Campo
Tiago Hespanha
Surrounded by the Arcadian-looking landscape of Europe’s biggest military base on the outskirts of Lisbon, sheep and bees meet ornithologists and soldiers training for combat.
D
Film Archive
Campo
Credits
João Matos
Tiago Hespanha
Tiago Hespanha, Rui Xavier, Luísa Homem, Cláudia Varejão, Paulo Menezes
Francisco Moreira, Tiago Hespanha
Eva Boliño, Adriana Bolito, Giorgio Gristina, Tiago Melo Bento
Europe’s biggest military base is situated on the outskirts of Lisbon. Soldiers following fictitious scenarios train for a future war, the neighbours hear the impact of the guns at night, a boy plays the piano. Soldiers and amateur astronomers watch through the night on their missions, ornithologists lie in wait for the mating calls of rare birds, snipers for enemies and targets. Beekeepers look after their bees, a shepherd helps a ewe giving birth: Arcadian-looking landscapes with deer and grazing sheep in the morning mist meet a modern field of Mars (“campo de marte”), as military training grounds were called in ancient Rome.
This film doesn’t hurry its observations, listening to the tales of the people as well as to the sound of the piano composition “Battle in the Stars”, inspired by the war games. It listens to the sheep, the birds, and the bees. This generates a simultaneousness – and equality – of violence, nature, people, the historic and future layers, the material and the transcendental.
Frederik Lang
This film doesn’t hurry its observations, listening to the tales of the people as well as to the sound of the piano composition “Battle in the Stars”, inspired by the war games. It listens to the sheep, the birds, and the bees. This generates a simultaneousness – and equality – of violence, nature, people, the historic and future layers, the material and the transcendental.
Frederik Lang
Ceremony
Phil Collins
What does Manchester in 2017 have in common with the Russian revolution? Friedrich Engels. His theories form the starting point for reflections on the state of contemporary Great Britain.
Ceremony
Documentary Film
Germany,
Ukraine,
UK
2018
67 minutes
subtitles:
English
Credits
Siniša Mitrović, Natasha Dack Ojumu
Phil Collins
Mica Levi, Demdike Stare, Gruff Rhys
Neus Ollé-Soronellas, Joseph Briffa, Jonathan Stow, Alex Large, David Bewick, Pedro Labanca, Federico Funari, Phil Collins, Siniša Mitrović, Matthias Schellenberg
David Charap, Andreas Dalström
Phil Collins
Jochen Jezussek
What do 2017 Manchester and the Russian Revolution 100 years earlier have in common? Friedrich Engels. Before he wrote the Communist Manifesto with Karl Marx, the philosopher and entrepreneur had lived for a few years in the northern English industrial capital of the 19th century. Taking Engels’ communist theories as a starting point, the artist Phil Collins reflects on their topicality: What is the “condition of the working class in England” – the title of one of his main works – today? Wouldn’t Engels be more likely to write about the “working poor”? What are the differences between the past and present “tyranny of capital”, which still seems to have our societies, our life, thinking and actions firmly in its grip? Is that why communism has become a conceivable ideal again?
And Engels himself, too, gets to return to Manchester, in the shape of a statue whose transport from a Ukrainian village to its new home in the former industrial capital of the world the film follows – a many-layered socialist road movie from one of the outer edges of the EU to the (soon to be) other.
Frederik Lang
And Engels himself, too, gets to return to Manchester, in the shape of a statue whose transport from a Ukrainian village to its new home in the former industrial capital of the world the film follows – a many-layered socialist road movie from one of the outer edges of the EU to the (soon to be) other.
Frederik Lang
Honeyland
Tamara Kotevska, Ljubomir Stefanov
A bee whisperer in the Macedonian mountain idyll, from whose strenuous everyday life she sometimes flees. A condensed, intense drama that is much more than just a portrait.
Honeyland
Hatidze is not alone. She has her bees. And she nurses her sick, bedridden mother. Every now and then she packs her jars of honey and homemade baskets and goes to the market in the capital, where she flirts with the sellers, treats herself to a hair dye and enjoys escaping the loneliness of her Macedonian mountain idyll for a moment: being, for a short while, nothing but a single woman around fifty, free from all her routine burdens and ready to enjoy life. In her remote, barren mountain village she hardly has time for this, because there she is devotedly breeding bee colonies in crevices. As a bee whisperer, she sings old folksongs to her charges, needs no head or hand protection and takes only the honey she is entitled to, leaving the rest to the bees. They are her family. But when a nomad clan with seven kids and 150 cows suddenly settles on the neighbouring property, her lonely idyll is in danger of being shattered.
