Hammer and compass in Mozambique. We see a GDR flag waved at a rally in Maputo, carried by "Madgermanes", contract workers who once toiled in eastern Germany. Some of them founded families there, like Eulidio. His daughter Sarah grows up with her mother in Berlin. The relationship with her "second home" is slow in growing, partly thanks to Luana, Sarah's baby, whose father, Eduardo is also from Mozambique.
Berlin-Kreuzberg. Kenan's big day has arrived. The nine-year-old half-orphan is to be circumcised, following the millennia-old Muslim tradition. But before that, there is a party! During the party, which Kenan's father Ibrahim organises more for his own father than for his son, Kenan and Ibrahim are confronted with archaic traditions and the question: What does it actually mean to be a man?
A tiny parcel shop in Berlin, which sends packages to faraway loved ones, offers the city’s Georgian community a slice of home.
15-year-old Nike is torn between her wish of belonging to the cool clique around her friend Jess and individual autonomy, which to her is represented by her new friend Lea. When she takes Lea along to a party she does not know how to react to the competing friends - resulting in her not reacting at all. - The film deals with mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion the disorientation of young girls, whose identities are rather theatrically claimed then actually realized – a Brechtian teen drama.
In his costal village, Nemo is an outsider. With his diving suit and the huge helmet he looks different than everybody else and won't fit in. But his life is about to change when he meets Laika, an astronaut.
A group of men share a small space in a prison metal workshop in Botosani, Romania. When they’re not working, they animatedly discuss religion and hypocrisy, lament during tea that they don’t have onions for sausage, or joke and sing.
A woman who came to Tehran for a nose operation loses her wedding ring. While her husband is pursuing his hobbies and the employees search the hotel for the lost item, she finds the peace she was looking for.
Of my parents exactly one video tape remained. I found it after almost 20 years and I realized: My sister and me never have talked about our loss. We grew up with our grandparents in a Russian-German ghetto somewhere in rural Germany. I want to know what she feels. And I want her to know what I feel.
In the southern United States, two young women meet by chance in the back of a police car and, without saying a word, experience the injustice hovering above them.
A short magical realism dance film explores the quirky personalities and awkward encounters that one only finds in a nail salon.
A 27-year-old Indonesian, Tim, is having a family vacation with both of his parents on a remote island far from the city, where they learn about the myth of a reincarnated deer that exists somewhere along the beach. Island locals believe that seeing the deer is a sign of meeting one’s soulmate. Tim is the only one who secretly hoping to discover the deer, hiding his desire from his very devout Christian parents.
In this hand-painted and drawn animation, a lonely old man fishes his dreams from the moon's reflection. Looking inside them, he faces surreal and devastating nightmares until a spiritual discovery frees him from all illusions.
They were born and raised on a small island amidst a vast natural landscape - four sisters who now live in cities. Their parents have left Germany to raise their children far from consumerism and external control. On a visit back to the island, the sisters bring along some of the pace and concerns of our world today.
Deaf dancer Kassandra Wedel flips the switch on expectations of sound and movement as she conducts her own piece, using patterns and rhythms from her urban environment. Closed captions and choreography serve as the source of the music, with her band interpreting her dancing and not the other way around, to pose a unique challenge to the viewer's perception of hearing and sound perspective.
Night after night, an unsuspecting woman is visited in her sleep by a demon.
The Vietnamese Nghi has a bad feeling as she sees the foreign Chinese groom for the first time on the day of her daughter’s wedding. Nghi and Phuong decided that the 17 years old should get married to relieve the family of their debts. But then, the bride disappears after the ceremony and the mother faces the decision what she is ready to give for her family's happiness.
If you were a dog in outer space what would you do? The story unfolds in the depths of space: On a weird planet the dogs live as they please, but are confronted with their willful surroundings.
Twelve-year-old Frida is almost blind; she can only make out contours, shadows and colors. At the same time, she can "see" much more than other people. She believes that with the energy we all have within us, we can achieve things that we thought were impossible. In Dear Darkness, we see how she puts this into practice. Frida is lovingly encouraged by her parents, whom we see in the background as they invite her to experience a sculpture or go swimming with her. Frida has an entirely unique view of the world, from which she occasionally takes a distance so she can listen, feel and think. To do so she seeks out complete darkness, because only if there are no visual stimuli can she find peace. In this way, she hardly differs from her sighted peers-and this is why part of the film takes place in the dark.
Ring is an experimental 16mm short film. It is composed by 20 shots of 30 seconds each, of landscapes and situations following the 35,7 km of the Berlin S-Bahn Ring. An hypnotic flow of fixed shots will transform the experience of observation of the journey only through the internal rhythm, textures and composition of the shots, and where the main subject matter will be time and the present as a symbol of itself.
