German Film @ Canada - Goethe-Institut

Thank you to our loyal Akin fans old and new, who came out to 6 films over 3 nights in Toronto these past 8 days. Now that our Fatih Akin retrospective is over, let me tell you what you didn't see (just because Fatih makes too many good movies):


SENSIN - YOU'RE THE ONE! (1995)
Right off the bet, Fatih's first won the Audience Award at the International Short Film Festival Hamburg in 1996. He wrote, directed and starred in the short comedy "Sensin".
The story:
Kubilei, a young Hamburg Turk, knows exactly what his dream woman is like: She loves Marlboro, punk and Robert de Niro. And she has to be Turkish...
(Can you tell it's 1995 from the picture quality?) Continue reading "8 Akin Films We Didn't Show You" »

It’s been four years since “Soul Kitchen” and Fatih Akin at TIFF, and with his new (Alberta-shot…) film in post-production, it’s time to celebrate the first German director since 1986 to win the Berlin Film Festival in 2004.

We're happy to present a comprehensive Fatih Akin Retrospective in our ongoing program GOETHE FILMS at Toronto’s TIFF Bell Lightbox, spanning a decade of his work. The retro is celebrating the 40th birthday this year of one of the most outstanding and daring contemporary German filmmakers over 3 nights, including his international hits “Head-On” and “Edge of Heaven”.

One very special treat in the series: Our screening of his musical Istanbul hommage "Crossing the Bridge" will be preceded by a live presentation by singer Brenna MacCrimmon (Toronto/Istanbul), who stars in the film, and Toronto post-traditional percussionist Debashis Sinha.


All 35mm! See it while you can (and enter your ticket stub each night for your chance to win an original Akin movie poster, courtesy of our friends at German Films).

Email me until October 13 and tell me how you heard about our retro for your chance to win tickets... Continue reading "GOETHE FILMS: Akin Retrospective -- WIN!" »

Born in Germany in 1928 and resident in Argentina since her childhood, Narcisa Hirsch is a pivotal figure in Latin American experimental cinema. Despite her strong-willed individualism, she views filmmaking as a profoundly social practice, having collaborated with an informal collective of Latin American key filmmakers strongly supported and fostered by the Goethe-Institut Buenos Aires and now referred to as El Grupo Goethe. Free Screen at TIFF Cinematheque and the Goethe-Institut Toronto have invited Narcisa Hirsch for a special two-night retrospective (June 13 + 15) programmed by California College of the Arts scholar Federico Windhausen and a first encounter with Michael Snow. I sat down with Narcisa on her first day in Toronto -- one of the highlights of my film year.


Jutta Brendemühl: Argentinian dictator Jorge Rafael Videla just died. How do you, as someone who has lived through his regime, feel about that, over 30 years later?

Narcisa Hirsch: At the time it wasn’t explicit but it’s becoming clearer now: a civil war was going on in Argentina. Argentina has always had one party set against another, Peron against the non-Peronistas, the military against the militantes or guerillas or Montoneros. Videla was not especially a friend of mine. But I think that it would help Argentinians if they could recognize the historical continuity since the 19th century, because we still have that idea of two groups, the bad ones and the good ones and their ideologies. Continue reading "Narcisa Hirsch & El Grupo Goethe" »

Dear Romuald Karmakar,

With 19 “clips” over 19 days, with protagonists ranging from animals at Berlin Zoo to neo Nazis on Alexanderplatz, I was surprised but happy to hear you are one of four artists, alongside Germany's favourite Ai Wei Wei (and his mother), to animate the German Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale starting tomorrow –or rather the French Pavilion, as both countries have traded places again this year, harking back to the first post-war Biennale. But that shouldn’t matter to you as a multi-hyphenated German-French-Iranian writer-director-producer of feature films and docs anyway. I was a bit worried about what kind of shot you would be given at the grandiose art spectacle when Deutschlandfunk radio commented on your inclusion in Susanne Gaensheimer's curation: "The film community ignores this honour, the art world is irritated. As usual, Romuald Karmakar polarizes." Continue reading "To Romuald Karmakar, c/o Venice Biennale" »