The two directors Ljubomir Stefanov and Tamara Kotevska have condensed roughly 400 hours of film material in a poetic, intense drama that is much more than just the portrait of a beekeeper. Between observation and metaphor, they follow Hatidze through ups and downs. In her world it’s the bees that decide who will be allowed to stay in the end.
Julia Weigl
The two directors Ljubomir Stefanov and Tamara Kotevska have condensed roughly 400 hours of film material in a poetic, intense drama that is much more than just the portrait of a beekeeper. Between observation and metaphor, they follow Hatidze through ups and downs. In her world it’s the bees that decide who will be allowed to stay in the end.
Julia Weigl
Marona’s Fantastic Tale
Anca Damian
Marona-Sara-Ana-the-Ninth is of noble descent, but not a princess. She was given her names by her master and mistress. The modern fairytale about a dog raises questions of identity.
Marona’s Fantastic Tale
Animated Film
Belgium,
France,
Romania
2019
92 minutes
subtitles:
English
German
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
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
Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin
Werner Herzog
Once again, Werner Herzog goes on a journey to make an intimate film not only about a friend but about himself – a curious dreamer and indefatigable nomad.
Nomad: In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin
Credits
Lucki Stipetić, Steve O’Hagan
Werner Herzog
Louis Caulfield, Mike Paterson
Marco Capalbo
Werner Herzog
Bruce Chatwin and Werner Herzog are brothers in spirit. One of them a legendary writer, the other a legendary filmmaker, two stubborn men. Both loved and still love adventures, especially hiking. Or, as Herzog likes to describe his obsession for long walks: “The world reveals itself to those who travel on foot.”
Chatwin died of AIDS in 1989. His filmmaking friend visited him shortly before he died to say farewell. It took thirty years before the German dedicated a very personal documentary portrait to the Brit. He follows in Chatwin’s footsteps, travelling – in his familiar casual and exploratory way – to the locales of the writer’s work, always carrying the old chestnut-brown leather backpack Chatwin gave him as a parting gift. He goes to the end of the world to South America to follow his friend’s impressive book “In Patagonia”, to the Australian outback to learn about the Aborigine song traditions that inspired Chatwin’s “Songlines”, and finally to the writer’s foggy homeland of Wales. Once more Werner Herzog sets out on a journey to ultimately realise an intimate film not only about a companion but most of all about himself – a curious dreamer and indefatigable nomad.
Julia Weigl
Chatwin died of AIDS in 1989. His filmmaking friend visited him shortly before he died to say farewell. It took thirty years before the German dedicated a very personal documentary portrait to the Brit. He follows in Chatwin’s footsteps, travelling – in his familiar casual and exploratory way – to the locales of the writer’s work, always carrying the old chestnut-brown leather backpack Chatwin gave him as a parting gift. He goes to the end of the world to South America to follow his friend’s impressive book “In Patagonia”, to the Australian outback to learn about the Aborigine song traditions that inspired Chatwin’s “Songlines”, and finally to the writer’s foggy homeland of Wales. Once more Werner Herzog sets out on a journey to ultimately realise an intimate film not only about a companion but most of all about himself – a curious dreamer and indefatigable nomad.
Julia Weigl
That Which Does Not Kill
Alexe Poukine
An unagitated, performative stocktaking of the subject of rape. Alexe Poukine recovers the offence from the dark zone and lets victims and perpetrators speak.
That Which Does Not Kill
Credits
Cyril Bibas (CVB), Cécile Lestrade, Elise Hug (Alter Ego)
Alexe Poukine
Elin Kirschfink
Agnès Bruckert
Ada Leiris
Bruno Schweisguth
Conchita Paz, Epona Guillaume, Aurore Fattier, Marijke Pinoy, Marie Préchac, Sophie Sénécaut, Anne Jacob, Tristan Lamour, Noémie Boes, Maxime Maes, Yves-Marina Gnahoua, Tiphaine Gentilleau, Séverine Degilhage, Laurence Rosier
It’s well-established that the majority of sexualised violence doesn’t take place in the public sphere but in the seemingly protected realm of family, partnership and friends. This is also true of a young woman who was raped by a good friend on a private date. Her report was the occasion and basis of this film which interprets it first performatively, then analytically by women and men playing various roles.
