Press Release – 24 November 2024

exground filmfest 37: Presenting This Year’s Prize Winners

DAS IST KEINE FIGUR, DAS IST VERRAT wins GERMAN SHORT FILM COMPETITION // TWENTYTИƎWT is Best International Short Film // GOTTESKINDER Receives Multiple Awards at exground youth days // Audience Award DAS BRETT in the MADE IN GERMANY Section Goes to THE WITNESS

Yesterday, Saturday evening, in the scope of a festive awards ceremony, the winners of the competitions at exground filmfest 37 were revealed. Following the final tallying of the audience voting, the awards ceremony kicked off at Caligari FilmBühne with film guests, jury members, prize sponsors and award presenters in attendance. In total, exground filmfest awarded cash and non-cash prizes valued at nearly 20,000 euros.

German Short Film Competition

This year’s first prize in the German Short Film Competition, determined by the audience, went to DAS IST KEINE FIGUR, DAS IST VERRAT by Romina Küper. The award is endowed with prize money in the amount of 3,000 euros, sponsored by the State Capital of Wiesbaden. Second place, endowed with 2,000 euros by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V., went to HAI LATTE by Carsten Strauch, while third prize, also endowed with 1,000 euros in prize money by the State Capital of Wiesbaden, went to GETTY ABORTIONS by Franzis Kabisch.

Feature Film Competition for DAS BRETT in the MADE IN GERMANY Section

In the feature film audience competition in the MADE IN GERMANY section, THE WITNESS by Nader Saeivar was honoured with DAS BRETT and 3,000 euros in prize money.

Amnesty International Wiesbaden Film Award

Alongside the traditional awards, this year exground filmfest was thrilled to present the inaugural edition of the Amnesty International Wiesbaden Film Award, endowed with 1,000 euros in prize money, to the best film in the Thematic Focus on Flight and Expulsion. The award goes to Muriel Cravatte’s film MOTHERSHIP, which accompanies the Ocean Viking off the coat of Libya and shows how international helpers rescue refugees from the sea. In the words of the jury: “The film represents an important contribution towards raising awareness of the urgent problem of sea rescue and preventing fatalities in the Mediterranean. In an exciting and gripping manner, it depicts the work of the helpers and the fate of the rescued.”

The festival’s opening film, Boris Lojkine’s THE STORY OF SOULEYMANE, was honoured with a Special Mention. The jury shared the following statement: “The film relates two days in the life of the African-born bicycle deliveryman Souleyman, as he prepares for his asylum hearing. The camera follows him while he rides his bike. Souleymane gives the many individuals of the anonymous mass of refugees a face. As viewers, we become deeply immersed in his fate and his world as he experiences it. This made a profound impression on us.”

International Short Film Competition

In the International Short Film Competition, the International Jury selected TWENTYTИƎWT by Max Hattler as the winning film. The prize money in the amount of 2,000 euros is sponsored by the exground Circle of Friends. Jury members Nina Friemann, Jutta Wille and Marko Stojiljković explained their choice with the following words: “When we see individuals, we don’t see the whole picture. When we see the whole picture, it is only a busy picture puzzle composed of individual humans. We live crowded close together in big cities, but we are alone, alienated – and the sounds that we make end up part of a collective murmuring. For his clearly structured study of our contemporary society, we have chosen to honour Max Hattler for his film TWENTYTИƎWT.”

A Special Mention goes to Natálie Durchanková for her film RISING ABOVE “for a very moving, brave and powerful film, with which she finds a self-determined way to overcome a traumatic experience”, as the jury explained in its statement.

Wiesbaden Special – Short Film Competition

In the audience competition for best Wiesbaden short film, GESENDET by Moritz Pähler came out on top. Pähler won both the cash prize of 500 euros sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. and the non-cash prize package worth 1,000 euros from LiveFrame Rental, for the provision of lighting and dolly equipment. In the words of the jury: “Alongside other strong submissions such as CROSSROADS and KLOPF, KLOPF, we were impressed by the timely nature of the subject matter and Moritz’ excellent realization. With our selection, we would additionally like to show that films that are not perfectly executed from a technical perspective – which is our focus as an equipment rental firm – also always have a chance here and are in a sense pre-destined for this of all awards.”

exground Gong Show

In the scope of the cult-classic competition for trashy treasures and amateur works, Toni Meštrović was honoured for SCREAM – Meštrović took home the “Golden exground Cucumber” and the accompanying 50 euros cash prize.

exground youth days – International Youth Film Competition 

The Youth Jury in the International Youth Film Competition gave this year’s Award for Best Feature Film to GOTTESKINDER by German director Frauke Lodders: “Frauke Lodders has created a haunting and courageous feature film that explores the tension between faith, societal expectations and personal freedom. The story of Hannah and Timotheus, who grow up in a strict free-church evangelical family, harbours profound conflicts – from romantic feelings that are considered impure to manipulation by religious structures. The characters are initially stereotypes caught up in the constraints that dominate their religious community who develop their own distinct sense of depth and vitality in the moments where they are most torn. They both find themselves in a state of existential crisis when they can no longer reconcile their personal feelings with the rules of the community. The visual realisation is impressive, thanks to the carefully crafted image composition, which reflects the isolated world of the protagonists in a very authentic way. The creative staging and in-depth development of the characters combine to form a film with a powerful narrative that makes the viewer think.”

The jury also awarded a Special Mention to the Lithuanian film TOXIC by Saulė Bliuvaitė. According to the jury: “We were impressed by both the subject matter – toxic feminine beauty standards and the willingness to engage in self-harm in an attempt to fulfil them – and the cinematic means employed here. The nostalgic mood and highly striking images as well as the sound design enable viewers to experience the protagonists’ lives from the inside, including the reality of seemingly inescapable poverty.”

The winning film of this year’s short film competition in the scope of exground youth days is YARÊ by Sallar Othman from Austria. The jury members chose to honour YARÊ because, in their words, “it portrays and addresses issues that are too often ignored and misunderstood from a Western perspective. With a documentary-like feel, the film introduces us to a foreign environment full of dust and heat. In small details and wide shots, it masterfully depicts the effects of water shortage on a girl and her family – as well as the political realities at the root cause of the water shortage. However, the film shows these serious problems without making an appeal to the audience’s capacity for empathy. The film doesn’t want our pity – instead its open ending stands more as a symbol that people will never give up fighting.” The award is endowed with 500 euros in prize money, sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V..

The jury also gave a Special Mention to the short fiction film A SUMMER’S END POEM by Chinese director Lam Can-zhao. In the jury’s words: “Its aesthetic shots of the Chinese landscape are melancholic and striking. The film tells the simple yet haunting story of a boy in search of individuality. Instead of relying on unnecessary dialogue, this film tells its story almost exclusively via creative and original cinematography. With its calm and atmospheric approach to storytelling, A SUMMER’S END POEM is a film that remains etched in the viewer’s mind and impresses with its bold creative choices.”

The Audience Award in the scope of exground youth days also went to GOTTESKINDER by German filmmaker Frauke Lodders. The winner receives prize money in the amount of 1,000 euros, sponsored by the State Capital of Wiesbaden.

exground youth days – Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition

In the Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition, Amélie Limberg came out on top with her short fiction film HERO ACADEMY – THE OFFSPRING. First place comes with 500 euros in prize money, sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V.. TAKE CONTROL by Linus Nolte took second place, receiving a shopping voucher from the Apple Store ergo sum worth 200 euros. Both films were created in the scope of the Film Club at the IGS Kastellstraße.

Klappe 7 – Children’s Film Festival

In the scope of exground filmfest 37, Klappe 7 – Children’s Film Festival also took place once again. The short fiction film LITTY – ZUM FRESSEN GERN by Koriwi emerged as the winner here. WENN STREIT ZU WUNDERN FÜHRT by the BGS Ursula-Wölfel-Schule won the Audience Award.

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners!

ex37_Partners_and_Sponsors_2024.pdf

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Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com

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Press Release – 21 November 2024

exground filmfest 37: The second festival weekend features highlights from the Thematic Focus on Flight and Expulsion, exciting short film competitions, numerous film guests and the festive award ceremony.

Following six very successful festival days, exground filmfest is gradually approaching the finish line – but before the curtain closes, the second festival weekend still awaits, with further highlights and special guests. The film program kicks off Friday at 17:15 at Caligari FilmBühne with a screening of THE WITNESS by Nader Saeivar, a chilling cinematic reflection on the current state of an Iranian society characterised by state repression and brave resistance which is competing for the title of Best German Feature Film (and 3,000€ in prize money) in the festival’s Made in Germany section. Nader Saeivar will be on hand for a Q&A following the screening.

International Short Film Competition – Part II, German Short Film Competition and Award Ceremony

On Friday at 19:30, we are presenting part two of the International Short Film Competition. A further 8 of the 17 films featured here in total will join the battle for the Jury Award, which features a cash prize of 2,000 euros, sponsored this year by the exground Circle of Friends, as it has been annually since 2009. The winning film in the International Short Film Competition will be revealed during the festival award ceremony following the German Short Film Competition screening, which begins at 18:00 on Saturday. The latter again features ten shorties from a wide variety of styles and genres vying for awards worth a total of 6,000 euros. The fare here is humorous, thoughtful, provocative, experimental – leaving audience members with the agonizing choice of how to cast their three votes. And, of course, there’s the cherry on top: the special guests from the film crews, most of whom have already confirmed their intention to attend. Finally, we have a special festival treat for those who are unable to make it to one or both of the short film competitions: on Sunday, at 15:00, there will be a repeat screening of all the winners from our short film competitions on the big screen at Caligari FilmBühne – free of charge!

Focus on Flight and Expulsion: Films and Panel Discussion

The Focus program continues on Friday with a screening of Nicole Vögele‘s THE LANDSCAPE AND THE FURY at 16:30 in Murnau-Filmtheater – with the director herself in attendance. Vögele’s gripping film deals with the border zone between Bosnia and Croatia near the town of Velika Kladuša. Old military equipment stands in the woods, while the soaked passport photos of refugees lie on the fallen leaves. On their gruelling odyssey along the Balkan route, they pass through landscapes where demining teams are still clearing away the dangerous remnants of the wars of the 1990s. Back then, the violence in former Yugoslavia forced hundreds of thousands to flee.

Saturday’s programming continues at Murnau-Filmtheater with a panel discussion at 15:00 as part of this year’s Thematic Focus on Flight and Expulsion. Images of flight, expulsion and exile are omnipresent – whether in the news, on social media or in the cinema. But which perspectives and film forms break down stereotypes and power structures and create real counter-images to the brutalised discourse? Moderated by Amos Borchert, the panel includes director Robin Vanbesien (HOLD ON TO HER), Olha Beskhmelnytsina, producer of INTERCEPTED, and Han Nguyen-Chi, directorof INTO THE VIOLET BELLY.

The Focus short film program, featuring numerous film guests and portrayals of people who have been forced to flee, continues the investigation of this year’s theme at 17:00. These individuals have been displaced for instance by violence, hunger, persecution or climate change. They can be seen on rubber rafts in the sea, in an old camp or amid demining crews at the border. For some, these are just images. For many, they are realities of life.

The Best of European Cinema

The final festival weekend features screenings of three particularly worthwhile films from the European Cinema section. WHEN THE LIGHT BREAKS (showing at 19:30 in Murnau-Filmtheater) tells the story of a person who passed away far too young and how the living – shocked in their grief – attempt to cope with their loss. In addition, director Michael Schwarz and producer Alexander Griesser will be on hand for their supporting film KONDOR.

Directly after the screening, at 21:30, the German premiere of SIMA’S SONG will take place. Late-1970s Afghanistan, before the civil war: the ardent communist Suraya (from a wealthy family) and the conservative Muslim Sima (from a modest background) are best friends. But when Sima’s brother is killed by the Communist Party, their friendship is put to the test. Director Roya Sadat will also be on hand for the screening – accompanied by further members of the cast – to field audience members’ questions after the film.

