Arne Birkenstock

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Schlager is the stalwart of German pop culture and emerges stronger from every modernization crisis. But what are the stories behind the flawless backdrop of the German Schlager world? What makes Schlager stars true artists and German songs a perennial commercial success? The 90-minute documentary "Deutschland Schlagerland" goes in search of the personal stories behind the music, travels to provincial stages and big cities, talks to producers and performers. The aim is no less than to explain and understand the social and cultural phenomenon of "Schlager" in its entirety.

What would Jesus preach in the 21st century? Who would his disciples be? And how would today's society respond to the return of the Son of God? With The New Gospel, Milo Rau is staging a "Revolt of Dignity". Led by political activist Yvan Sagnet, the movement is fighting for the rights of migrants who came to Europe across the Mediterranean to be enslaved on the tomato fields in southern Italy and to live in ghettos under inhumane conditions.

Wolfgang Beltracchi got away with forging art masterpieces for over 40 years. He may be egotistical and nihilistic, but his genius in undeniable. He managed to fool gallery owners, historians and investors with the stroke of a brush. This documentary follows his last days as a free man.

Observational documentary about people as refugees and asylum seekers in many geographical locations such as Germany, Brazil, Western Sahara, Myanmar, Cuba, South Sudan.

Chandani wants to become a Mahout as her father. Her father decides to give her a chance and gives her responsibility for an elephant calf. Chandani is a girl in a male profession. Everyone doubts her abilities. The ranger Mohammed becomes her only supporter and shows her the world of elephants in the jungle. Here they save an elephant baby from its death. Strengthened by this, she makes progress in the work with her little elephant Kandula. But when Kandula is taken away from her, also her path changes.

An inter-caste couple from India that had to break with their families in order to get married, a Japanese couple that was forced to marry and struggles with love, a knobby german postwar couple and two gay men from the United States, who were only allowed to marry after five decades, solving the associated legal problems by adopting each other. They all open up about their relationships, which have all lasted, remarkably, longer than fifty years. In frank and funny interviews, each pair reflects on life before and beyond the moments that brought them together, and how they’ve grown as partners.

In March 2013, a courtroom was set up to provide a stage for a show trial that pitted the different sides of the cultural war in Russia. Yet the people on stage were no professional thespians but real-life actors: artists, politicians, church leaders, real lawyers, a real judge and a real jury. Director Milo Rau achieved a unique and oppressive insight into Russia under Putins authoritarian reign.

Philipp Jedicke’s second feature documentary presents itself as a cineast eulogy for the Viennese pop scene as a curious and heterogeneous bunch with an extremely idiosyncratic radiance.

Tracing a decade of East German football, survivors of the Cold War tell a story of betrayal, murder, and manipulation in a revealing insight into how the Stasi secret police saw football as more than a game.

In the musical road movie, New Zealand musician Hayden Chisholm sets out on a journey of discovery across Germany in search of German folk music. As a stranger with an unbiased view of German culture and an open ear for the lyrics and melodies of modern and traditional musicians, he encounters a lively diversity of regional customs and activities. In Sound of Heimat – Deutschland singt, directors Arne Birkenstock and Jan Tengeler also shed light on the ambivalent attitude toward folk music and the understanding of one's own homeland that is so widespread in Germany. These are topics that have been forgotten in many places due to past ideologization and the "ideal world" of the Musikantenstadl.

They have already lived for a century. They are great women who have turned the world they live in upside down with their female power. And they never tire of making plans for the future. They come from Cuba, Japan, Germany, America and Poland and with their fascinating life stories give a wonderful female perspective to a restless century.

The war in Congo has caused more than six million deaths over the last twenty years. The population is suffering, but the offenders stay with impunity. Many people see this conflict as one of globalisation's crucial econimic distribution battles because the country has major deposits of many high-tech raw materials. Milo Rau, one of Europe's most acclaimed theatre directors, succeeds in gathering victims, perpetrators, observes and analysts of the conflict for a unique civil tribunal in eastern Congo. The documentary film brings these spectacular court trials to life on the big screen and creates an unvarnished portrait of the largest and bloodiest economic wars in human history.

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