animated Minds”, launched in 2003, visualises the interior worlds of mentally disordered people. The new instalment shows women who suffered from postnatal depression after the birth of their children. Katie talks of her feelings of guilt and powerlessness in the face of this new situation in her life. The animation makes her feelings and thoughts visible.

Annegret Richter
International Competition Animadoc 2015
Animated Minds: Stories of Post-Natal Depression – Mike's Story Dan Binns

It’s a little-known fact that postnatal depression affects not only women who find no access to their child and new life after birth. The disorder also radically changes their partners’ and families’ lives.

UK

UK
2015

Animated Minds: Stories of Post-Natal Depression – Mike's Story

Animadoc
UK
2015
3 minutes
Subtitles: 
No

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Andy Glynne
Director
Dan Binns
Music
Alexander Parsons
Animation
Dan Binns
Sound
Alexander Parsons
It’s a little-known fact that postnatal depression affects not only women who find no access to their child and new life after birth. The disorder also radically changes their partners’ and families’ lives. This episode of “Animated Minds” shows how Mike experiences the situation as a man and father.

Annegret Richter
International Programme 2015
Black Sheep Christian Cerami

Two brothers from a suburb in Northern England come under the influence of the right-wing “English Defence League”, known for its vociferous anti-Islam stance.

Black Sheep

Documentary Film
UK
2015
16 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Alex Sedgley
Director
Christian Cerami
Cinematographer
Simon Plunkett
Editor
Samuel Haskell
Sound
Vicky Harris

Two brothers from a suburb in Northern England come under the influence of the right-wing “English Defence League”, known for its vociferous anti-Islam stance. What starts as curiosity becomes a trip into the world of tough boys with outspoken attitudes for the older one and a nightmare for the 13-year-old Jack. With a feature-film-like camera the director captures the battle of wills between more than two different characters with impressive precision. Cornelia Klauß


Brave New Old

Animated Film
UK
2012
10 minutes
Subtitles: 
_without dialogue / subtitles

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Adam Wells
Director
Adam Wells
Music
Luke Davoll
Animation
Adam Wells
Detailing the daily trails of a man, his wife, and a film noir private detective is not an unusual accessory to a film, but the mechanical storytellings used in this case change everything.
International Programme 2017
Dying Breed Mick Catmull

A year on Ivan’s, Rosemary’s and Geoffrey’s farms – a filmic love poem to an endangered traditional rural lifestyle in Cornwall which glorifies nothing.

Dying Breed

Documentary Film
UK
2017
85 minutes
Subtitles: 
No

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Mick Catmull
Director
Mick Catmull
Music
Neil Reed
Cinematographer
Mick Catmull
Editor
Mike Bow
Sound
Mick Catmull
Agriculture is going through a sea change: more than a third of British farms were closed down in the past ten years, sold to land speculators, agricultural corporations or even London bankers who can afford a little agricultural romanticism but don’t need it to earn a living. The family farm which has shaped village life and landscapes for centuries looks more and more like a discontinued model. That applies not only to remote western Cornwall, where the documentary filmmaker Mick Catmull followed three long-established farmers, Ivan, Rosemary and Geoffrey, for a year. With precise observations of the daily routines of animal husbandry and often trenchant conversations full of British humour this debut film successfully portrays and documents a lifestyle and a breed of people. The result is also something like a love poem to a traditional rural lifestyle that is threatened by extinction all over the world – completely without glorification or “Country Life” romanticism.

Frederik Lang


Nominated for Healthy Workplaces Film Award
International Programme 2013
Grasp the Nettle Dean Puckett

An activists’ camp on London’s Parliament Square, caught between political struggle, plodding grassroots democracy, dubious allies, and police violence. An insider’s perspective on “Occupy”.

Grasp the Nettle

Documentary Film
UK
2013
89 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Daniel Erlacher
Director
Dean Puckett
Music
Leo Leigh, Lee Bruce, Duncan Sangster
Cinematographer
Dean Puckett
Editor
Paco Sweetman
Script
Dean Puckett, Can Aniker
Sound
Jeet Thakrar
It’s always easy to make fun of green or protest movements if your own laziness keeps you from taking action against wrongs. That’s how the filmmaker Dean Puckett feels, too: seen from outside his own inertness is only bearable from a certain ironic distance. So he gives up his life, flat, and job to really learn how these groups work.
In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, a few people in London team up to do more than call for a different, more sustainable life in the streets. In peaceful collaboration with the local residents, they found a kind of ecological village on a piece of disused land in West London. It’s a utopia with homemade tents, vegetable plots, and evenings around the campfire. When they have to give way to the excavators that come to prepare the ground for new apartment blocks, this ragtag band of activists, dropouts tired of civilisation, homeless people, and lunatics moves to the city centre to raise their tents on Parliament Square. All of a sudden, they are faced not only with the challenge of getting their own chaos under control but also with the humourless authority of the state.
Puckett has made a nuanced portrait of social experiments in times of crises, when formerly safe structures erode and the need for more freedom erupts in urban spaces.