In the intense coming-of-age thriller THREE KILOMETERS TO THE END OF THE WORLD, a teenager must overcome resistance from family, church and state power in order to finally live freely. A razor-sharp drama and stirring film experience that was awarded the “Queer Palm” in Cannes and will be entered into the 2025 Oscar race for Romania, showing this Saturday at Caligari FilmBühne, starting at 21:30.

Festival Conclusion and Matinée with Director Robin Vanbesien

The final day of exground filmfest 37 kicks off at noon this Sunday with a matinée at Caligari FilmBühne featuring a screening of HOLD ON TO HER with an appearance by special guest director Robin Vanbesien, a visual artist and filmmaker whose work explores modes of embodied knowledge and collective imagination engaged in social and political struggles. In conversation with curator Amos Borchert, he will talk, among other topics, about the thematic and aesthetic concepts behind HOLD ON TO HER, the concept of “ciné place-making” and “The Post Film Collective”, which Vanbesien co-founded.

The 37^th edition of exground filmfest concludes with a satirical masterpiece: RUMOURS (starting at 18:00). We have always suspected as much, of course, but our hunch is confirmed during dinner in the idyllic park at fictive Dankerode Castle: even top politicians are only human. Exhaustion, private problems and old affairs get in the way of productive work. The politicians are so distracted that they initially fail to notice that staff members and service personnel have disappeared. The film is also graced with a magnificent cast, featuring Cate Blanchett as a feisty German Chancellor and Charles Dance as a sleepy US President.

Tickets for the 37^th edition of exground filmfest are available online at www.exground.com, as well as through the exground filmfest app (which can be found here).

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners!

ex37_Partners_Sponsors_2024.pdf

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com

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exground filmfest Opens 37^th Edition with Numerous International Guests

This evening, exground filmfest will celebrate its opening in Wiesbaden in the presence of the city’s Head of Cultural Affairs Dr. Hendrik Schmehl and Karin Wolff, CEO of Kulturfonds Frankfurt RheinMain. Joined by a host of special local and international guests, the festival will be kicking off its 37^th edition at Caligari FilmBühne with a screening of the French film THE STORY OF SOULEYMANE (FR 2024), directed by Boris Lojkine. This haunting drama about a bicycle deliveryman in Paris – the exploited refugee Souleymane of the film’s title – is also a worthy start to this year’s thematic focus on flight and expulsion – even more so, as lead actor Abou Sangare has just recently been nominated for a European Film Award for his gripping performance.

exground filmfest recommends a look at the following overview to get an impression of the multi-faceted program that awaits over the coming festival days.

Program Highlights

On Saturday, 16 November, exground filmfest is showing Mahdi Fleifel‘s extraordinarily authentic thriller TO A LAND UNKNOWN (GB/FR/GR/NL/QA/SA 2024), which is set in Athens. Cousins Chatila and Reda pursue petty crime and sex work to scrape together some cash and obtain fake passports in order to continue their journey to Western Europe. Mahdi Fleifel has managed to create a compelling buddy movie about the melancholy nature of exile.

Johanné Gómez Terrero‘s SUGAR ISLAND (DO/ES 2024), an anti-racist, decolonial manifesto honoured with multiple awards in Venice, will give viewers the opportunity to immerse themselves in a spiritual world on Sunday, 17 November. Makenya, a Dominican-Haitian teenager who lives with her grandfather, an activist for workers’ pension rights, and her mother, a devotee of Afro-Dominican spirituality, in a community surrounded by sugar cane fields, is forced to grow up when she experiences an unwanted pregnancy. Editor Raúl Barreras will be on hand for the film screening.

Also screening on the second day of the weekend, fittingly, is the bittersweet comedy MOST PEOPLE DIE ON SUNDAYS (AR/IT/ES 2024), with director Iair Said in attendance. David, an overweight gay man in his mid-thirties who is afraid of flying, returns to Buenos Aires from Europe for his uncle’s funeral. When his mother reveals that she plans to switch off his father’s ventilator, he vacillates between the close bond he shares with her and the strong, perhaps selfish desire to overcome his existential fears.

On Monday, 18 November, Jannis Alexander Kiefer, who has previously been honoured at exground filmfest for several of his short films,will be making a return to the festival to present his quirky, magnificently cast feature-film debut. ANOTHER GERMAN TANK STORY (DE 2024) takes the audience to Wiesenwalde, where there is normally nothing going on – that is, until a Hollywood film crew shows up to shoot a series about the Second World War. The villagers chase their dreams, though a sudden power outage threatens to nix all of their plans and causes old stories to resurface.

The Iranian drama THE OLD BACHELOR (IR 2024), directed by Oktay Baraheni, will also be shown on Monday, with the film’s producer Hanif Sorouri in attendance. In an economically depressed Iran, two middle-aged brothers live with their tyrannical father. The man, prone to outbursts of rage and driven by male chauvinism, was left by his second wife, who he subjected to abuse. Now he bullies his eldest son, while the younger brother contemplates how he might be able to kill his father. A Greek tragedy in a modern guise.

Last but not least, Monday evening the beloved exground GONG SHOW is back again at Caligari FilmBühne – everyone is warmly invited to attend (admission is free!), whether with their own films or as fans of trashy cinema.

On Tuesday, 19 November, director Justine Bauer will personally present her work MILCH INS FEUER (DE 2024) and field questions from the audience. The film revolves around three generations of female farmers living under one roof. Anna is pregnant and thinking about castration, while Katinka, who wears her bikini in the milking parlour, may not be able to become a farmer at all. A summer spent on fading farms. Justine Bauer’s feature-film debut is more than just a drama shot in dialect, it is also a compelling tale of a life lived close to animals and nature – and of a young farmer searching for her own path between self-discovery and family tradition. Janis Schmidt, director of the supporting film ESSEN BESTELLEN (DE 2024), will also be making a guest appearance at Murnau-Filmtheater.

On Wednesday, 20 November, director Benjamin Pfohl will also be present for a Q&A following the screening of his film JUPITER (DE 2023). The comet is coming! At least that is what his film’s protagonists believe. 14-year-old Lea is torn from the life she’s accustomed to in a flash when her parents take her and her brother off to the mountains. Her family has become enmeshed in a cosmic cult promising salvation on a higher plane of existence on Jupiter. Little by little, Lea’s memories reveal her family’s struggle to find stability in life, while she is forced to choose between death and a life of self-determination on Earth. The star-studded debut film is based on the short film of the same name which won an award at exground filmfest in 2019.

Cinema fans should make sure not to miss Marcelo Gaetano‘s gripping drama BABY (BR/FR/NL 2024) on Wednesday. The director will also be participating in a Q&A. After his release from juvenile detention, Wellington finds himself alone on the streets of São Paulo. His parents have moved away without leaving any contact information, and he has neither a place to stay nor the money to build a new life. While frequenting an adult movie theatre, he meets Ronaldo, an older escort. The experienced hustler takes Wellington under his wing and introduces him to the ins and outs of the scene.

On Thursday, 21 November, Oksana Karpovych’s INTERCEPTED (CA/FR/UA 2024) takes the audience along to the warzones of Ukraine. A film talk with producer Olha Beskhmelnytsina will take place following the screening. A child on a swing, seemingly carefree and light, then burned-out tanks on the side of the road. Suddenly we hear voices in Russian. “Hi Mama, can you take a moment to talk?” – the first in a series of phone calls between Russian soldiers and their families. Combined with often tableau-like footage of destroyed Ukrainian cities and villages, they generate a haunting sort of friction.

Tickets for the 37^th edition of exground filmfest are available online at www.exground.com. They can also be found here in the exground filmfest app.

Please feel free to contact us regarding press accreditation for exground filmfest 37.

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners! 

ex37_Partners_Sponsors_2024.pdf

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com

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exground filmfest 37: Full Program Revealed!

Roughly 200 Films from 49 Countries // exground Xtras with Supporting Events // Cash and Non-Cash Prize Packages Worth Nearly 20,000 Euros                                                                                                      

The program for the 37^th edition of exground filmfest is now available online at www.exground.com. From 15 to 24 November, the festival will present around 200 short and feature films at its partner venues in Wiesbaden and a selection of films in Frankfurt am Main following the festival week. From nearly 2,100 submissions, the curatorial team has selected the most compelling films from 49 countries. In addition, exground filmfest’s YouTube channel will once again feature special content to accompany the in-person festival. In a total of six competitions, exground filmfest will be awarding monetary prizes and prize packages valued at nearly 20,000 euros. 

Countries Represented, Supporting Program and Festival Venues

The selected films include 17 world premieres, four international premieres, two European premieres and an impressive 36 German premieres. Germany is the most represented country, with 67 films, while France comes in second with 16 films and co-productions within the program. However, the program also features cinema nations that are often underrepresented or virtually absent in German cinemas, such as Venezuela, Bolivia, the Dominican Republic and Uzbekistan.

The exground Xtras offer industry events, art exhibitions, the beloved exground Gong Show and the annual Film Quiz held in the Marktkirche crypt. In the scope of the latter, host Rex Kramer invites the audience to join in shaping the program by choosing works from a rich film collection. The most successful team here can look forward to receiving lovely prizes from the exground warehouse. The program LET’S GET EDUCATED, assembled and moderated by Bernd Brehmer, offers a look at 16mm instructional films of debatable pedagogical value that were capable once upon a time of turning a dreary school lesson into fertile soil for wild fantasies, at least for the duration of a short film, and more often than not managed to achieve the opposite of their intended purpose, arousing curiosity for the wild life waiting outside, beyond school walls and life as a minor.

In addition to the festival venues in Wiesbaden – Caligari FilmBühne, Murnau-Filmtheater, the Marktkirche crypt and Nassauischer Kunstverein – select films from the Thematic Focus program will also be shown again in Frankfurt am Main at Pupille Kino, on the campus of Frankfurt University.

Film Program: Germany, Europe, USA and the World

The selection at exground filmfest is divided into the sections Made in Germany, American Independents, European Cinema, World Cinema and the youth days.

In 2024 exground filmfest features four Oscar submissions

These include Leonardo Van Dijl’s haunting character study JULIE KEEPS QUIET (BE/SE 2024), remarkable for its steadily building tension and subtle storytelling, which will be representing Belgium in the Oscar competition. Shortly before an important tennis tournament is to take place, Julie’s world falls apart when her coach Jérémy is suspended from her tennis academy following an internal investigation into another girl’s suicide. Although she struggles with the separation, Julie focusses more than ever on her sport, stubbornly refusing to comment on the accusations as she becomes increasingly withdrawn.

The musical thriller EMILIA PÉREZ (FR 2024) by multi-award-winning director Jacques Audiard, which won two prizes in Cannes this year, is also a candidate for an Academy Award. Rita, a lawyer, is a tiny light in a big firm: overqualified but underrepresented. Drug dealers, murderers and cartel bosses owe their freedom to her intelligence, though her irredeemably corrupt boss always takes credit, basking in the spoils of her brilliance. That is, until one day she is offered a way out. With her help, cartel boss Manitas del Monte aims to get out of the mafia world and arrange a new life for his wife Jessi and their children, putting a plan he has been preparing in secret for years into practice, by transforming himself completely into the woman he has always been deep down inside: EMILIA PÉREZ. The film features a magnificent cast of stars, including Selena Gomez and Zoe Saldana.

Rich Peppiatt‘s impressive outing KNEECAP (IE/GB 2024), Ireland’s 2025 Oscar candidate, will also be screening in Wiesbaden. The director depicts the struggle for Irish national identity. An unlikely trio is formed in Belfast, consisting of brothers Naoise and Liam Óg, two wild young drug dealers, and the stuffy, middle-aged teacher JJ – the three play themselves in a fictionalised biography. With their hip-hop group, they ruffle feathers left and right. For the English, the use of the Irish language alone is worthy of a thrashing, while the civil rights movement would rather hear traditional songs than youth slang about sex and drugs. Neither side can keep the boys from succeeding.

Emanuel Pârvu‘s THREE KILOMETERS TO THE END OF THE WORLD (RO 2024) is a razor-sharp drama and stirring film experience that was awarded the “Queer Palm” in Cannes and will be entered into the 2025 Oscar race for Romania. Before starting university in Bucharest, 17-year-old Adi spends one last summer at home in the Romanian part of the Danube delta. When he becomes the victim of a brutal homophobic attack one night, everything suddenly changes. His parents take away his cell phone, lock him in his room and try to exorcise his “sin” with the help of the village priest.