In addition to the act itself, it addresses its consequences and how to deal with feelings of guilt, shame, paralysis and repression – but soon the performers’ own experiences as victims of perpetrators, too. In its directness and detail, speaking out is sometimes agonising for all participants. But talking and listening are the only chance to get hold of the phantoms and demons of the past and thus heal the wounds. Alexe Poukine’s differentiated and multi-faceted approach to an issue usually discussed in sensationalist terms offers us, the audience, a chance to dispassionately re-adjust our perspective on the act of rape.
Silvia Hallensleben
In addition to the act itself, it addresses its consequences and how to deal with feelings of guilt, shame, paralysis and repression – but soon the performers’ own experiences as victims of perpetrators, too. In its directness and detail, speaking out is sometimes agonising for all participants. But talking and listening are the only chance to get hold of the phantoms and demons of the past and thus heal the wounds. Alexe Poukine’s differentiated and multi-faceted approach to an issue usually discussed in sensationalist terms offers us, the audience, a chance to dispassionately re-adjust our perspective on the act of rape.
Silvia Hallensleben
The Wind. A Documentary Thriller
Michał Bielawski
The wind, the wind, the heavenly child: a character study of a landscape and an exceptional case of regional climate which blows through Polish forests, organisms and souls.
The Wind. A Documentary Thriller
Documentary Film
Poland,
Slovakia
2019
75 minutes
subtitles:
English
German
Credits
Maciej Kubicki
Michał Bielawski
Bartłomiej Solik
Hubert Pusek
Michał Bielawski
When the Halny rises in the High Tatras in the south of Poland, the number of emergency calls spikes. The Halny is a wind that makes people nervous, stresses them and intensifies their crises. In his “documentary thriller”, Michał Bielawski tells the story of a force of nature and of the people who have to live with the wind.
Nothing is harder to calculate than the weather, because it has a different effect on every organism and every soul. Bielawski approaches his weather report from the two endpoints of the axis of events: In impressive panoramic shots, he shows how the Halny is created by thick clouds rolling down from the mountains into the narrow valleys. He also shows how the people have adapted to the upheavals and occasional bigger or smaller natural disasters. A particularly impressive protagonist even seems to identify with this unique regional world: Teresa hugs the trees; she wants to have a spot of her own in the protected forest. She becomes the embodiment of a landscape of which Michał Bielawski, with his images and a strong, atmospheric soundtrack, has created almost a character study.
Bert Rebhandl
Awarded with the MDR Film Prize.
Nothing is harder to calculate than the weather, because it has a different effect on every organism and every soul. Bielawski approaches his weather report from the two endpoints of the axis of events: In impressive panoramic shots, he shows how the Halny is created by thick clouds rolling down from the mountains into the narrow valleys. He also shows how the people have adapted to the upheavals and occasional bigger or smaller natural disasters. A particularly impressive protagonist even seems to identify with this unique regional world: Teresa hugs the trees; she wants to have a spot of her own in the protected forest. She becomes the embodiment of a landscape of which Michał Bielawski, with his images and a strong, atmospheric soundtrack, has created almost a character study.
Bert Rebhandl
Awarded with the MDR Film Prize.
The Young Observant
Davide Maldi
Luca is supposed to become a hotel clerk, though he is actually a shy, rebellious teenager. An intimate coming-of-age story in carefully arranged vintage images.
The Young Observant
To become a hotel clerk you need one thing above all else: discipline. Of course that’s not so easy for an adolescent. Shy, fourteen-year-old Luca finds it especially difficult. He can neither stand still nor wants to have his shaggy red hair cut. He’d rather flirt with his teacher during French lessons or go hunting in the lonely forest. He’s bored by the equally renowned and stuffy hotel management school, whose perpetual routines get on his nerves: folding napkins, polishing glasses, listening. The problem, though, is that his family have great expectations of him.
Having grown up in a tiny Alpine mountain village, the boy of course knows how his way around the cows on the farm back home. The surrounding forests were his territory where he could let off steam. Now school is supposed to tame him, teach him self-discipline and ultimately help him find a decent job. In restful vintage images the Italian director Davide Maldi illustrates the tight corset of a training institution that seems to have fallen out of time. Antique wooden furniture, lemon-yellow walls, young gentlemen in black waistcoats and buttoned-up white shirts. They provide the costumes and setting of an intimate coming-of-age story which revolves around a sacrifice: Must Luca give up his free spirit to become “something”?
