“See you next year!” a Portuguese fire warden says as he dismantles his control equipment at the end of the season. Humans and nature in southern Europe may be used to forest fires, but that does not change the facts: The ever more massive conflagrations are caused by climate change. We have long been living in the age of fire.

In the Portuguese interior, a forest fire has just devastated a large area. Wounded nature is silent, not a single bird is heard, only the wind that makes the charred tree trunks rustle. But the vegetation recovers astonishingly fast. Where all life seemed to be gone, greenery soon sprouts from the ruined trees. The residents of the affected region are engaged in the reconstruction with great respect for their natural environment. Because plants, too, are sentient creatures. In quiet, almost melancholic, but also hopeful images, the film pays tribute to the strength of the trees and illustrates how essential it would be for humanity to learn to live in harmony with nature again.

Apulia, 1959: Women in white dresses dance ecstatically in a small chapel. They jump around, roll on the ground, some even climb the altar. They are said to have been bitten by a spider. Their dancing mania requires a ritual exorcism with music. Pictures like these inspired Italian anthropologists to travel to southern Italy. Equipped with tape recorders, film and photo cameras, they tracked down the phenomenon of tarantism.
This essayistic documentary follows the wealth of multi-media archive material produced on this research trip. It brings out the voices of the affected women, who turn out to be experts of their own performances. A special relationship developed between the scientist Annabella Rossi and the “tarantata” Michela Margiotta, with their correspondence at the centre of the film. Even today, these images of female frenzy are disturbing, revealing the loss of control of husbands, families, science and the church. In today’s Apulia, the film discovers living forms of tarantism, tamed as folklore, a tourist attraction. There are new poisons that have infested the system. They, too, must be danced out.

After 62 years of marriage Aïcha Soualem is on her own again. Mabrouk, whom she has left, is nevertheless supplied by her daily with food and sugar cubes. Director Lina Soualem is interested in the relationship between her grandparents, who, as the last remaining Algerians in Thiers, France, look back on an eventful past. An empathic investigation all the way back to their native village of Laaouamer which leaves room for ambiguous emotions.

“Soualem” is the password which not only enables Lina Soualem to unlock the tiny, snow-covered village full of cousins in Algeria, which her grandparents left a long time ago. In a sense, “Soualem” is also the title of this gentle investigation of a granddaughter. And Laaouamer, that little place in Algeria, is only the final destination of a long journey which may be narrated via geographical coordinates but interweaves them closely with biographical and emotional ones. Aïcha and Mabrouk rarely talk about themselves. Instead, self-affixed wall badges speak: “The world’s best mom lives here” or “Welcome to the world’s best grandma’s”. To learn more about the couple, whose lives were shaped by French colonialism, Lina Soualem uses private photos and videos. Her investigation is full of love: persistent, but never prying.

Director Yvann Yagchi, the son of Palestinian migrants, and his Jewish best friend spend a carefree childhood far away from politics on the neutral ground of Switzerland. As adults, both long for religious and ethnic affiliation. Yvann wants to visit Palestine at last and break generations of silence about the fate of his family. His friend moves to a Jewish settlement in the West Bank. Thus begins the story of a failed reunion.
With frankness and patience, Yvann’s film, addressed directly at his former closest confidant, documents his own emotional development: Initial optimism and diplomatic reserve soon give way to an underlying unease. When a Palestinian refugee challenges him to give up the platitudes about striving for truth and formulate his opinion clearly, we realise that there can be only one standpoint for Yvann. There is a rift between the friends, vividly illustrated by animated doodles. Reflections on a lost friendship turn into a search for identity, made immeasurably harder by the ongoing destruction of Palestinian existence.

Two cells observed under the microscope. They grow up together and meet many different creatures on their outings. One day they are separated by an accident and it takes a long time before they find each other again. After the first outburst of joy, they realise that they have changed and no longer fit together. A colourful and profound animation.

Peeling away layers of pain, layers of perspectives, passing by both trauma and hope, this film dives into Rwanda thirty years after the genocide. Covering such a topic has always presented itself as a challenge to documentarians. While Claude Lanzmann’s “Shoa” (1985) is over nine hours long, “Traces of Responsibility” unfolds its eight potential hours as innumerable 85 to 110-minute screenings. In allowing different viewing experiences, this film does not commit to a single version of Rwanda, but rather accentuates its multifaceted, and, yes, complex history. The audience may vote to visit genocide memorials and hear survivor testimonies or to follow a theatre troupe educating children about tolerance. They might choose to visit a market or an art museum, to go to a karaoke bar or to just go home.
“You could a write a 1,000-page book just from our [two] stories,” says Semana Jumapili, a survivor we might encounter. When one considers this, even this film of many paths seems limited. There are countless stories to be told. The genocide in Rwanda was horrifying, and yet there is so much solace in the people we encounter throughout the film. They inspire us to fight injustice and heal wounds which seem too big to overcome.

 

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A shimmering shoal of herrings are swimming through the wide ocean when they are suddenly broken up by seagulls. Separated from the shoal, a small herring ends up all alone in a tidal pool. Looking for a way out, he encounters many other marine creatures. Some scare him. But there’s no time for this now: Only by joining forces can they defend themselves against the hungry seagulls.