Made in Germany with High-Calibre Audience Competition

As in the previous four years, for the 37^th festival edition the audience will choose the winning film in the Made in Germany section, which features German silver screen stars like Laura Tonke, Gisa Flake, Meike Droste, Johanna Wokalek, Ulrich Matthes, Mark Waschke and Andreas Döhler in 2024.

Jannis Alexander Kiefer, who has previously won prizes at exground filmfest with several short films, returns to the festival with his bizarre, fabulously cast feature-film debut. ANOTHER GERMAN TANK STORY (DE 2024) takes the viewer to Wiesenwalde, where there is normally nothing going on – until a Hollywood film crew shows up to shoot a series about the Second World War. The villagers chase their dreams, but then a sudden power outage threatens to nix all of their plans and causes old stories to resurface.

The comet is coming! At least that is what the protagonists in Benjamin Pfohl’s JUPITER (DE 2023) believe. 14-year-old Lea is torn from the life she’s accustomed to in a flash when her parents take her and her brother off to the mountains. Her family has become enmeshed in a cosmic cult promising salvation on a higher plane of existence on Jupiter. Little by little, Lea’s memories reveal her family’s struggle to find stability in life, while she is forced to choose between death and a life of self-determination on Earth. The star-studded debut film is based on the short film of the same name which won an award at exground filmfest in 2019.

Justine Bauer‘s MILCH INS FEUER (DE 2024) revolves around three generations of female farmers living under one roof. Anna is pregnant and thinking about castration. Katinka, who wears her bikini in the milking parlour, may not be able to become a farmer at all. But grandma’s tomatoes turned out better than ever this year. A summer spent on fading farms. Justine Bauer’s feature-film debut is not just a drama shot in dialect, it is also a compelling tale of a life lived close to animals and nature – and of a young female farmer searching for her own path between self-discovery and family tradition.

The German-Austrian co-production THE WITNESS (DE/AT 2024), directed by Nader Saeivar based on a screenplay by Jafar Panahi, was shot in Farsi. Tarlan is a witness to the murder of her friend Rana. The perpetrator: Rana’s husband, a high-ranking government official. When the police refuse to pursue any serious investigation into the case, Tarlan must decide whether she will bow to political pressure and lose her reputation and livelihood – or fight for justice. The film serves as a cinematic reflection on the current status quo in Iranian society, depicting both state repression and brave resistance.

Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. organises the competition and sponsors the DAS BRETT award for the best German feature film, endowed with 3,000 euros in prize money.

European Cinema: Strong Girls and Women Take Centre Stage

The European Cinema section assembles nine highlights from the big A-list festivals

A particular stand-out here is Austrian director Ulrike Kofler‘s GINA (AT 2024), a female portrait of multiple generations. In a run-down rental unit on the edge of the city, nine-year-old Gina not only takes care of her little brother, she also looks after her pregnant, overwhelmed mother Gitte. She wants to turn her mom’s on-and-off boyfriend into a real father and Gitte’s own mother into a loving grandmother. Gina fights against neglect, hopelessness and child welfare services, and for the baby in Gitte’s womb and her own self.

Hugo Ruiz’ feature-film debut, the tough-as-nails revenge thriller ONE NIGHT WITH ADELA (ES 2023), is a further highlight in this section. A woman sees red! Adela is a street sweeper in Madrid. Her work makes her feel empty, sad, disturbed and horny. Tonight, when her shift is over, she wants to get even with those who have made her what she is: a human wreck. Her night of revenge is about to begin. Rebellious, seductive, provocative, politically incorrect, disturbing – all this is brought to the screen by the brilliant female lead, who gives her all.

SIMA’S SONG (NL/FR/ES/TW 2024), directed by Roya Sadat, which takes the viewer back to late-1970s Afghanistan, before the civil war, is also an exceptional work of cinema. The ardent communist Suraya (from a wealthy family) and the conservative Muslim Sima (from a modest background) are best friends. But when Sima’s brother is killed by the Communist Party, their friendship is put to the test. Driven by a desire for revenge, Sima joins the Mujahideen in Pakistan, while Suraya rises within the party. It is only when they are forced to escape from prison together that they realise how true friendship is also capable of bridging political divides.

American Independents: From Gripping Documentaries to Dramatic Comedies

The American Independents section features seven strong feature films from the USA.

Oliver Stone and Rob Wilson‘s LULA (US/BRA 2024) is an empathetic portrait of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, one of the world’s most influential political figures. The film depicts Lula’s extraordinary path to re-election as President of Brazil in 2022, after 19 months of imprisonment. With unparalleled access to Lula and his inner circle, in a series of unfiltered interviews Oliver Stone sheds new light on the charismatic politician and reveals the inside story of “Operation Car Wash”. The Hollywood director’s latest documentary film celebrated its premiere in Cannes.

In her award-winning documentary BLACK BOX DIARIES (US/JAP/GB 2024), Shiori Ito tells how she herself went public as a young journalist in May 2017 with an accusation of rape against the biographer of then Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Ito saw changing Japan’s hopelessly outdated laws against sexual assault as her only chance of bringing the perpetrator to justice. The documentary film unfolds like a thriller, also showing secret footage of the investigation and capturing the years-long battle against a broken justice system shaped by patriarchy. A ground-breaking case in Japan!

Tyler Taormina‘s dramatic comedy CHRISTMAS EVE IN MILLER’S POINT (US 2024) depicts four generations of the Balsano family coming together for what is probably their last Christmas celebration in their family home on Long Island. Boisterous aunts, uncles, cousins and an irrepressible grandmother drink themselves merry and gab non-stop. While the partiers lose themselves in boisterous revelry, Emily and Michelle sneak off to turn the suburban winter wonderland into a backdrop for their youthful rebellion. In his follow-up to the acclaimed HAM ON RYE, writer and director Tyler Taormina puts his eerie cinematic stamp on the Christmas film, skilfully blending comedy, nostalgia, pathos and misanthropy.

World Cinema: Cinematic Treasures from Around the Globe

The World Cinema section presents current highlights from this year’s festival season from around the globe.

Marcelo Gaetano’s BABY (BR/FR/NL 2024) is an extremely gripping tale. After his release from juvenile detention, Wellington finds himself alone on the streets of São Paulo. His parents have moved away without leaving any contact information, and he has neither a place to stay nor the money to build a new life. While frequenting an adult movie theatre, he meets Ronaldo, an older escort. The experienced hustler takes Wellington under his wing and introduces him to the ins and outs of the scene.

Johanné Gómez Terrero‘s SUGAR ISLAND (DO/ES 2024), which won several awards in Venice, immerses us in a spiritual world while serving as an anti-racist and decolonial manifesto. An unwanted pregnancy forces Makenya, a Dominican-Haitian teenager, to grow up. She lives with her grandfather, an activist for workers’ pension rights, and her mother, a devoté of Afro-Dominican spirituality, in a community surrounded by sugar cane fields. The mechanisation of the sugar industry threatens to displace the family without any compensation.

The section also features Iair Said‘s bittersweet comedy MOST PEOPLE DIE ON SUNDAYS (AR/IT/ES 2024). David, a gay man in his mid-thirties, is overweight and afraid of flying. He returns to Buenos Aires from Europe for his uncle’s funeral. When his mother also reveals that she plans to switch off his father’s ventilator, he vacillates between the close bond he shares with her and the strong, perhaps selfish desire to overcome his existential fears. To wit, he ends up spending endless hours learning to drive, visiting medical specialists and having sex with any man who will give him a little attention.

Competitions at exground filmfest

In a total of six competitions, exground filmfest is awarding monetary prizes and non-cash prize packages worth nearly 20,000 euros, including in the German Short Film Competition and the International Short Film Competition (IC), as well as in the Wiesbaden Short Film Competition. The jury for the 23^rd IC is composed of German festival organiser, curator and cultural manager Nina Friemann, Slovenian-based film journalist, critic and festival programmer Marko Stojiljković and Jutta Wille, managing director of AG Kurzfilm, who possesses years of experience in the film production sector.

In the scope of exground youth days, the best films for a young audience are competing for awards in the International Youth Film Competition and the Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition. The “exground Golden Cucumber” will also be awarded once again to the trashiest film from the Gong Show program.

Tickets for the program of exground filmfest 37 are available effective immediately through www.exground.com – as well as via the exground filmfest app.

For press accreditation at exground filmfest 37, please feel free to contact us – we would be happy to send you our registration form.

Following the festival, select films will once again be screened in the Rhine-Main region beyond Wiesbaden, at Pupille – Kino in der Uni (Mertonstraße 26–28, 60325) in Frankfurt am Main.

The complete festival program will be revealed following the 2024 press conference on 31 October (11 am, Caligari FilmBühne) and will be available at www.exground.com.

Gerald Pucher, Anna Schoeppe, Andrea Schoeppe, Uwe Stellberger, Photo: Ottmar Schick for Wiesbadener Filmfestival e.V.

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners! 

ex37_Partners_Sponsors_2024.pdf

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
Tel.: +49 176 48269589

presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com

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Press Release – 16 October 2024

exground filmfest 37: Thematic Focus on Flight and Expulsion

Running this year from 15 to 24 November, exground filmfest offers ample opportunity to enter into conversation with visiting filmmakers and expand personal horizons. The traditional exground Focus is particularly well-known for its capacity to provide new perspectives. This year’s program takes a special close look at the topic of flight and expulsion.

Why flight and expulsion, of all subjects? exground filmfest is also a forum for socio-political dialogue. In contrast to the emphasis on regional and local scenes in the Country Focus sections of previous festival editions, the 37^th edition of exground filmfest adopts a global perspective and examines an issue that the European continent and the world at large are preoccupied with more than ever. Foregoing simplistic answers, the Thematic Focus on “Flight and Expulsion” showcases politically engaged fictional and documentary works of international cinema that grapple with the complex causes and effects of flight – such as climate change, wars, hunger, human rights violations, the absence of the rule of law, persecution, neo-colonial exploitation and the lack of economic prospects. Along with the current situation regarding flight and expulsion and concurrent isolationist tendencies, the Thematic Focus aims to illuminate the many causes of flight and possible ways to ameliorate the issue. The Focus section comprises stylistically and conceptually unconventional, emotionally moving and socially relevant cinema, complemented by an extremely diverse supporting programme.

Highlights from the Focus Program 

exground filmfest 37 will open with a screening of the first film from the Focus program: THE STORY OF SOULEYMANE (FR 2024), directed by Boris Lojkine, a gripping drama featuring haunting performances, which revolves around the life of the eponymous protagonist, an exploited refugee eking out a living as a bike delivery-person in Paris.

In the documentary film BACKGROUND (DE 2023), Syrian filmmaker Khaled Abdulwahed, who fled his country for Germany and now lives in Leipzig, prods his father, who opted to stick it out in Aleppo, to reminisce about the latter’s time in Saxony in the mid-1950s as an engineering student. On the telephone, the two joke about cultural peculiarities and comment on Khaled’s detective-like sleuthing in German archives. Photos of the father are processed and his body is re-embedded in present-day places, gradually creating a multi-layered panoramic view of the two countries’ intertwined relationship and the role of images in the process of remembering. The film was honoured with the Grand Prix at FID Marseille in 2023.

MY FATHER’S PRISON (VE/CZ 2023), directed by Ivan Andres Simonovis Pertiñez, takes us to Venezuela, which has been the scene of one of the largest refugee movements in the world for a number of years now. The corrupt Maduro regime has driven millions of individuals to leave the country. In MY FATHER’S PRISON, with the help of video footage, a filmmaker living in exile in Berlin tells the story of his father, a former police chief of Caracas, who was sentenced to 30 years in the infamous prison “El Helicoide”. When the prison sentence is converted into house arrest after a long period in response to international pressure, the family plans a daring escape.

