Filmgalerie 451

Germany, 1945. Soldier Willi Herold, a deserter of the German army, stumbles into a uniform of a Nazi captain abandoned during the last and desperate weeks of the Third Reich. Newly emboldened by the allure of a suit that he has stolen only to stay warm, Willi discovers that many Germans will follow the leader, whoever he is.

Twenty-year old Naomi lives a simple life with her younger siblings in Peru. Only her big sister seems to live a life of fortune, being married in Germany. But now she is dead, murdered by her German husband. Stunned by the news, Naomi can’t imagine accompanying her mother to Germany, the land of the crime. But then she changes her mind, becomes a joint plaintiff, and takes part in the trial in Berlin.

Originally conceived as a film about 9/11, Richard Wagner, and the warrior Hagen von Tronje, to be shot in the German southwest African colony of Lüderitz, Namibia, The African Twin Towers instead turned into an unusually personal and absorbing documentary about an incomplete film and Schlingensief’s art in general.

Following a protest against deforestation, a masked activist falls into a ravine. Injured and stranded, she wanders through the forest until she discovers an isolated commune, whose masked inhabitants are seeking an alternative to the failed German state.

Charo seems like a typical Berlin teenager. She's a student surrounded by good friends and has her eye on the coolest guy in school. But no one knows that Charo has been living in Germany illegally for years, not even her best friend Laura. Problems start to arise when Charo's mother is caught by the police and wants to take Charo back to Columbia. Charo now needs to trust Laura with her secret because it's the only way she'll be able to fight for her future in Germany.

Using rich archive material, this documentary looks back at Christoph Schlingensief and his cross-border art project for the 1998 Bundestag elections.

The film juxtaposes/compares two museums: The Museum of Art, Ein Harod, Israel, which Samuel Bickels (1909-1975) built there in 1948, and The Menil Collection in Houston, Texas, built by Renzo Piano (b. 1937) 1986 . The method of natural lighting in Bickels‘s construction was the direct model for Piano, who adopted for his construction at the request of its patroness Dominique de Menil.

As stated in the opening titles and at the end Freakstars 3000 is supposed to be a commentary on the problems of the non-disabled people. The more I was shocked about how the disabled were depicted in this film the more I started to realize that in every non-disabled TV counterpart of this show (German TV shows like "Popstars" or "Friedmann" or the home shopping channels) its mentally "non-handicapped" participants are treated in a completely identical way: The total prostitution of the mind in front a huge TV audience at the expense of one's most important gifts one should hang on to: dignity. On the other hand one could completely understand people who are furious about "exploiting" these handicapped persons. But that's what Schlingensief's works are all about: shock people and don't care about those who cannot or will not try to get the message (if there is one).

Dane, a driver for an NGO in N’Djamena (capital of Chad), has the misfortune to run over a schoolboy. His pregnant wife runs to his aid to pay the hospital bills, but it’s too late: the child succumbs to his injuries, and his family summons Dane’s. He will be subjected to the diya, the blood debt, the payment of an exorbitant sum he doesn’t have.

Rome in 65 AD, Emperor Nero's tyrannical regime has reached its zenith, Nero's self-indulgence and excessiveness brings up the opposition against him, conspiracies threaten his power. By all means Nero tries to defend his despotic claim of sovereignty. The famous philosopher Seneca has been Nero's teacher, mentor and close advisor since childhood, he is significantly involved in his ascent. Nevertheless, Nero gets weary of Seneca and Nero uses a foiled attack on his life to falsely accuse Seneca of being an accomplice.

Interview with Christoph Schlingensief on his films. Including many film clips.

The true story of Otomo, a black man seeking work and asylum in the German city of Stuttgart. However, all he finds is racism, police trouble and his final destiny.

Ecology, equality, sustainability: Anita and Sarah pursue lofty political goals as they establish a new feminist party. By contrast, the men who are infected by a new type of virus tend to have less honorable intentions. The consequences: sexual obsession, molestation, and death. Urgent effort is put into developing a vaccine. But should the male sex be saved at all?

Werner Schroeter was one of the most significant proponents of New German Cinema. Schroeter was diagnosed with cancer in 2006. In her film, Elfi Mikesch, who photographed a number of Schroeter’s films and who collaborated closely with him to create his vision, provides us with an intimate insight into Schroeter’s artistic output during the remaining four years of his life.

Christoph Schlingensief puts an end to the misery of "new German film production" and at the same time kicks off a new start without stale romanticism and mysticism.

A film director confides in his interlocutor. He talks about the working process, about creative blocks, about artistic crises and expressive forces. At some point, the idea takes hold that this conversation could be turned into a film. And this is the very film we’re watching the two of them in.

In April of 2013, American singer Patti Smith travels to the grave of French writer Jean Genet in Larache, Morocco. She brings him three stones, which she collected for him over 30 years ago.

In the 21st part of his Photography and beyond series, Heinz Emigholz projects as usual a series of structures into our brains and from there on to the screen: Airports, motorways and bus stops; department stores, market halls and warehouses.

Contemporary cinema’s preeminent chronicler of architecture and its intersection with the ever-present crisis of 20th-century modernity, Heinz Emigholz returns with an alternately mournful and sly treatise on how the presence—and, in some cases, absence—of municipal and communal building architecture is inseparable from capitalist ideology. Focusing mainly on cities and provinces in Argentina, Germany, and Bolivia, Emigholz’s latest film is a work of quiet observation and historical excavation. From slaughterhouses in Salamone to the flooded former spa city of Epecuén to the newly built Humboldt Forum in Berlin, the film demonstrates the effect of capital on public spaces, where creation and destruction go hand in hand, and as always, Emigholz makes the journey one of intellectual force and cinematic beauty.

The gritty, kinetic, visionary cinema of Roland Klick is ripe for rediscovery. After shooting with international stars, such as Mario Adorf and Dennis Hopper, Klick celebrated international success and achieved cult status. Yet after making only six features, he disappeared from the scene in a rather mysterious way. The story of an uncompromising film maniac.