A public swimming pool complex in the middle of a forest which is soon to be renovated: between water slides, French fries, TikTok and sun cream, six teenagers spend the long summer days in the “Badi”, as outdoor pools are called in Swiss German. It is a place to discuss, laugh, try things out and simply hang out together. Whether on the grass, in the water or between the different pools, their conversations revolve around everything that currently moves them. This sun-kissed film accompanies these adolescents at a moment of transition. They talk about the past, think about the future and try to find out who they are and how they will find their place in a changing world. The film stays close to their glances, conversations and encounters, taking an unvarnished look into the inner world of these adolescents – their curiosities, their humour, their contradictions and their insecurities. For one summer long, the Badi becomes a place where childhood and future can exist alongside each other. And while the orange slide is dismantled, the question of what will remain of this summer bubbles up through the water.

Lina Dinkla

Łukasz dreams of becoming a professional boxer. His mother Monika supports him as much as she can. But the fact that this means he has to move to a sport boarding school over 500 kilometres away is something she can’t fathom. For who will do his washing there and make sure that he turns up to training on time? For Łukasz, the move is a step towards independence, but also a test of his abilities among like-minded people. Between hard training, new friendships and first love, the boarding school doesn’t just become a springboard for his sporting career, but also the place where he comes of age. Over five years, Adam Roszkowski accompanies his taciturn protagonist on his way to the Polish junior championships. In a blend of observation and discreet staging, everyday training routines, family moments and a first date come together to form a narrative that is so close to its characters that the documentary format almost melts into the background. Entirely indebted to the principle of show, don’t tell, “Growing Up” also gives an account of the dedication needed for competitive sport and the price it carries as well as of the silent battles needed to go one’s own way.

Tina Jany

The mother’s film archive raises questions. What did she see in the many doll’s faces staring at us through her camera? Why so many shots of flowers? When she herself is in the picture, she is always moving. Was she trying to get away from something? The narrator wants to find their own motifs. But where? It is easy for the mother to say: Film your own reality! Sounds great, but how, when you feel that you are different? As the material is questioned, more and more own images find their way into the film. Integrating themselves. Perhaps they ask the same questions of the world.

Jan Künemund

They develop software, work as lifestyle coaches, own marketing agencies or an Amazon shop, travel around the world without paying for accommodation: digital nomads for whom a laptop on a suitcase is sometimes enough of a workplace. Some of their aspirations fall by the wayside in the process and become the project of an enterprising Munich-based developer: Mathias is courting rootless individualists and clever investors to become backers of a project that is to turn a deserted former luxury hotel in the Bulgarian mountains into a hip coworking space. He promises a sense of community, intense human connections and few taxes, an outdoor pool and a campfire idyll. While the nomads who dream of home are waiting for the utopia to become reality, the residents of the surrounding villages sense a new “Wind of Change” with some scepticism. A brilliant structural analysis of a business model that capitalises on modern longings and knows how to carve out the necessary space.

Jan Künemund

Sisters Nazieh, Shazieh and Hanieh are from Afghanistan and live with their father at a refugee camp in Athens without any idea of how long they will stay there. Their mother has already arrived in Germany, where a new law now prevents the family from reuniting there as planned. They start growing up in a situation where waiting is the norm. The film accompanies the trio over seven years and shows the fragile normality they establish separately and together in the face of adversity: sport training sessions, language classes and shooting their own film scenes, which are marked by their experiences as refugees. Educator and filmmaker Christos Stefanou got to know the three sisters at the refugee camp, where he worked for five years as a teacher. Aware of the vulnerability of their situation and this phase in life, he follows a collaborative approach in his first feature-length documentary. Drawing on close-up observation, he captures the three sisters’ gestures, thoughts and everyday routines, which reveals their developmental steps and the passing of time not just in physical terms. And while their learning successes sometimes lose any meaning in the face of their constantly changing life situation, one essential question remains: will the family manage to get back together despite all the imponderabilities?

Tina Jany