Cyrielle Raingou’s (FR/CA 2023) THE SPECTER OF BOKO HARAM is set in the border region between Cameroon and Nigeria that, in spite of being terrorised by the Islamist “Boko Haram” militia, is a place where many individuals still seek refuge. The military patrols the streets. A girl named Falta asks her mother to tell her about her father’s death. Brothers Ibrahim and Mohamad struggle to embrace everyday life at school following their experiences as child soldiers. In her feature-film debut, Cyrielle Raingou manages to create a gentle, respectful snapshot of these traumatised children, who radiate so much lust for life in spite of all they’ve been through.

Oksana Karpovych’s INTERCEPTED (CA/FR/UA 2024) takes the audience along into a warzone. A child on a swing, seemingly carefree and light, then burned-out tanks on the side of the road. Suddenly we hear voices in Russian. “Hi Mama, can you take a moment to talk?” The first in a series of phone calls between Russian soldiers and their families. Combined with often tableau-like footage of destroyed Ukrainian cities and villages, they create a haunting source of friction. Mundane conversations alternate with confessions of excessive violence and the internalised propaganda of those who remained at home. Karpovych has managed to create a remarkable reflection on cause and effect.

SONG OF ALL ENDS (FR 2024), directed by Giovanni C. Lorusso, shows poetic images of everyday life from the Shatila camp in Beirut. Created in 1949 to house displaced Palestinians, the site went on to gain horrific notoriety through the massacre that occurred there in 1982. Since the devastating port explosion of 2020, the Alhaddad family has been mourning young Houda, who died in the tragic accident. Despite their disconcerting beauty, the film’s mostly black and white images are deeply imbued with the shocks of the past. Over a period of two years, Italian filmmaker Lorusso visited this place, ultimately crafting a calm documentary masterpiece reminiscent of Pedro Costa’s films, enriched with the ghosts of fiction.

Mahdi Fleifel’s extraordinarily authentic thriller TO A LAND UNKNOWN (GB/FR/GR/NL/QA/SA 2024) is set in Athens, where cousins Chatila and Reda pursue petty crime and sex work in an attempt to come up with cash and fake passports to continue their trip to Western Europe. Finally, everything seems almost within reach, but drug addiction and a decision to try their hand as smugglers lead to dark territory. Both Palestine and Germany remain dreams, each in its own way. Mahdi Fleifel stages a compelling buddy movie about the melancholy of exile.

MOTHERSHIP (FR/BE 2023), directed by Muriel Cravatte, follows work aboard the “Ocean Viking”, whose crew members have dedicated themselves to civil sea rescue in the Mediterranean in the wake of the collective failure of Europe’s powers that be. They pick up individuals crammed in unseaworthy boats, provide food, medical attention and psychological counselling and offer protection from the Libyan coast guard. At the same time, the crew tries to compel authorities to observe European law and grant them entry permits for ports. A captivating portrait full of hope, in an age where the last humane values are at risk of capsizing alongside thousands of fellow humans.

In OPPONENT (SE 2024), Iranian-in-exile Milad Alami stages the story of Iman and his family, who have been forced to flee Iran for Sweden, where they must cope with icy landscapes, a constant stream of temporary homes and an uncertain asylum application process. To increase the family’s chances of receiving some sort of more permanent residency, the former professional grappler returns to the mat. This not only leads to homoerotic tensions with young Thomas – soon Iman also encounters his former colleagues from Iran and must face the unsettled scores between them.

Nicole Vögele’s THE LANDSCAPE AND THE FURY (CH 2024) deals with the border zone between Bosnia and Croatia: old military equipment stands in the woods, while the soaked passport photos of refugees lie on the fallen leaves. On their gruelling odyssey along the Balkan route, they pass through landscapes where demining teams are still clearing away the dangerous remnants of the wars of the 1990s. Back then, the violence in former Yugoslavia forced hundreds of thousands to flee. Today, those fleeing Syria, Afghanistan and other conflict regions encounter a European border regime that dehumanises and pushes back those seeking protection.

Exhibitions, Readings and Discussion

The multiple-award-winning travelling photo exhibition “Look at Me – Faces of Flight”, which was created as a volunteer project in the Haltern am See asylum lobby and support group, will be shown at Murnau-Filmtheater. The exhibition invites guests to take a closer look. Who are the refugees seeking refuge here with us? What drove them to flee? How does fleeing actually work? And finally: How did the people experience their arrival in Germany?

Nassauischer Kunstverein Wiesbaden is showing video art by Fluxus scholarship recipient Maja Smrekar in the supporting programme from 31 October 2024 to 16 February 2025 under the titles I HUNT NATURE AND CULTURE HUNTS ME and SUPERPOSITION – PART II. The works address the festival theme from the perspective of non-human actors. The video shows Smrekar’s performance with wolves and wolf-dog hybrids. The artist explores the emotional relationship between humans and dogs and makes reference to their co-evolution. It is not flight and expulsion that ensure survival, but co-operation and tolerance instead.

A reading by Ronya Othmann from “Vierundsiebzig” will take place at the Mauritius-Mediathek on Friday, 22 November 2024 at 6:30 p.m. The discussion will be moderated by Anna Yeliz Schentke and is co-organised by the supporting group “WIR in Wiesbaden”, Spiegelbild – Politische Bildung aus Wiesbaden and Förderverein Wiesbadener Literaturhaus Villa Clementine e.V. Ronya Othmann has sought to find a form for the unutterable, to describe the genocide of the Yezidi population, the seventy-fourth of its kind, perpetrated by IS fighters in Shingal in 2014.

On Sunday, 17 November at 4:30 p.m. in the crypt of the Marktkirche, Hennes Grossmann and Mirjam Reininger will present their lecture INSIGHT INTO CIVIL SEA RESCUE ON EUROPE’S BORDERS. While calls to seal off Fortress Europe are getting louder and louder, thousands of people continue to drown just beyond its walls in the central Mediterranean every year. Organisations like RESQSHIP are attempting to counter the dying with civilian-operated ships. In this lecture, crew members of the motorised sailing vessel “Nadir” operated by RESQSHIP will report on their missions and the inhumane conditions off Europe’s coasts. A short film with footage from on board and a subsequent discussion will leave room for your questions.

On Saturday, 23 November at 3:00 p.m. at Murnau-Filmtheater, a PANEL DISCUSSION ACCOMPANYING THE THEMATIC FOCUS ON FLIGHT AND EXPULSION will take place. Images of flight, expulsion and exile are omnipresent, whether in the news, on social media or in the cinema. But which perspectives and film forms break down stereotypes and power structures and create real counter-images to the brutalised discourse? How can solidarity work? Can film change the situation? Robin Vanbesien, director of HOLD ON TO HER, and Hoda Taheri, director of MOTHER PRAYS ALL DAY LONG, will discuss these questions under the moderation of Amos Borchert, curator of the Thematic Focus.

Matinee

The Sunday Matinee brings this year’s exground filmfest focus on flight and expulsion to a fitting close. On 24 November at 12 noon, the documentary HOLD ON TO HER (BE 2024) will be shown in the presence of director Robin Vanbesien. In 2018, a van carrying fleeing people is shot at by police in Belgium. Two-year-old Mawda Shawri dies. A few years later, Robin Vanbesien and activists in Brussels organise a gathering and give Mawda a voice. Using previously conducted interviews as voice-overs to accompany the film’s images, they create a space of collective remembrance that provides room for grief, anger, political demands and a counter-narrative to the state’s lies. In conversation with curator Amos Borchert, Robin Vanbesien will talk about the thematic and aesthetic concepts behind HOLD ON TO HER, the concept of “ciné place-making” and “The Post Film Collective”, which Vanbesien co-founded.

Amnesty International Wiesbaden Film Award

Traditionally, exground filmfest has taken a stand for the protection of human rights. The festival’s co-operation with Amnesty International, an established part of the program for many years, is taking on special added significance this year. In addition to the traditional prizes, in 2024 a jury will present the Amnesty International Wiesbaden Film Award, endowed with 1,000 euros in prize money, to the best film in the Thematic Focus on Flight and Expulsion.

The Focus section is once again made possible with the generous support of Kulturfonds Frankfurt RheinMain.

You will find the ex37 Focus booklet here.

Select films will once again be screened in the Rhine-Main region following the festival, at Pupille – Kino in der Uni, Mertonstraße 26–28, 60325 Frankfurt am Main.

The full festival program will be announced following the annual press conference (31 October, 11:00 a.m., Caligari FilmBühne) and will be subsequently available at www.exground.com. 

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners! 

 ex37_Partners_Sponsors_2024.pdf

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 

presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com 

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Press Release – 2 October 2024

14 Feature-Length and Short Films at 21^st exground youth days

exground filmfest is showing 14 international feature-length and short films to young film audiences in the 21^st edition of exground youth days. The selection focuses on the realities of young people’s lives. Young people aged 12 and up can look forward to screenings of seven current film productions, each featuring a supporting film, from 16 to 20 November, at Caligari FilmBühne. All films will be shown in German or with German subtitles.

youth days – International Youth Film Competition for Feature Films

The exground youth days feature-film competition will open on 16 November with a screening of Vinko Tomičić Salinas’ brilliant social drama THE DOG THIEF (BO/CL/MX/FR/EC/IT 2024). Set in Bolivia, the film revolves around a very special relationship which develops over time between the 15-year-old orphan Martín, who ekes out a living as a shoeshine boy on the streets of La Paz, and the lonely tailor Señor Novoa.

Another highlight at this year’s exground youth days is the German premiere of María Zanetti’s ALEMANIA (AR/ES 2023). In this sensitive and multi-layered coming-of-age drama, 16-year-old Lola from Argentina wants to go to Germany as an exchange student together with her best friend – in order to make a fresh start free from the constraints of home, where her life feels totally determined by her mentally troubled older sister and her parents, who are also opposed to the move.

The German production GOTTESKINDER (DE 2024), directed by Frauke Lodders, represents another shining link in the chain of dramas featured in this year’s youth programming. Siblings Hannah and Timo are growing up in a strict evangelical family. Hannah, heavily involved in the free church, makes a passionate commitment to her faith by taking a vow of chastity. When Hannah meets and subsequently falls in love with Max, the new boy next door, her life suddenly becomes more complicated. Her brother Timotheus, on the other hand, develops romantic feelings for his best friend Jonas. Believing that his homosexuality goes against God’s will, he tries to fight his “impure” thoughts and attends so-called “spiritual counselling sessions” in search of relief.

Shuchi Talati‘s sensitively told coming-of-age tale, the mother-daughter drama GIRLS WILL BE GIRLS (IN/FR/USA/NO 2024), is also set in a patriarchal world. 16-year-old Mira has been appointed the very first prefect at her elite boarding school in the Himalayan foothills, and her path to academic excellence seems preordained. However, on her very first day, the sophisticated diplomat’s son Sri awakens romantic feelings and sexual desire within her, sparking a thrilling journey of self- discovery.

Leonardo Van Dijl’s haunting character study JULIE KEEPS QUIET (BE/SE 2024) is remarkable for its steadily building tension and subtle storytelling. Shortly before an important tennis tournament is to take place, Julie’s world falls apart when her coach Jérémy is suspended from her tennis academy following an internal investigation into another girl’s suicide. Although she struggles with the separation, Julie focusses more than ever on her sport, stubbornly refusing to comment on the accusations as she becomes increasingly withdrawn.

The impressive Lithuanian film TOXIC (LT 2024), directed by Saulė Bliuvaitė, which won the “Golden Leopard” at Locarno Film Festival, deals with the destructive obsession with beauty that can plague young women. In the desolation of a run-down Baltic industrial town, the director follows two 13-year-old girls, Marija and Kristina, who long to escape their drab existence. Dreaming of modelling careers and falling prey to toxic beauty standards, the two girls begin to torture their bodies to the extreme, even using tapeworms in their quest to become as skinny as possible.

Anthony Schatteman‘s YOUNG HEARTS (BE/NL 2024) is screening out-of-competition in the scope of “Kino macht Schule”, at a school event organised in co-operation with Medienzentrum Wiesbaden, donum vitae regional association for Wiesbaden and Rheingau-Taunus-Kreis e.V.. The film tells the story of 14-year-old protagonist Elias, who, though initially preoccupied with school, falls in love with Alexander when he meets the new boy next door and then wants to spend every free minute with him. It turns out that Alexander also has a thing for boys. Alas, fearful of how people around him will react, Elias keeps his feelings to himself and begins to entangle himself in lies. Finally, a deep conversation with his grandfather makes him realise what he truly desires: to win Alexander’s heart.