Lina Dinkla

I’m OK

Animated Film
Canada,
UK
2018
6 minutes
Subtitles: 
_without dialogue / subtitles

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Abigail Addison (Animate Projects), Elizabeth Hobbs, Jelena Popović (National Film Board of Canada)
Director
Elizabeth Hobbs
Editor
Elizabeth Hobbs
Animation
Elizabeth Hobbs
Script
Elizabeth Hobbs
Sound
Sacha Ratcliffe
Galloping at breakneck speed through the tempestuous delirium of Oskar Kokoschka. After his failed amour fou with Alma Mahler he plunges into war as a dragoon in 1915, is wounded and comes to terms with things by creating the expressionist drama “Orpheus and Eurydice.” Elizabeth Hobbs takes up the dynamic quality of Kokoschka’s drawings and the turmoil of his emotional ecstasy. Restless ink strokes are entwined in a powerful and brightly coloured mesh of short-lived scenes of passion and suffering.

André Eckardt
International Programme 2015
If the Cuckoo Don’t Crow Steve Kirby

94-year-old Doris calls the BBC to report a great storm because she doesn’t hear the cuckoo’s call. And she’s right. The weather experts are astonished.

If the Cuckoo Don’t Crow

Animated Film
UK
2015
2 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Steve Kirby
Director
Steve Kirby
Animation
Steve Kirby
Script
Nic Pandolfi, Brian from Melton
94-year-old Doris calls the BBC to report a great storm because she doesn’t hear the cuckoo’s call. And she’s right. The weather experts are astonished. Later her son explains how this came about in a (real) radio interview. The interview in itself is already amusing, but the animation gives us a particularly refreshing view of the life of a woman who knows the weather.

Annegret Richter
International Programme 2018
Island of the Hungry Ghosts Gabrielle Brady

The Christmas Island crabs scuttle wherever they want. The asylum seekers interned on the island must stay where they are. A filmic reflection in powerful metaphors about the right to hospitality and forbearance.

Island of the Hungry Ghosts

Documentary Film
Australia,
Germany,
UK
2018
98 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Alexander Wadouh
Director
Gabrielle Brady
Music
Aaron Cupples
Cinematographer
Michael Latham
Editor
Katharina Fiedler
Script
Gabrielle Brady
Sound
Leo Dolgan
There are places that make us realise instantly that they don’t need us and never did. They exist even if we don’t look at them. Christmas Island, a tiny 135 square kilometre dot in the Indian Ocean, is such a place. It probably first saw humans in 1643. It’s hard to imagine how amazed the endemic red crabs, which were alone with themselves, the tropical thicket and the snow white sandy beaches until then, must have been at this loud-mouthed guest who declared himself the great “discoverer”! The refugee reception centre on Christmas Island is another such place. Since 2001, the Australian government has detained asylum seekers here to deny them their right to regular admission procedures on the continent. The crabs continue amazed.

We are brought face to face with this amazement in the powerful images, sounds and metaphors of Gabrielle Brady’s cinematic reflection on the right to hospitality and forbearance – poetically condensed, emotionally haunting and politically poignant. First in the shape of trauma therapist Poh Lin, who helps the inmates of the detention camp come to terms with their fate while she herself is struggling to maintain composure. Then as the mythical story of the wandering spirits of the dead, told by the Chinese immigrants. And finally as a sprawling, teeming, unimpressed nature that grows and crawls wherever it pleases.

Sylvia Görke


Nominated for the Goethe-Institut Documentary Film Prize

International Programme 2014
Monkey Love Experiments Will Anderson, Ainslie Henderson

A little monkey in a laboratory watches the preparations for the moon landing on television and becomes convinced that he was selected for this. Full of anticipation he trains for his big day.

Monkey Love Experiments

Animated Film
UK
2014
8 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Cameron Fraser
Director
Will Anderson, Ainslie Henderson
Music
Atzi
Cinematographer
Ruan Suess
Editor
Neil Jack
Animation
Ainslie Henderson, Will Anderson
Script
Ainslie Henderson, Will Anderson
Sound
John Cobban
A little monkey in a laboratory watches the preparations for the moon landing on television and becomes convinced that he was selected for this. Full of anticipation he trains for his big day.
International Programme 2013
Nae Pasaran Felipe Bustos Sierra

After the 1973 coup, Scottish workers refused to deliver engines for fighter planes to Chile. The reconstruction of a self-determined act of solidarity.

Nae Pasaran

Documentary Film
UK
2013
13 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Rebecca Day
Director
Felipe Bustos Sierra
Cinematographer
Julian Schwanitz
Editor
Anne Milne
Animation
Frederic Plasman
Sound
Jack Coghill
What’s the connection between the military dictatorship in Chile and the workers of a Rolls Royce manufacturing plant in Scotland? Here are the known facts: when the workers learn after the 1973 coup in Chile that the machine parts they make are used in the Chilean junta’s fighter planes, they refuse to deliver them. According to later Chilean reports, however, the machines were deployed after all. The workers doubt it. What’s their secret? Director Felipe Bustos Sierra reconstructs the events like a thriller, focusing on three former Scottish workers who meet again at a pre-arranged place. He confronts them with the known facts and uses animated sequences to interpret what happened on the grounds of the factory under cover of night and fog. Combined with archive material from the 1970s, a tongue-in-cheek portrait of a self-determined act of solidarity among workers emerges.

