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Filmstill A Provincial Hospital

A Provincial Hospital

A Provincial Hospital
Ilian Metev, Ivan Chertov, Zlatina Teneva
Panorama Middle and Eastern Europe 2022
Documentary Film
Bulgaria,
Germany
2022
110 minutes
Bulgarian
Subtitles: 
English

Kyustendil, a city in the Bulgarian mountains, was hit hard by Covid. The local hospital is probably a reasonably representative microcosm of how the medical staff dealt with the worst consequences of the pandemic. Ten years after his debut “Sofia’s Last Ambulance” (DOK Leipzig 2012), Ilian Metev returns with another film about a national health system that opposes the virus with gallows humour and individual commitment.

Metev himself was stuck in London during the shooting, monitoring from afar as co-director Teneva and her colleague Chertov collected the material and edited it alone. The focus is on the hospital staff. And if there is one main protagonist among the countless members of the cast, it’s Dr. Popov. Warm-hearted and always ready with a quip, we even often see him without a mask – the other employees are usually hidden behind protective gear. They all share a tough sense of humour to get them through the days and nights. The logistical challenges of such a film project also crop up: The people with the cameras are frequently mentioned and addressed. In this emergency community of patients, doctors and film crew they seem to be always ready to joke. But death, up in the intensive care unit, is very close.
Lina Dinkla

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Ilian Metev, Ivan Chertov, Zlatina Teneva
Script
Ilian Metev, Ivan Chertov, Zlatina Teneva
Cinematographer
Ivan Chertov
Editor
Ilian Metev
Producer
Martichka Bozhilova, Ilian Metev, Ingmar Trost
Sound
Zlatina Teneva
Sound Design
Ivan Andreev, Adrian Lo
World Sales
Marcella Jelić
Nominated for: MDR Film Prize
Filmstill Fragile Memory

Fragile Memory

Krykhka pam’yat
Igor Ivanko
Panorama Middle and Eastern Europe 2022
Documentary Film
Ukraine,
Slovakia
2022
85 minutes
Ukrainian,
Russian,
Polish
Subtitles: 
English

In the 1960s, the Soviet cinematographer Leonid Burlaka worked on films that went around the world for the Odesskaya kinostudiya in his native city of Odesa in the former Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Today he is eighty years old and diagnosed with Alzheimer’s; his memory is visibly fading. Filmmaker Igor Ivanko follows the traces left by his grandfather and discovers an archive of immense value in the garage.

Dozens of rolls of photo film, albeit almost decayed, are found between gardening and other tools. The grandson scans the material and shows it to his grandparents. Burlaka’s face brightens when he recognises familiar faces, but he can’t remember much. Ivanko realises that he has a treasure of historical dimensions in his hands. Leonid Burlaka began his career when many Soviet creative artists were struggling with censorship. When state repression eased in the mid-1960s, he had long established himself in his profession. The political change, however, was reflected in his works. Ivanko’s attempt to record his grandfather’s memories before they disappear forever comes too late. But he succeeds at making a film that looks back on fifty years of cinema and life in the USSR: a stirring portrait of the times and the family between emotion and information.
Lina Dinkla

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Igor Ivanko
Cinematographer
Igor Ivanko, Illia Yehorov
Editor
Igor Kosenko
Producer
Mariia Ponomarova, Alexandra Bratyshchenko, Igor Ivanko, Peter Kerekes
Sound
Karina Rezhevska
Score
Marek Piaček
World Sales
Clementine Engler
Nominated for: MDR Film Prize
Filmstill Love Is Not an Orange

Love Is Not an Orange

Love Is Not an Orange
Otilia Babara
Panorama Middle and Eastern Europe 2022
Documentary Film
Belgium,
Moldova,
Netherlands,
France
2022
73 minutes
Romanian
Subtitles: 
English

“Imagine this camera is your mother”, a father tells his daughter. In the 1990s, scores of families from the Republic of Moldova began a ritualised mail exchange between the mothers, who had emigrated for economic reasons, and their relatives back home. The former sent money and goods; the latter sent videotapes. These amateur recordings are the material of this film. They testify to the painful gaps the absent persons left in the lives of those who stayed behind.