School classes interested in attending the screening of YOUNG HEARTS at 10.30 a.m. on 20 November 2024 should contact Medienzentrum Wiesbaden e. V. at: kino@mdz-wi.de or phone (+49) 611 1665841.

Attractive Prizes

This year, in the scope of exground youth days, the selected works will once again be vying for the title of Best Feature Film within the competition. A youth jury will

determine which of the directors gets to take home prize money in the amount of 2,500 euros, sponsored by the State Capital of Wiesbaden. An audience award will also be presented, endowed with 1,000 euros by the State Capital of Wiesbaden. 

Short Films at exground youth days 

An additional prize of 500 euros, sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V., will be awarded by the Wiesbaden Youth Jury for the best short film. A total of seven short films from Norway, Sweden, Austria, Spain, China, Malaysia, Germany and Uruguay will be screened before the feature-length films – including the short fiction film YARÊ (AT 2024), directed by Sallar Othman, which tells the story of the eponymous protagonist and the drought plaguing her village and keeping her from going to school. The animated documentary THIS IS RAQUEL’S NOT-SO-SECRET DIARY (ES 2023) by Raquel Agea, in which the heroine’s long-running account of her days and the topic of boys play a major role, will also be shown. In the short fiction film EIN FAHRRAD FÜR ALICIA (DE 2024) by Masha Mollenhauer, 14-year-old Alicia is accused of stealing the bike she was given. In the fiction film LIV (SE 2024), directed by Hillevi Gustafson, Olivia prepares to start high school. In Cagil Bocut’s drama EVERYDAY IT GETS A LITTLE EASIER (TR 2024), Cemre has to prepare for her team’s competition while also finding time for her A-levels, her boyfriend and her family. The coming-of-age-themed short films are rounded off by A SUMMER’S END POEM (CN/CH/MY 2024), directed by Lam Can-zhao, and TITS (NO 2023), by Eivind Landsvik.

Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition: Submission Deadline Extended!

Wiesbaden-based directorial talents between the ages of 12 and 18 have the chance to present their own work on the big screen for the first time. The competition for the best Wiesbaden youth film, endowed with cash and non-cash prizes totalling 700 euros, will open exground youth days on 16 November at 3 p.m. at Caligari FilmBühne. The submission deadline has been extended to 15 October 2024.

The full festival program will be announced following the annual press conference (31 October, 11 a.m., Caligari FilmBühne) and will be available at www.exground.com. Tickets for cinema screenings will be available starting on 31 October 2024 on the festival homepage (www.exground.com), from the tourist information counter at Marktplatz 1 or from the ticket counter at Caligari FilmBühne.

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners!

ex37_Partners_Sponsors_2024.pdf

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com 

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Press Release – 23 September 2024
Save the Date: exground filmfest 37 Taking Place from 15 to 24 November in Wiesbaden 

Running from 15 to 24 November 2024, in its 37^th edition exground filmfest is once again presenting an extensive film and supporting program in Wiesbaden (Germany). This year’s program encompasses both feature-length and short works in the categories of fiction feature, documentary, animation and experimental film. Accompanying discussions, lectures, exhibitions and a reading, in addition to the exground youth days, round off a brilliant selection of national and international films.

Thematic Focus on Flight and Expulsion   

Whereas the festival has used its Country Focus in recent years to draw heightened attention to independent filmmaking in countries affected by rising right-wing populism and ascendent authoritarian structures, the 37^th edition adopts a more global perspective.

Foregoing simplistic answers, the thematic focus on “Flight and Expulsion” showcases politically engaged fictional and documentary works of international cinema and grapples with the complex causes and effects of flight and displacement, such as climate change, wars, famine, human rights violations, the absence of the rule of law, persecution, neo-colonial exploitation and lack of economic prospects.

Alongside the current situation regarding flight and displacement and concurrent isolationist tendencies, the thematic focus aims to illuminate the many causes of flight and possible ways to assuage the issue. Cyrielle Raingou’s empathetic documentary film LE SPECTRE DE BOKO HARAM (FR/CM 2023), winner of the 2023 competition at International Film Festival Rotterdam, is representative in this respect, for dealing with the realities of children’s lives in northern Cameroon, the dynamics of hope and despair, the destructive power of terrorism and the emancipatory potential of education.

In addition to these intensely committed works about flight, exground filmfest also seeks to shed light on what it means to “arrive” and on the often-suppressed history of migration. In his essay film BACKGROUND (DE, 2023), Khaled Abdulwahed draws a line between his life in Leipzig and that of his father, now left behind in the conflict zone of Syria, who had actually spent significant time in Germany himself decades prior. Employing the media of film and photography, he approaches his own family history with the same steady hand and care that he brings to his examination of the relationship between Syria and East Germany.

Not least in the wake of the prevailing discourse on migration, which is also drifting to the right in Germany, including the tightening of asylum regulations by the federal and state governments and mass deportation plots by the Alternative for Germany and other extreme right-wing actors revealed in reporting over the past year, exground filmfest wishes to set an example for an approach to the topic of “flight and displacement” that goes beyond populist rhetoric stigmatising the phenomena. With a programme of films and talks, a photo exhibition, video art, a reading, lectures and a panel discussion, the 2024 festival offers a framework for an informed and nuanced discourse.

Opening Film: THE STORY OF SOULEYMANE by Boris Lojkine 

In keeping with the thematic focus, exground filmfest 37 will open with Boris Lojkine‘s precisely staged dark drama THE STORY OF SOULEYMANE (FR 2024). Lojkine’s work as a director has been heavily shaped by his background in philosophy. As Souleymane cycles through the streets of Paris delivering meals, he repeats his story. His asylum application hearing, the key to receiving his residency papers, is slated to occur in two days. But Souleymane is not ready. In Lojkine’s film, anonymous delivery riders get their identities and stories back, as the director lets them relate what fate has actually had in store for them in France. The film was shot with a very small crew of just five or six people, without lighting or other equipment. The bicycle scenes were filmed from other bicycles. Festival attendees can now look forward to seeing the impressive results.

Opening Film at exground youth days

The international co-production THE DOG THIEF (BO/CL/MX/FR/EC/IT 2024), directed by Vinko Tomičić Salinas, has the honour of kicking off this year’s edition of exground youth days. Martín, a shoeshine boy working on the streets of La Paz, Bolivia, decides to steal the dog of his best customer, a lonely tailor who he begins to imagine as his father.

Programming Highlights

exground filmfest is screening Nelicia Low‘s award-winning fencing family drama PIERCE (SG/TW/PL 2024) in the scope of its World Cinema series. Low’s feature-film debut tells the gripping story of two brothers, both fencers, and their single mother, who earns her living as a singer in a nightclub. After fatally wounding a competition opponent with a broken blade, the older son was sentenced to serve several years in juvenile detention. Upon his release, his mother attempts to keep him away from his younger brother, unconvinced of his innocence. Undeterred, the brothers become closer, secretly enjoying their newly formed relationship, until a fencing incident leads to a dramatic climax. Low, who also wrote the screenplay, was herself active as a fencer for Singapore up to 2010.

The Iranian drama THE OLD BACHELOR (IR, 2024), directed by Oktay Baraheni, is screening in the same section. In an economically depressed Iran, two middle-aged brothers live with their tyrannical father. The man, prone to outbursts of rage and driven by male chauvinism, was left by his second wife, who he subjected to abuse. Now he bullies his eldest son, while the younger brother contemplates how he might be able to kill his father. When the man rents out the flat above them to a young woman with the intention of marrying her, the attraction the woman exerts on the older son slowly brings this deeply damaged family to the edge of the abyss. A Greek tragedy in a modern guise.

The musical thriller EMILIA PÉREZ (FR 2024) by multi-award-winning director Jacques Audiard, which already won two prizes in Cannes this year, is a particular stand-out in the European Cinema series. Rita, a lawyer, is a tiny light in a big company: overqualified but underrepresented. Drug dealers, murderers and cartel bosses owe their freedom to her intelligence, though her irredeemably corrupt boss always takes credit, basking in the spoils of her brilliance. That is, until one day she is offered a way out. With her help, cartel boss Manitas del Monte aims to get out of the mafia world and arrange a new life for his wife Jessi and their children, putting a plan he has been preparing in secret for years into practice, by transforming himself completely into the woman he has always been deep down inside: EMILIA PÉREZ. The film features a magnificent star cast.

Tyler Taormina’s dramatic comedy CHRISTMAS EVE IN MILLER’S POINT (US 2024) is screening in the American Independents series. Four generations of the Balsano family come together for what is probably their last Christmas celebration in their family home on Long Island. Boisterous aunts, uncles, cousins and an irrepressible grandmother drink themselves merry and gab non-stop. While the partiers lose themselves in boisterous revelry, Emily and Michelle sneak off to turn the suburban winter wonderland into a backdrop for their youthful rebellion. In his follow-up to the acclaimed HAM ON RYE, writer and director Tyler Taormina puts his eerie cinematic stamp on the Christmas film, skilfully blending comedy, nostalgia, pathos and misanthropy.

Introducing the Amnesty International Wiesbaden Film Award

Traditionally, exground filmfest has taken a consistent stand for the protection of human rights. The festival’s co-operation with Amnesty International, an established part of the program for many years, will take on special added significance this year. In addition to the traditional prizes, at exground filmfest 37 for the first time a jury will present the Amnesty International Wiesbaden Film Award, endowed with 1,000 euros in prize money, for the best feature-length film in the thematic program treating flight and expulsion.

The full festival program will be announced following the annual festival press conference (31 October, 11 am, Caligari FilmBühne) and subsequently available online at www.exground.com. 

 exground filmfest would like to thank all its sponsors and co-operation partners!

ex37_Partners_Sponsors_2024.pdf

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com

//

Press Release 27 November 2023

exground filmfest 36: Presenting This Year’s Prize Winners

CORRUPTION ON EARTH Wins GERMAN SHORT FILM COMPETITION // LOVE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH IT is Best International Short Film // LIGHT LIGHT LIGHT Wins the Main Award at exground youth days // Audience Award DAS BRETT in the MADE IN GERMANY Section Goes to LASVEGAS

This past Sunday evening, in the scope of a festive awards ceremony, the winners of the competitions at exground filmfest 36 were announced. Following the final tallying of the audience voting, the awards ceremony kicked off at Caligari FilmBühne with film guests, jury members and awards presenters in attendance. In total, exground filmfest awarded cash and non-cash prizes valued at nearly 20,000 euros.

German Short Film Competition

This year’s first prize in the German Short Film Competition, selected by the audience, went to CORRUPTION ON EARTH by Omid Mirnour, who also took home the jury prize of EUR 1,500 for “One day of colour grading for a short film project” from Magenta TV Fernsehproduktionsgesellschaft. The award is endowed with prize money in the amount of 3,000 euros, sponsored by the State Capital of Wiesbaden. Second place, endowed with 2,000 euros by by Magenta TV Fernsehproduktionsgesellschaft, went to FIFTEEN MINUTES by Sejad Ademaj, while third prize, also endowed with 1,000 euros in prize money by the State Capital of Wiesbaden, went to GRANICA by Joshua Neubert.

Omid Mirnour, director of CORRUPTION ON EARTH

Feature Film Competition for DAS BRETT in the MADE IN GERMANY Section

In the feature film competition MADE IN GERMANY, the audience selected LASVEGAS by Kolja Malik to receive DAS BRETT and 3,000 euros in prize money.

International Short Film Competition 

In the International Short Film Competition, the International Jury selected LOVE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH IT by Yotam Knispel from Israel as the winning film. The prize money in the amount of 2,000 euros is sponsored by the exground Circle of Friends. Jury members Maria Weyer, Roberto Doveris and Martin Scheuring explained their choice with the following words:

“The film manages beautifully to get the audience intrigued with the story so deeply through a very well-built script. As we get involved with the main character, we keep trying to figure out what is going on in this journey of moral tension between love and social responsibility. The film exhibits such a well-crafted mise-en-scène, the ensemble cast ends up being very good, every level is convincing. We celebrate the many layers of meaning and options for reading the film, which leaves us with a film that is very open for discussion. It sticks with you a long time after watching it.”

