Blanka Daneluk

In this four part episodic film, young people from Rostock live through a day of setbacks, secrets and revelations.

This hyper-intersectional film is an amalgam of sci-fi creature-flick, campy music video, grotesque comedy, agitprop flick against heterocentric research as well as (soft-)pornographic subversive statement. "FUDLIAKS! Tear the sexes apart!" is set in an undefined present, in a mysterious laboratory: the Institute for Gender Normalization. The research subject of this neo-conservative think tank: the scientific underpinnings of conventional heteronormative bodies and biologically binary genders. But a new research series turns all that on its head!

As the day of the family photo approaches, panic sets in because there's something the family doesn't know yet: Barbara is Berry and non-binary. What's more, the long hair that her parents always loved is now gone. The image of their daughter in a floral dress hasn't really been Berry for a long time, or perhaps never was. Except that one time a year, for the sake of Mom and Dad. The family gathering becomes a nightmare, and coming out feels like holding a sword of Damocles over Berry's head, with the implication of "always having to be different..." hanging over them. The film takes us on a journey of identity and embodiment, constantly torn between anxiety and finding a sense of belonging within the community. —Julia Sprenger