Lars Meyer
International Programme 2015
No Signal Katharina Huber

The violence is planned. Whether as a protest or simply a statement, the manifesto and the stone to throw are ready. Now it’s a matter of waiting, killing time and mentally preparing for the confrontation.

No Signal

Animated Film
UK
2014
6 minutes
Subtitles: 
_without dialogue / subtitles

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Katharina Huber
Music
Wolf Eyes
Animation
Katharina Huber
Sound
Marian Mentrup
The violence is planned. Whether as a protest or simply a statement, the manifesto and the stone to throw are ready. Now it’s a matter of waiting, killing time and mentally preparing for the confrontation. Like a warrior. But the fear won’t go away and every sound, every movement reminds you of what may be about to happen.

Annegret Richter
International Programme 2017
On Another Corner Mihaela Popescu

Teddy bears against a fence, children’s photos, coloured balloons, hanging heads, a struggle for composure, grief. It’s both state of emergency and everyday life.

On Another Corner

Documentary Film
UK
2017
17 minutes
Subtitles: 
No

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Mihaela Popescu, Marcus Davis
Director
Mihaela Popescu
Cinematographer
Mihaela Popescu
Editor
Mihaela Popescu
Sound
Marcus Davis
Teddy bears against a fence, children’s photos, coloured balloons, hanging heads, a struggle for composure, grief. People touch each other’s shoulders with sympathy, press photographers stand around rather apathetically to be joined later by television crews with their cameras and microphones. A predominantly African-American neighbourhood in Chicago, where a seven-year-old boy was shot in a revenge mission against his father in the turmoil of a gang war. It’s both state of emergency and everyday life.

Frederik Lang
International Programme 2019
Playhouse Adda Elling

A lesbian relationship and the playful exploration of the dynamics between the presentation and representation of female role patterns on film and in reality.

Playhouse

Documentary Film
UK
2018
25 minutes
Subtitles: 
No

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Teodora Shaleva
Director
Adda Elling
Music
Thomas Ross Fitzsimons
Cinematographer
Alana Mejia Gonzalez
Editor
Stella Heath Keir
Sound
Ines Adriana
“So now we’re gonna play a game. – Is it a game? – It depends on how you look at it …” Two lovers in a secluded holiday home. Over a summer dinner, Line and Rosie discuss issues of power and the representation of women and female sexuality on film. A game in front of and behind the camera begins, in the course of which they change roles more and more seamlessly. Who creates which level of reality and who bears responsibility for how a scene is perceived?

Luc-Carolin Ziemann
International Programme 2015
Territory Eleanor Mortimer

Gibraltar seen from the monkeys’ point of view. Apparently amazed, they watch the ceaseless activities of their human cohabitants but refuse to be driven away by construction noises or blow pipes.

Territory

Documentary Film
UK
2015
17 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Eleanor Mortimer, Jacob Thomas
Director
Eleanor Mortimer
Music
Fraya Thomsen
Cinematographer
Eleanor Mortimer
Editor
Nina Rac
Sound
Florentin Tudor
Gibraltar seen from the monkeys’ point of view. Apparently amazed, they watch the ceaseless activities of their human cohabitants but refuse to be driven away by construction noises or blow pipes. With no respect for the British monarchy they swing from lanterns and slide down rain pipes. Intelligent montage and careful sound design reveal the double occupation of the rock as well as the double meaning of the term “colony”. Who actually owns this territory?

Lars Meyer
International Programme 2014
The Auction House: A Tale of Two Brothers Edward Owles

A family business in Kolkata, managed comfortably by Little Boss Arshad. Until his big brother from London wants to introduce European efficiency. Culture clash comedy, Indian style.

The Auction House: A Tale of Two Brothers

Documentary Film
UK
2014
85 minutes
Subtitles: 
English

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Producer
Giovanna Stopponi
Director
Edward Owles
Music
Harry Lightfoot
Editor
Emiliano Battista
Sound
Gernot Fuhrmann
It’s tough. Keeping the business afloat in Kolkata for 40 years while one’s brother is leading the good life in London, and now this: the elder brother returns and takes over! Founded by their grandfather, the “Russell Exchange” auction house has aged quite a bit. It’s a long time since “Little Boss” Arshad made a profit. But that is to change now if Anwar has his will. The mission: taking the company into the 21st century. This sets the framework of a story where business and life plans clash. In “Little Boss’s” experience, everything can be sold. “Wrong! Don’t ever say that again! From tack to car – yes! Socks and shoes – no!” and then the crushing “We in Europe …” What under different conditions could lead to a veritable crisis is solved by this Indian-Islamic traders’ clan according to the rules of family hierarchy. The younger brother obeys, like he did when his father sent the brother to London and he was left – unasked for and unwanted – with the family business. “If I could do what I wanted!” We hear this sigh quite often – and yet: business is better than ever. So the two make peace with each other, on the basis of – how could it be otherwise – a flourishing “Russell Exchange” that their children will take over one day. Hopefully.
Matthias Heeder