Yotam Knispel, director of LOVE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH IT

The jury commented on their Special Mention for WHERE I LIVE by Susi Jirkuff from Austria with the following statement: “The Special Mention goes to WHERE I LIVE (WO ICH WOHNE) by Susi Jirkuff, a film that portrays a very relatable experience of fear, suddenly becoming real. It takes you on a very unconventional journey, through rough animation, that becomes stronger and stronger, and catches your attention with a very sober, kind of neutral and calm voice in the first-person. This surreal kind of fairy tale shows innovatively that there is no way out of the downward social spiral where there are no happy endings.”

exground youth days – International Youth Film Competition 

The Youth Jury in the International Youth Film Competition gave this year’s Award for best Feature Film to LIGHT LIGHT LIGHT by Finnish director Inari Niemi:

“The film manages to relate the typical themes of coming-of-age genres, like first true love, loss and problems within the family, in an original and innovative way. This is especially evident in the Chernobyl symbolism, the haunting soundtrack and the nostalgic flashbacks.

The use of lighting is also brilliant. Scenes where one would rather look away are illuminated in glistening bright light. The way the most emotional scenes unfold mesmerises the viewer visually. It is this masterful treatment of the themes of trauma and abuse as well as the magnificent actors that make this film an absolute ‘must-watch’ for us.”

The winning film of this year’s short film competition in the scope of exground youth days is BEFORE MADRID by Ilén Juambeltz and Nicolás Botana from Uruguay, in which a young couple prepares together for their first time. “Thanks to the realistic execution here, this subject is neither demonised nor glorified – as is so often the case – but is instead depicted as a natural step in the life paths of young individuals. The film also managed to win the jury over with its excellent performances from the two protagonists, which portray insecurity and anticipation wonderfully.

In an age in which cinema and television frequently treat sex as taboo or matter-of fact, there is an urgent need – especially for young people – for films such as this one, which removes the pressure and provides a realistic representation.” The award is endowed with 500 euros in prize money, sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V..

Juuli Niemi, scriptwriter of LIGHT LIGHT LIGHT

The jury also awarded a Special Mention to the animated short film IT’S NICE IN HERE by Robert-Jonathan Koeyers from the Netherlands, for taking up the relevant topics of police violence and racism and portraying them in a multi-faceted manner through alternating animation styles that underscore the different perspectives.

The Audience Award in the scope of exground youth days went, in a tie, to EDGE OF EVERYTHING by Sophia Sabella and Pablo Feldman from the USA and LIGHT LIGHT LIGHT by Inari Niemi from Finland. Both winning films will receive prize money in the amount of 500 euros, sponsored by the State Capital of Wiesbaden.

exground youth days – Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition

In the Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition, Hendrik Schücke came out on top with his short fiction-film EMILY. First place comes with 500 euros in prize money, sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V.. SNACKNAPPING by “Die Bananenbrote” took second place; the team took home a shopping voucher from the Apple Store ergo sum worth 150 euros.

Klappe 7 – Children’s Film Festival
In the scope of exground filmfest 36, Klappe 7 – Children’s Film Festival also took place once again. The short fiction-film MKW – DIE MUTIGSTEN KINDER DER WELT by the BGS Ursula-Wölfel-Schule emerged as the winner here. GIRLS & BOYS by the BGS Gustav-Stresemann-Schule won the Audience Award.

Wiesbaden Special – Short Film Competition

In the audience competition for best Wiesbaden short film, KT197 – EINE HEIMAT, EIN STADTTEIL, EIN KLARENTHAL by Lenard Lüdemann came out on top. The prize money in the amount of 500 euros is sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. A non-cash prize worth 1,000 euros from LiveFrame Rental, consisting of lighting and dolly equipment, went to Moritz Göbel for his short fiction-film KOPF IN DEN WOLKEN.

exground Gong Show

In the scope of the cult-classic competition for trashy treasures and amateur works, suiraM and kirtaP were honoured for their film DIE DUNKELHEIT HINTER DEN PIXELN – the two took home the “Golden exground Cucumber” and the accompanying 50€ cash prize.

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners! 

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
presse@exground.com

//

Press Release – 23 November 2023

The Second Festival Weekend is Upon Us! Featuring the Country Focus on Chile, Highlights from the World of German Cinema, the International Short Film Competition and Numerous Special Guest Appearances in Wiesbaden

Captivating film talks on works from all over the world, personal encounters between international filmmakers and the festival audience, the exground Gong Show, TALES FROM THE CRYPT: SALON EXOTIQUE and THE RETURN OF VIEWER’S DIGEST, as well as a reading in co-operation with Amnesty International Wiesbaden inside the Marktkirche crypt: the first half of exground filmfest has already demonstrated very clearly just how important and beloved the festival is. The happenings on site at the festival’s various venues are characterised by inspiring moments in the cinema, experiencing film within a community and cultural exchange based on mutual interest and respect. In short: the best possible conditions for the slogan of this year’s festival trailer to take root and blossom: SEE AND LISTEN by Martin Gessner – beyond all national (or any other) boundaries. In general, once can observe that the trailer has resonated especially deeply and widely this year.

Now, after six successful festival days, exground filmfest is approaching the finish line ­– and the second festival weekend has a host of special highlights and guests in store for the audience.

Focus on Chile: Films and Panel Discussion
Several of the films from the Country Focus on Chile have already been screened in the presence of numerous film guests, such as MEETING POINT by Roberto Baeza, whose producer and cast member Alfredo García spoke about the very moving making of the film in the scope of a film talk. The film’s producers share a unique bond through the fates of their fathers, who met inside the torture centre Villa Grimaldi following their imprisonment under the military dictatorship – one survived while the other “disappeared”. This significant and weighty work of collective remembrance was shown on screen in the Marktkirche crypt to an appreciative audience.

The program for Saturday, November 25, features further highlights from the section: including OUTSIDER GIRLS by Alexandra Hyland, who will attend the screening along with producers Selva Gonzalez and Alberto Doveris. Weeks after a sweet night of partying, Rafaela realises that she is pregnant. Since a child is the last thing that she can imagine in her current life and abortion is still illegal under most circumstances in Chile, Rafaela and her BFF have to search around for pills on the black market. To be able to afford them, they take on countless odd jobs, as their friendship is put to the test. Film guests for the supporting film MANO SECA are also expected to attend.

Saturday also features five challenging works that get under one’s skin in the short film program SHORTS FROM CHILE. Characterised by vibrant formal experimentation and great enthusiasm for visual poetry and the aesthetic potential of various materials (including VHS, Super 8 and 16 mm), these films devote themselves to complex subject matter, such as family memories, motherhood, gender attributions, violence and death. In the scope of the PANEL: CHILEAN CINEMA OF TODAY “Chile despertó! – Chile has awoken!”, Focus curator Amos Borchert will speak with guests about current issues and aesthetic choices – as well as the interplay between filmmaking and social changes in light of the contemporary challenges facing Chilean society. Participants include Roberto Doveris (producer and filmmaker), Alexandra Hyland (director of OUTSIDER GIRLS), Felipe Huenchuñir (director of THE FALLEN) alongside other guests to be announced.

International Short Film Competition – Part II, German Short Film Competition with Awards Ceremony and Concert

In addition, two short film sections will be featured on Friday, 24 November, and Sunday, 26 November: the International Short Film Competition – Part II and the German Short Film Competition.

For the 22^nd time, exground filmfest is presenting the International Short Film Competition, for which many guests have again undertaken the journey to Wiesbaden this year. 16 films from 16 countries are vying here for the Jury Award, which is endowed with 2,000 euros in prize money, sponsored by the exground Circle of Friends. The second part will be presented in the evening on Friday, 24 November.

This year, exground filmfest has once again selected ten films for the German Short Film Competition. The section features a colourful mix of fiction films, documentaries and animated works. Here too the majority of the directors have shared their intention to attend, meaning the audience will have an opportunity to get to know the filmmakers during conversations after their respective films or over a drink following the awards ceremony. For the festive after-ceremony party, the Chilean band BADECIMA will be performing inside the movie theatre.

MADE IN GERMANY with Feature-Film Debuts

In the MADE IN GERMANY section, on Saturday, 25 November, directors Henning Beckhoff (with FOSSIL, 2023) and Behrooz Karamizade (with EMPTY NETS, 2023) will be making guest appearances in Wiesbaden. Although both are debut films, the two works have already created quite a stir at various large international festivals.

FOSSIL, directed by Henning Beckhoff, treats contemporary questions related to climate change and activism. Open-cast mine worker Michael stubbornly refuses to accept the pending phase-out of coal. He doesn’t want to see any change, no new flowering artificial lake-country landscapes. For Michael, work in the strip-mine is more than just a profession, which is why he tries to convince his colleagues to protest the rapid change, leading to a spiral of increasing isolation.

The protagonist of Behrooz Karamizade’s first fiction feature EMPTY NETS, Amir, also falls victim to a sort of isolation. Amir loves Narges, and Narges loves him back. The two dream of building a life together – alas, when Amir loses his job, the possibility of marriage seems to recede into the distance, due to a high bride price. In the hopes of being able to transcend class differences through hard work, Amir hires on with a fishery on the raw coast of the Caspian Sea, where he quickly becomes entangled in criminal machinations related to illegal caviar poaching. Things start to spiral dangerously out of control for Amir, threatening to devour his dreams.

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners! 

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
presse@exground.com

//

Press Release – 20 November 2023

36^th Edition of exground filmfest Opens with Numerous International Guests

This past weekend, exground filmfest opened with festivities in Wiesbaden: with a slew of special local and international guests in attendance, the festival kicked off its 36^th edition on 17 November with a screening of the Chilean film 1976 by Manuela Martelli to a sold-out crowd in Caligari FilmBühne, with the Consul General of the Republic of Chile, Francisco Mackenney Palamara, also in attendance. On behalf of the assembled filmmakers and artists, curatorial and organisational team member  Andrea Wink welcomed the director of the opening film.

In addition, in the scope of her opening speech Wink thanked all of the festival’s stakeholders for their support and expressed her relief at the fact that cuts to the city of Wiesbaden’s cultural budget have been postponed for the time being, emphasizing that the potential cuts represent an existential threat to the realisation of the next festival edition. Wink called on city council members to continue to preserve Wiesbaden’s diverse cultural scene, in regards to current budget consultations for 2025 as well. Hessian State Secretary for Higher Education, Research and the Arts Ayse Asar, representing the state government, also touched on the issue in her address.

In the introduction to her film, Manuela Martelli revealed to the audience the question that had already occupied her while writing the screenplay – namely, how one can continue to lead one’s normal life while horrific things are happening right before one’s own front door, in clear reference to the current state of the world. A subsequent talk moderated by Focus curator Amos Borchert examined the film’s many different facets. 1976 left attendees with plenty to talk about following the official opening and the reception at City Hall with City Councillor for Cultural Affairs Dr. Hendrik Schmehl and Mayor Gert-Uwe Mende.

Karin Wolff, Managing Director of Kulturfonds Frankfurt RheinMain, stated that she was particularly excited about the Country Focus on Chile due to the fact that works of cinema from the distant land hardly ever gain the attention of a broader audience otherwise and that exground filmfest this year also proves the vital importance of artistically examining the socio-political challenges of the present moment, 50 years after the end of military dictatorship in Chile.

At the opening, City Councillor for Cultural Affairs Dr. Hendrik Schmehl recommended the films of the exground youth days‘ program, which are still screening through Wednesday, 22 November, and which the Youth Jury will review critically over the coming days, before selecting a winning film from the entries to the International Youth Film Competition. The youth days celebrated their own opening this past Saturday, together with a very animated and enthusiastic young audience from Wiesbaden and the surrounding area.

