Documentary film has always had an important place in the cinematic landscape. Commercial successes like michael moore's "fahrenheit 9/11" works or "the journey of the penguins" of the french antarctic explorer luc jacquet made the genre public. But even in the short time of about ten minutes, it succeeds in effectively depicting aspects and actual events. The first role in the documentary film competition at the bamberger kurzfilmtage was a testament to this. "From searching and finding" was the overriding motto of the five cinematic entries.
"One in two" the title already reveals that the protagonists are double personalities. Producer jan mocka and director lilian nix researched the transvestite environment and documented the lives of normal men – and their parallel lives as women. We see the protagonists shopping for shoes and handbags, dive with them into the nightlife of rough metropolises, but also learn about their everyday work during the week. The makers have succeeded in portraying home-made conflicts, the search for living out one's own personality between publicity and privacy, the renunciation of "normality" partnerships, the difficult accord with prejudices.
Carmen butta observes in "akram and the wall in the sea an eleven-year-old fisherman at his daily work in the sea off gaza. She succeeded in creating a vivid reportage of a young man who, caught in his fate in many ways, is searching for his place in life. As a teenage breadwinner of his family caught in the difficult task, as an adolescent in the narrow confines of palastina, which are also found in the sea off the gaza strip.
Alina cyranek's film "scenes of a farewell" made a very powerful and moving contribution. She watched the rehearsals of a female senior theater group, who defied the approaching death and farewell to life with incredible playfulness and joy. The director herself grew up without any grandparents, and this explains her soft spot for old people and their life stories: "old women can tell you so much!"
Not a propaganda film
Jan Mocka provided similarly powerful insights with his portrait of two missionaries of the mormon church "jesus abroad", when he shows the meticulous rituals, the strict rules and commandments of the community, but also the unshakeable courage to live and the contentment of the young men. "But that's also the dangerous thing about the search: it's so open that you can quickly get sucked into it, mocka explained afterwards the problems with the shooting. He also faced the accusation from the audience of "a propaganda film" to have filmed, exposed. He disagreed, pointing to individual scenes in which the two missionaries also gave very convenient and inadequate answers to critical inquiries. And he added: "maybe we should have asked a few more dropouts whether they are still so happy and satisfied afterwards."
The berlin media artist marion pfaus, artist by the name of "rigoletti," takes a completely different approach to documentary film. Your three-minute "berlin disaster" irritated the audience with an obvious lack of documentary character. She was also looking for the missing star for roland emmerich on the boulevard of stars in berlin. Why roland emmerich? "We have in common that we can make good films with little money", pfaus revealed with a wink.
With a wink
This wink is her trademark in different dimensions. Ironically, strongly satirical and exaggerating, she takes everyday life to task. In most cases, this also has a serious background. As in the case of their actionism for "pro-quote-regie", a campaign to increase the visibility of women in the film business. Why does it need a quote? "Because women are actually disadvantaged. I've never really been interested in that, because i think i would actually make my films the same way if i were a man," she revealed, she revealed in a conversation the afternoon before the competition. But the campaign is also about not portraying feminism as mean-spirited or even hostile to men.
And so pfaus stages red-carpet interviews during the berlinale, taking the grain out of common cliches and stereotypes about women and men. "The 'pro-quote' is not about women's films being better and more interesting. It's simply a matter of everyone getting an equally large slice of the cake. For example, female directors don't get into television series at all. That liked the action others." The documentary film can also be actionistic.
The organizers of the short film days proved (and prove with the second role on today's saturday) a competent hand in the selection of the films. And also show in the 25. Year the first-class quality of the bamberger festival.
