DOK Leipzig: Films for All Creatures

ISLAND OF THE HUNGRY GHOSTS (clip)
by Gabrielle Brady (DE, UK, AU 2018)
A category of its own, rightly winning awards from Tribeca to Edinburgh. So near-perfect it should be out of competition to leave room for the rest of this year's cohort. If you're up for an associative trip, you're in for one big mind-expanding allegory of and mediation on nature, migration, trauma, and spirit.

Another dreamy favourite:
DREAMAWAY (trailer)
by Marouan Omara and Johanna Domke (EG, DE 2018)
The Egyptian resort town of Sharm el Sheikh, seen from the perspective of young, entrepreneurial locals. Loveable, surreal, bizarre, melancholic, resilient, hopeful. Told in a beatiful hybrid of documentary and improv performance that comes to life and light through what is not there, post-terror, post-tourism, post-revolution. A FLORIDA PROJECT in doc form.

For anyone who can handle a lot of uncertainty, a wee bit of theoretical physics & a pinch of spirituality:
THE SYMPHONY OF UNCERTAINTY (trailer)
by Claudia Lehmann, Konrad Hempel (DE 2018)
A look at Hamburg's spaceship-like DESY particle accelerator lab, where Prof. Gerhard Mack --Germany's answer to Stephen Hawking-- lives out his love of complex systems and of finding answers to cosmic questions. The opposite of a boring science doc, a playful, nearly mystical exploration of the meaning of life --and the importance of facts today--, underscored by an experimental music group creating "The Symphony of Uncertainty" around and out of the lab. One of the festival's most unusual and enjoyable films.

For anyone who knows loss:
BREATHING LIFE INTO STONE (German trailer)
by Katinka Zeuner (DE 2018)
Made with zero public funding, one of the best-received films at DOK Leipzig 2018, a tender story of art and grieving, circling a Berlin (grave) stonemason who uses his craft to help people heal. Transcendental, empathic, comforting, pan-human. The Goethe-Institut jury at Dok Leipzig liked it so much that we gave it an Honorary Mention in our awards decision.

For anyone who has a mother, knows a mother, is a mother, wants to be a mother, or not:
(M)OTHER (trailer)
by Antonia Hungerland (DE 2018)
What makes a mother, what makes a good mother, does everyone need a mother? "Family forests," as one gay dad calls them in the film, from Berlin to London, Ontario, from a "bad" single mother to a polyamorous German gay trio with two adopted black kids, from a Canadian surrogate to a critical sociologist(-mother -- the filmmaker's, who in turn ponders lesbian motherhood with her wife).

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UNA PRIMAVERA (trailer)
by Valentina Primavera (AT, DE, IT 2018)
A radically frank and utterly absorbing rapprochement by the Italian-German filmmaker to her mother's attempt to separate from her husband. Candid camera, Italian family style, an alternative version of GLORIA.

If you want to see Western society's non-future:
LORD OF THE TOYS (trailer)
by Pablo Ben Yakov (DE 2018)
A bleak, utterly hermetic look at a jaded/radicalized No Future youtuber subculture, here set in East Germany. The Leipzig premiere created a public controversy amidst the discussion of whether (far-right) fire starters should be given a cinematic platform and how films with controversial protagonists and themes should be contextualised (see Errol Morris and Steve Bannon).

If you can want to dig deeper into the allure of extremism:
EXIT (trailer)
by Karen Winther (NO, DE, SE 2018)
An ugly and revealing but still relatable look at what makes young people become (far left/far right/islamist ...) extremists -- and how to get out. The filmmaker herself is a "former," going on an extraordinary international journey to investigate and weave some answers together and continue to work on her own feelings of guilt, shame, pain, and gratefulness to the people who helped her. The Goethe-Institut jury at Dok Leipzig liked it so much that we awarded it the Goethe Doc Prize.

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CHRIS THE SWISS (trailer)
by Anja Kofmel (CH, DE, HR, FI 2018)
See above, but here a sister --as writer-director-camerawoman-illustrator-- traces her late Swiss journalist/mercenary brother's appropriation of the Balkan Wars to satisfy his extremist cravings. An outstanding example of a hybrid animated docs in the tradition of Joshua Oppenheimer's THE ACT OF KILLING or Marc Wiese's CAMP 14.

War is stupid, from all angles:
STRESS (trailer)
by Florian Baron (DE, US 2018)
Visually powerful (from exquisite slo-mo to sweeping drone scenes of cityscapes) and engagingly told exploration of US veterans in Pittsburgh and their struggles with PTSD, reintegration, family life, and making sense of their experiences.

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THE WAR ON MY PHONE (trailer)
by Elke Sasse (DE 2018)
How Syrian refugees in Germany see the war back home through their screens and stay connected and engaged to help family, raise money, give comfort, free prisoners, and affect change in their homeland, far away so close.

If you're interested in globalization & social justice & the effects of hyper-capitalism:
IN THE CLAWS OF A CENTURY WANTING (trailer)
by Jewel Maranan (DE, PH, QA 2017)
One big sweeping (2hr+) look at how Manila slum dwellers are displaced by global development, and how they fight for their rights and their chosen environment. A vibrating panorama of David vs. Goliath.

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THE PRICE OF PARADISE
by Bettina Borgfeld (DE 2018)
The German filmmaker went into a different kind of danger zone to explore a sad and scary David vs. Goliath story: The Channel Island of Sark, long a (feudal) rural "utopia" of a small and friendly community living in peace and solidarity, is seeing their lifestyle and worldview swept away in the hostile takeover by two British "ultra high net worth individuals," the Barclay brothers, who go to extreme measures to end life as Sarkees know it. A cautionary tale of an annexed microcosmos that stands in pars pro toto for our world today, from fake news and propaganda to buy-outs and corporate threats.

If you like social observation in the best German tradition:
THE WAIT
by Karin Becker (DE 2018)
Three people about to go to jail coming to terms with change and disruption beyond their control, pondering decisions big (what to tell the kids) and small (how many bras do you need to pack for a 4-year sentence?). Quiet, heartbreaking without judgment.

For the film nerd:
LIVING THE LIGHT – ROBBY MUELLER (trailer)
by Claire Pijman (NL, DE 2018)
Wim Wenders, Jim Jarmusch, Lars von Trier and other grateful collaborators paying detailed homage to the great late DOP master of light, with lots of clips and personal footage.

For the computer nerd:
ALL CREATURES WELCOME (trailer)
by Sandra Trostel (DE 2018)
Amid all the dystopia, a colourful look at the (largely) utopian (and largely male) world of digital peaceniks. A transmedia game of "hacking as a mindset."

by Jutta Brendemühl

image: still courtesy ALL CREATURES WELCOME by Sandra Trostel