Migration is a big factor in post-socialist states buffeted by recession and inflation after the end of the Soviet Union – and in this case, also by the civil war over Transnistria. According to data from 2011/2012, about a third of Moldovan children had one parent abroad. In this small country between Romania and the Ukraine, too, a higher percentage of fathers choose work migration. Otilia Babara, however, is specifically interested in the consequences of long absent mothers, who work for nursing services in Italy, for example, to earn their family’s livelihood, and who express their love through care packages. The loss of connection to their mother – all of whom stay out of the frame –, which affects girls in particular, emerges in the cracks of the staged home videos, when wandering glances reveal that the children no longer believe in their return.
Jan-Philipp Kohlmann

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Otilia Babara
Script
Otilia Babara
Editor
Pierpaolo Filomeno
Producer
Hanne Phlypo
Co-Producer
Christine Camdessus, Simone van den Broek, Otilia Babara
Sound
Mark Glynne
Sound Design
Olmo van Straalen
Nominated for: MDR Film Prize
Filmstill My Love Affair with Marriage

My Love Affair with Marriage

My Love Affair with Marriage
Signe Baumane
Panorama Middle and Eastern Europe 2022
Animated Film
Latvia,
USA,
Luxembourg
2022
108 minutes
English
Subtitles: 
English

“Beware of everything, especially men”, Zelma was told as a rule of thumb for a successful life as a woman. But when you meet the greatest love of all, and it happens to Zelma several times, biochemistry takes over and all advice is forgotten. In an animated musical, Signe Baumane’s protagonist dances her way through promising romantic beginnings, disappointed hopes and failing marriages – only to find out that she had better make the rules herself.

How much does this Zelma have in common with her inventor? Did Signe Baumane, too, meet a Sergey once and was so overwhelmed by noradrenaline, serotonin and dopamine that she simply failed to hear his condescending tone? In any case, the native Latvian and New Yorker by choice is known for using taboos and questionable notions of desirable and permitted, therefore “proper” femininity as a source of friction for her stories. For a long time, she remained faithful to the short form, until she presented her first feature-length animation in 2014 with “Rocks in My Pockets” – also at DOK Leipzig. She follows it up with “My Love Affair with Marriage” – not just in terms of length, but also in terms of the ironic, entertaining and yet serious exploration of the roles that biology and unexamined retold myths assign to women.
Sylvia Görke

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Signe Baumane
Cinematographer
Signe Baumane
Editor
Signe Baumane, Sturgis Warner
Producer
Roberts Vinovski, Sturgis Warner, Signe Baumane, Raoul Nadalet
Sound
Pierre Vedovato
Score
Kristian Sensini
World Sales
Natalia Dabrowska
Filmstill Silent Love

Silent Love

Silent Love
Marek Kozakiewicz
Panorama Middle and Eastern Europe 2022
Documentary Film
Germany,
Poland
2022
72 minutes
Polish
Subtitles: 
English

The rules in rural Poland are clear: Every man must have a woman; every dancer must have a female dancer. The pubescent Miłosz feels safe here, especially after his mother’s death. His sister Agnieszka, who is in a long-distance relationship with her friend Majka, does everything to obtain custody of her little brother. Gradually, a new family model is revealed, documented by Marek Kozakiewicz as an attempt that is as restrained as it is determined.

The windmills behind the houses rotate steadily, standing in place, signalling stability. But the lives of Miłosz and his 35-year-old sister are in turmoil. They are facing a red-tape marathon to make Agnieska his legal guardian: Both have been orphans for a few months. Director Marek Kozakiewicz depicts the establishment of a new family no one expects much applause for in conservative Poland. Because for Agnieszka and her partner, who is ten years older, the determination to try living together manifests tentatively. Without kisses, without celebrations, the decision almost casually becomes reality – the women are exploring the boundary between platonic tenderness and enforced secrecy. And Miłosz, too, seems to realise only slowly what the relationship between Majka and Agnieszka really is.
Carolin Weidner

Credits DOK Leipzig Logo

Director
Marek Kozakiewicz
Script
Marek Kozakiewicz
Cinematographer
Marek Kozakiewicz
Editor
Anna Garncarczyk, Agata Cierniak
Producer
Agnieszka Skalska, Alexandre Tondowski
Co-Producer
Ira Tondowski
Sound
Marek Kozakiewicz
Score
Bartosz Bludau
Broadcaster
Thomas Beyer, Catherine Le Goff
Winner of: MDR Film Prize