First Winners Announced in Wiesbaden Competitions

While the Youth Jury is still busy with their discussions and consultations, the first winners at exground filmfest have already been honoured. The youth days opening was also accompanied by the Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition screening: Hendrik Schücke won the main award (featuring a cash prize of 500€ sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V.) for his short fiction-feature EMILY. The members of the group “Die Bananenbrote” took second place with their film SNACKNAPPING, for which they received a 150€ voucher from the Apple Store ergo sum. Moritz Göbel was also honoured with an award on the opening weekend, for his film KOPF IN DEN WOLKEN – Göbel took home a prize package for lighting and dolly equipment valued at 1,000€, sponsored by the Wiesbaden-based company LiveFrame Rental, in the scope of the Wiesbaden Special – Short Film Competition. The audience award, endowed with 500 euros in prize money by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V., went to KT197 – EINE HEIMAT, EIN STADTEIL, EIN KLARENTHAL by Lennard Lüdemann – and that, as Andrea Wink put it at the awards presentation, “in the hood” with a movie theatre full of Klarenthalers, no less.

Wiesbaden Welcomes a Range of Filmmakers

After director Kolja Malik already presented his film LASVEGAS personally to the Wiesbaden cinema audience in the MADE IN GERMANY section on Saturday, the coming days offer festival attendees a number of other special German-language film highlights.

On Wednesday, 22 November, director Aylin Tezel will be in Wiesbaden for a screening of her debut film FALLING INTO PLACE. In her address on Friday, Anna Schoeppe, Managing Director of Hessen Film und Medien GmbH, emphasised the section in particular, including the international-award-winning drama EMPTY NETS, directed by Behrooz Karamizade, who is expected to be on hand to present his film personally on Saturday, 25 November. Director Janin Halisch will also attend the screening of her film TALK TO ME on Tuesday, 21 November, and is looking forward to conversations with the exground audience. The exground audience can also look forward to the screening of TERRESTRIAL VERSES by renowned directorial duo Ali Asgari and Alireza Khatami in the WORLD CINEMA section on Tuesday, 21 November. In the youth days program, co-directors Sophia Sabella and Pablo Feldman are excited to field audience questions on their family drama EDGE OF EVERYTHING on Wednesday, 22 November. The highlights for Wednesday, 22 November, also include the German premiere of DRUGSTORE JUNE in the AMERICAN INDEPENDENTS section.

Director Vanessa Nica Mueller and line producer Elisa Rosi travelled to Wiesbaden for the sole purpose of attending today’s projection of their film LANDEN and speaking about their work with the audience in the Marktkirche crypt. LANDEN is also taking part in the German Feature-Film Competition.

Finally, numerous filmmakers from the INTERNATIONAL SHORT FILM COMPETITION – PART I will be in attendance at Caligari FilmBühne on Thursday, 23 November.

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners! 

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 

presse@exground.com

//

Press Release – 2 November 2023  

 
exground filmfest 36: Full Program Revealed! 

Roughly 200 Films from 57 Countries // exground Xtras with Supporting Events // Cash and Non-Cash Prize Packages of over 18,000 Euros 

The program for the 36^th edition of exground filmfest is now available online at www.exground.com. From 17 to 26 November, the festival will present around 200 short and feature films at its partner venues in Wiesbaden, as well at cinemas in Frankfurt am Main. From nearly 2,100 submissions, the curatorial team has selected the most compelling films from 57 countries. In addition, exground filmfest’s YouTube channel will once again feature special content to accompany the in-person festival. In a total of six competitions, exground filmfest will be awarding monetary prizes and prize packages valued at over 18,000 euros. 

Countries Represented, Supporting Program and Festival Venues 

The selected films include 15 world premieres, six international premieres, seven European premieres and a whopping 54 German premieres. Germany is the most represented country, with 54 films, while France comes in second, with 24 films and co-productions within the program. Chile, this year’s Focus Country, has a strong presence, with 20 films. However, the program also features cinema nations that are often underrepresented or entirely absent in German cinemas, such as Congo, Cameroon and Palestine. 
 

The exground Xtras offer industry events, art exhibitions, the beloved exground Gong Show and the annual film quiz held in the Marktkirche crypt. Here, Bernd Brehmer will also again be hosting THE RETURN OF VIEWER’S DIGEST, which presents condensed highlights from film history in Super-8 format, with audience participation – viewers are even encouraged to join in choosing which reels from the rich collection should be included in the evening’s viewing session. In addition to the festival venues in Wiesbaden – Caligari FilmBühne, Murnau-Filmtheater, the Marktkirche crypt, Nassauischer Kunstverein and Literaturhaus Villa Clementine – select films from the Country Focus program will also be shown again at Pupille – Kino on the University of Frankfurt am Main campus and at Orfeos Erben in Frankfurt am Main. 

Film Program: Germany, Europe, USA and the World 

The selection at exground filmfest is divided into the sections Made in Germany, American Independents, European Cinema, World Cinema and the youth days.  

In 2023, exground filmfest’s selection features no less than six Oscar submissions for Best International Feature Film: THE SETTLERS from Chile, THE DELINQUENTS from Argentina, OMEN from Belgium, FOUR DAUGHTERS from Tunisia, INSHALLAH A BOY from Jordan and BYE BYE TIBERIAS from Palestine, for which special film guests are also expected to attend.  

As in the previous three years, for the 36^th festival edition the audience will choose the winning film in the Made in Germany section. Aylin Tezel, the director of FALLING INTO PLACE (Germany/Great Britain, 2023), which is set on the Isle of Skye, will also be in Wiesbaden for the festival. Tezel’s directorial debut has proven to be one of the most tender romances of the past years. The association Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. is organising the competition and sponsoring DAS BRETT, the award for the best German film.

The section’s highlights also include the gripping thriller ROXY (Germany/Belgium, 2022) by Dito Tsintsadze, with a brilliant performance from Devid Striesow in the lead role. The film tells the story of the unremarkable taxi driver Thomas Brenner, whose life takes an unexpected turn when a group of Russian men accompanied by an attack dog board his taxi. Also revolving around an international setting, the multi-prize-winning drama EMPTY NETS (Germany/Iran, 2023), directed by Behrooz Karamizade, features strong imagery in its portrayal of the inequalities found in Iranian society. The young Iranian Amir hires on with a fishery on the raw coasts of the Caspian Sea in order to scrape together the cash he needs to marry his true love Narges. The long anticipated marriage slips ever further into the distance as Amir becomes entangled in criminal machinations related to poaching. The German-Iranian director is also expected to attend the festival in Wiesbaden. 

The European Cinema section assembles nine highlights from the big A-list festivals. In this section, Boris Guts’ political thriller MINSK (Estonia, 2022) sticks out in particular. August 2020 in Belarus: strolling in downtown Minsk one evening, a couple of newlyweds accidently find themselves in the midst of protests against the manipulated presidential election, surrounded by hooded, heavily armed thugs from the regime, who start to beat and arrest everyone in sight, including passers-by, without  

warning. In the vicious comedy UNDER THERAPY (Spain, 2023), directed by Gerardo Herrero, three different couples are invited to an unusual group therapy session. The psychologist herself fails to show up. Instead, on top of the table lie a selection of numbered envelopes with tasks that the couples are instructed to perform together. 

The American Independents section features seven strong feature films from the USA. In Nicholaus Goossen’s comedy DRUGSTORE JUNE, which is celebrating its international premiere at exground filmfest, a small-town pharmacy is robbed, and a young woman who still lives with her parents aims to solve the crime on her own. At the same time, she attempts to get over her ex-boyfriend and finally grow up a little. The multi-award-winning film FANCY DANCE, directed by Erica Tremblay with Lily Gladstone in the role of Jax, is a declaration of love for the indigenous communities in the USA and their female members. Jax, who has been taking care of her niece Roki on a reservation in Oklahoma since her sister’s disappearance, uses every free moment to search for the missing woman while preparing Roki for a powwow. Driven by fear of losing custody of the child, she combs the backcountry hoping to find Roki’s mother in time for the native celebration. Marc Turtletaub’s A GREAT PLACE TO CALL HOME is set in a small town somewhere in Pennsylvania, where Milton (Sir Ben Kingsley) is placidly whiling away his golden years with gardening, community get-togethers and memory training exercises. When a UFO lands in his flower bed one night, no one seems to believe the old man – not the 911 dispatcher, not the cashier at the supermarket and certainly not the local council. Undaunted, Milton decides to take the extra-terrestrial visitor with a fondness for apples into his home. A clever and touching comedy about late-found meaning in life and the thirst for adventure.   

The World Cinema section presents current highlights from this year’s festival season from around the globe. In TERRESTRIAL VERSES (Iran, 2023), Iranian directorial partners Alireza Khatami and Ali Asgari take a sharp-tongued approach full of sarcastic wit in their tale of nine individuals who fall victim to the banal malevolence of the authorities in the theocratic state. Marina Seresesky’s LET THE DANCE BEGIN (Argentina/Spain, 2023) is a crazy road movie from South America, in which three “silver agers” set out in an old delivery van in search of a shared secret. Their exciting trip through Argentina is accompanied by plenty of tango, seeing as Carlos and Margarita were the world’s most famous tango partners 30 years ago. 

Competitions at exground filmfest 

In a total of six competitions, exground filmfest is awarding monetary prizes and non-cash prize packages worth over 18,000 euros, including in the German Short Film Competition and the International Short Film Competition (IC), as well as in the Wiesbaden Short Film Competition. The jury for the 22^nd IC is composed of Chilean filmmaker and producer Roberto Doveris, Martin Scheuring, head of short films and market projects at German Films in Munich, and Maria Weyer, deputy director for the area of media pedagogy at Medienzentrum Wiesbaden. 

 In the scope of exground youth days, the best films for a young audience are competing for awards in the International Youth Film Competition and the Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition. The “exground Golden Cucumber” will also be awarded once again to the trashiest film from the Gong Show program.  

Tickets for the program of exground filmfest 36 are available effective immediately through www.exground.com – as well as via the exground filmfest app. 

For press accreditation at exground filmfest 36, please feel free to contact us – we would be happy to send you our registration form. 

The complete festival program will be revealed following the 2023 press conference on 2 November (11 am, Caligari FilmBühne) and will be available at www.exground.com. 

 exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners! 

——–  
Press contact:  
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V.  
exground filmfest  
Marta Moneva-Enchev  
presse@exground.com 

//

Press release Country Focus on Chile

19 October 2023 

exground filmfest 36: Country Focus on Chile 

Why Chile? 

This year’s edition of exground filmfest, running from 17 to 26 November, offers cinema enthusiasts a wealth of opportunities to enter into conversation with filmmakers and expand their horizons. The traditional Country Focus is a prime example when it comes to the latter. This year, the section takes a special look at Chile. But why Chile, of all places? 

exground filmfest also sees itself as a forum for socio-political exchange. The ongoing protests in Chile, which began in 2019, are rooted in glaring injustices in the country’s political, economic and social spheres. For this reason, the festival team has committed itself this year to the task of assembling a film selection for the Country Focus that intensively examines the foundations of these imbalances, whether they be patriarchal structures, (neo-) colonial violence or the sustained impact of the terrors of the military dictatorship, which did not come to an end until 1990.  

The central themes here are collective remembrance and the speaking of individual truth, as well as the conscious platforming of the works of a younger generation. Some of these filmmakers will even be on hand in Wiesbaden to present their works personally. The Country Focus programming features a broad range of films, from traditional narrative-based student projects to independently realised experimental films and debuts, while also showcasing celebrated works from A-list festivals in Berlin, Cannes und Rotterdam, as well as Chile’s submission for the 2024 foreign-film Oscar THE SETTLERS (CL/AR/DK/FR/TW/GB 2023). The Country Focus section encompasses a broad spectrum of cinema – stylistically and conceptionally unconventional, emotionally moving and socially relevant – rounded off by an extraordinarily diverse supporting program. 

Highlights from the Focus Program  

exground filmfest 36 will open with the meticulously staged political thriller 1976 (CL 2022), the directorial debut from Manuela Martelli, which is set in the midst of the Chilean state terror of the titular year. Carmen leads a comfortable upper-middle-class life as the wife of a respected doctor. Her children have left the nest, and the couple has made their peace with the military dictatorship. While overseeing renovations of her summer residence at the seaside, Carmen is asked by a friend, a priest, to help a wounded man. She resolves to take over the care of the shooting victim, in secret. Manuela Martelli stages a tense drama with a steady hand and a flair for the metaphorical. The imagery is opulent, buoyed by atmospheric music and elegant performances. 