Julia Weigl
Having grown up in a tiny Alpine mountain village, the boy of course knows how his way around the cows on the farm back home. The surrounding forests were his territory where he could let off steam. Now school is supposed to tame him, teach him self-discipline and ultimately help him find a decent job. In restful vintage images the Italian director Davide Maldi illustrates the tight corset of a training institution that seems to have fallen out of time. Antique wooden furniture, lemon-yellow walls, young gentlemen in black waistcoats and buttoned-up white shirts. They provide the costumes and setting of an intimate coming-of-age story which revolves around a sacrifice: Must Luca give up his free spirit to become “something”?
Julia Weigl
Tiny Souls
Dina Naser
Three Syrian kids in a refugee camp in Jordan. Their experience of flight and exile, followed with empathy but also pointing beyond to ongoing history.
Tiny Souls
Documentary Film
France,
Jordan,
Lebanon,
Qatar
2019
85 minutes
subtitles:
English
German
They and all the others will continue to inspire life, Dina Naser writes at the end of her film about three children of war in Syria. They grow up in a refugee camp in Jordan: Marwa is the eldest, then there’s her sister Ayah and finally Mahmoud, the youngest. They have seven other siblings, but the family was torn apart when one brother in Syria no longer wanted to serve in the army and thus the dictator Assad. Marwa is the heroine of the film. She will soon be grown-up or at least considered almost of marriageable age by her parents. Her mother and father now make sure she doesn’t go out any more. But she already has a boyfriend.
Dina Naser follows the three children’s fate and everyday life over an extended period of time, starting in 2014. The filmmaker even hands the camera temporarily over to her protagonists – for the time when she can’t be with them. This can and should be compared to the situation of Palestinian refugees in 1948, among them Dina Naser’s father, whose experiences are referenced by the director. This opens up a larger context for this story which is profoundly and universally human but at the same time linked closely to the complicated Syria and Middle East conflict by its wealth of detail.
Bert Rebhandl
Dina Naser follows the three children’s fate and everyday life over an extended period of time, starting in 2014. The filmmaker even hands the camera temporarily over to her protagonists – for the time when she can’t be with them. This can and should be compared to the situation of Palestinian refugees in 1948, among them Dina Naser’s father, whose experiences are referenced by the director. This opens up a larger context for this story which is profoundly and universally human but at the same time linked closely to the complicated Syria and Middle East conflict by its wealth of detail.
Bert Rebhandl
Where We Belong
Jacqueline Zünd
Analytically and eloquently, five children of separated couples talk about the questions and gaps left by their parents. It’s up to them and us to decide what normality means.
Where We Belong
Documentary Film
Switzerland
2019
78 minutes
subtitles:
English
German
Parents separate, the children are left with questions and gaps: Dad cheated on Mom, so she threw him out. But didn’t Mom cheat on Dad, too? Life now happens between two homes, between two worlds. After an argument, the mother leaves for a “holiday” that is still going on a year later. It’s never mentioned. Brother and sister end up in a home after they tried to leave their mother. Their father had badmouthed her to them again and again. Taking the children, though, doesn’t cross his mind.
Coping with such experiences makes you grow up early. Surprisingly analytically and eloquently, five children of separated parents talk about their stories, only to turn back into children the next moment. With atmospheric images, sometimes impressionist and experimental, sometimes perfectly lighted like the stars on the big screen they become for a short while, the director manages to transcend the everyday life her protagonists talk about: By now, they probably know where they belong better than all the adults around them. It’s up to them and us to find out what normality means. Best to do it all on their own.
Frederik Lang
Awarded with the Young Eyes Film Award.
Coping with such experiences makes you grow up early. Surprisingly analytically and eloquently, five children of separated parents talk about their stories, only to turn back into children the next moment. With atmospheric images, sometimes impressionist and experimental, sometimes perfectly lighted like the stars on the big screen they become for a short while, the director manages to transcend the everyday life her protagonists talk about: By now, they probably know where they belong better than all the adults around them. It’s up to them and us to find out what normality means. Best to do it all on their own.
Frederik Lang
Awarded with the Young Eyes Film Award.