Chile’s Oscar submission, THE SETTLERS, directed by Felipe Gálvez, is also a feature-film debut. In this unpredictable anti-colonial Western set in 1901, a dissimilar trio, consisting of a US-American mercenary, a Scottish lieutenant and an indigenous labourer, sets off on a bloody mission. On behalf of an entrepreneur, they are tasked with murdering as many indigenous people as possible, in order to open up new grazing paths. With a bold screenplay and breath-taking formal language, the film tells a tale of genocidal violence and capitalist exploitation as the basis for the formation of the Chilean nation-state. 

A further special cinema highlight: OUTSIDER GIRLS (CL 2023), whose director Alexandra Hyland and producer Roberto Doveris will be present in Wiesbaden. Doveris will also serve as a member of the International Jury. In their film, some weeks after a sweet night of partying protagonist Rafaela discovers that she is pregnant. Unfortunately, a child is the last thing she needs in her life at the moment. As abortion is widely outlawed in Chile, Rafa and her best friend Gabriela have to search around on the black market for a solution. To be able to afford the pills in question, they take on numerous odd jobs. Full of empowerment, the film treats solidarity, the right to choose what happens to one’s own body and the untenable situation of individuals facing unwanted pregnancies in Latin America. 

Tajyo Yamazaki will also be making the trip to Wiesbaden to present his feature-film debut THANKS FOR COMING (CL 2023). Every year, Nancho’s family escapes the stifling heat of Santiago to spend the summer months at the seaside. When Nancho’s father dies unexpectedly, an uncle suddenly wishes to sell the summer house instead of leaving it in the family, forcing Nancho to come up with a plan to sabotage the sale. With zest, levity, laconic wit and likeable characters, Taiyo Yamazaki’s film is devoted to the absurd intricacies of family conflicts. 

Alfredo García, producer, author and protagonist of MEETING POINT (CL 2022), directed by Roberto Baeza, is also expected to attend the festival. Alfredo and Paulina are connected by their fathers’ fates. The two men met in the torture centre Villa Grimaldi – one survived, while the other “disappeared”. As filmmakers, Alfredo and Paulina re-stage the events, casting and shooting in the presence of their parents, in an attempt to face not only family trauma, but also the difficult work of collective remembrance. A polyphonic project that provides insight into how the military dictatorship remains interwoven with Chile’s tension-filled present. 

The imaginative docu-fiction OTRO SOL (CL/FR/BE 2023), directed by Francisco Rodríguez Teare, represents a further programming highlight. The film traces the outlandish legend of the bandit Alberto Candia, notorious for organising a spectacular robbery of a Spanish cathedral. Rodríguez Teare boisterously weaves interviews, everyday observations and staged sequences shot in Chile’s Atacama Desert and Spain into a myth revolving around greed and gold, interpretive authority and the legacy of colonialism. MY BROTHERS DREAM AWAKE (CL 2021) from director Claudia Huaiquimilla, on the other hand, depicts the lived realities of a group of adolescents in prison who died in a fire during an escape attempt. Huaiquimilla portrays life behind bars unflinchingly, with great honesty, but also great tenderness and a feel for intimacy and the societal contexts and connections of violence and the penal system.  

Exhibitions and Readings 
In the scope of the supporting program, in addition to a photo exhibition of Paula Ábalos’ work at Murnau-Filmtheater, from 20 October to 17 December Nassauischer Kunstverein Wiesbaden is showing the film LOS HUESOS (2021), directed by Joaquín Cociña and Cristóbal León, which New York City’s MoMA has already acquired for its collection. The story, shot in black-and-white, plays with Chile’s past, as the fates of both Diego Portales, a representative of the oligarchy, and Jaime Guzmán, a henchman of the dictator Pinochet, lay in the hands of a young girl. 

On 21 November, Günther Wessel will be reading from his book “Salvador Allende – A Chilean Story” in the Marktkirche crypt. 11 September 2023 marked the 50^th anniversary of the military putsch led by Augusto Pinochet against Chile’s freely and democratically elected president Salvador Allende. Drawing on a host of interviews, Günther Wessel tells Allende’s life story as well as the history of the country: from the putsch to the painful struggle to restore democracy, as well as the development of the latter into the present day. 

On 20 November, Patrick Twinem will read excerpts from the 2022 novel “Camanchaca” by Chilean author Diego Zúñiga at the Literaturhaus Villa Clementine. In the book, a 20-year-old relates the story of his family while travelling across the border to Peru with his father to have some dental work done. A road-movie in prose featuring an overweight, apathetic first-person narrator who is only vaguely familiar with his family’s past. 

Matinee 

The Sunday Matinee serves as the grand finale for this year’s Country Focus on Chile at exground filmfest. On 26 November, starting at noon, LIZARDS’ TALES (CL 1989) will be shown at Caligari FilmBühne, in the presence of director Juan Carlos Bustamante, who is travelling all the way from Chile to attend the event. A sort of anthology film that is as visually striking as it is poetic, LIZARDS’ TALES, which celebrated its world premiere in Berlinale’s Forum section back in its day, will be screened at exground with the help of a 16-mm projector. The film relates three episodes from the “years of silence”, the transitional phase immediately following the state terror of the Pinochet regime. Following the screening, the curator of the Country Focus on Chile, Amos Borchert, will moderate a conversation between Bustamante (born in 1940) and the audience. 

The Country Focus is made possible once again by the generous support of Kulturfonds Frankfurt RheinMain. 

As in previous years, following the festival week selected films will also be shown at several venues in the wider Rhine-Main region: 

Pupille – Kino in der Uni, Mertonstraße 26–28, 60325 Frankfurt am Main, and Orfeos Erben, Hamburger Allee 45, 60486 Frankfurt am Main. 

The full festival program will be announced following the press conference (2 November, 11 am, Caligari FilmBühne) and will be subsequently available online at www.exground.com.  

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners!  

Partners & sponsors – exground filmfest 36 

——–  
Press contact:  
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V.  
exground filmfest  
Marta Moneva-Enchev  
presse@exground.com  
www.exground.com  

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Press release youth days

10 October 2023

20th Edition of exground youth days Presents 13 Feature-Length and Short
Films

In the scope of the 20th edition of exground youth days, this year exground filmfest is showing 13 international feature-length and short films for the young cinema audience, focussing on the lived realities of young individuals. Young people aged 12 and up can look forward to seven contemporary film productions screening from 18 to 22 November, each preceded by a supporting film, at Wiesbaden’s Caligari FilmBühne. All of the films will be shown in German or accompanied by German subtitles.

Very much in keeping with the spirit of the times, the majority of these films are the work of female directors. The youth film festival will open with LIGHT LIGHT LIGHT (FI 2023) from Finnish director Inari Niemi, who transports the audience to a village in Southern Finland around the time of the 1986 nuclear reactor meltdown in Chernobyl. Through flashbacks, Niemi’s film tells of the abrupt end of a tender love
story between two female students from completely different family backgrounds.

The exground audience will also have the opportunity to see EDGE OF EVERYTHING (US 2023), directed by Pablo Feldman and Sophia Sabella, who have already announced plans to travel to Wiesbaden for the festival. Their film revolves around 14-year-old Abby, who finds herself poised on the boundary between
childhood and adulthood. When her mother dies, she is forced to move in with her father and his younger girlfriend. Abby feels abandoned and has trouble processing her loss. With the help of new friends, parties, drugs and first sexual experiences, she attempts to move beyond her grief.

The two siblings in Linda Olte’s SISTERS (LE/IT 2023) are growing up under equally difficult circumstances: absent father, mother in prison, children in an orphanage. One day they learn that an American family would like to adopt them. While the younger girl, Diana, is immediately super keen on the idea, the older Anastasia hesitates and attempts to build a new relationship with her mother, who has been
released from jail in the meantime.

THE FANTASTIC THREE (FR 2023), directed by Michaël Dichter, also deals with parents who are effectively absent. Twelve-year-old Max and his friends Tom and Vivian represent a close-knit family-like unit. In comparison, Max’s real family is chaotic: his dad is absent, his mom apathetic. When Max’s big brother returns home from prison wearing an ankle monitor, he brings his problems with him too. Max wants to help him and tries to come up with some cash. Inevitably, he starts to experience internal conflict, as he pulls his friends along into a spiral of violence.

Out of competition, in the scope of “Kino macht Schule” (“Cinema Goes to School”), organised in co-operation with Medienzentrum Wiesbaden and the donum vitae regional association for Wiesbaden and Rheingau-Taunus-Kreis e.V., a school event will take place featuring a screening of BESTIES (FR 2021), directed by Marion Desseigne-Ravel. The film is set in summer in a Paris suburb. Nedjma roams the
streets with her girlfriends, the gang is like her second family. When she sees Zina, the new girl in the neighbourhood, for the first time, she falls head over heels instantly, but Zina belongs to a rival clique. Nedjma is torn: between her loyalty to her group and her desire for Zina, which grows stronger with every night that the two spend together in secret. A real pearl of young queer cinema from France. To inquire
about attending the screening of BESTIES on 22 November 2023 at 10:30 am, interested school classes are kindly asked to contact Medienzentrum Wiesbaden e. V. at kino@mdz-wi.de or by telephone at (+49) 0611 1665841.

International Youth Film Competition

This year’s competition films are again vying for the honour of being named best feature-length film in the scope of exground youth days. A youth jury will determine which of the directors can take home the prize money (2,500 euros), sponsored by the State Capital of Wiesbaden. In addition, an audience award will be presented, endowed with prize money in the amount of 1,000 euros sponsored by the State
Capital of Wiesbaden.

Short Films at exground youth days

The Wiesbaden youth jury will present an additional prize of 500 euros, sponsored by Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V., to the best short film. A total of six short films from Spain, Canada, the Netherlands, Germany and Uruguay will be presented individually prior to the feature-length films – including the short fiction film ECHO (ES 2023), directed by Meritxell A. Valls, and the documentary film OASIS (CA 2022) by Justine Martin, a coming-of-age story treating marginalisation. The short fiction film CAMOUFLAGE (NL 2022), directed by Bregt Verhagen, deals with the subjects of poverty and family, while the animated work IT’S NICE IN HERE (NL 2022) by Robert-Jonathan Koeyers grapples with police violence, exclusion and
racial profiling. The short fiction films BEFORE MADRID (UY 2022), directed by Ilén Juambeltz and Nicolás Botana, and DISCONNECTED (DE 2023) by Daniel Schulte treat first sexual experiences, grief and loss.

Wiesbaden Youth Film Competition

Wiesbaden’s home-grown directing talents between the ages of 12 and 18 have the chance to present their own works on the big screen for the first time. This year’s competition for the best Wiesbaden-based youth film, featuring six entries, opens on 18 November at 3 pm at Caligari FilmBühne in the scope of exground youth days. The competition features cash prizes and non-cash prize packages with a total value of 650 euros.

The full program for the festival will be announced following the press conference (2 November, 11 am, Caligari FilmBühne) and will subsequently be available online at www.exground.com. Tickets for live cinema screenings will be available from 3 November 2023 on the festival website (www.exground.com), at the tourist information counter in Wiesbaden at Marktplatz 1 or at the Caligari FilmBühne ticket
office during the festival.
exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners!

 ex36_Partner_Sponsoren_2023.pdf 

——–  
  

Press contact:  
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V.  
exground filmfest  
Marta Moneva-Enchev 

presse@exground.com  
www.exground.com  

//

Press release Save the Date

28 September 2023

Save the Date: 36^th edition of exground filmfest to take place from 17 to 26 November in Wiesbaden

For its 36^th edition, taking place from 17 to 26 November 2023 in Wiesbaden, Germany, exground filmfest is once again presenting extensive film and supporting programs. The festival features screenings of both feature-length and short works in the categories of fiction feature, documentary film, animation and experimental cinema. Accompanying discussions, exhibitions, readings and concerts, as well as a new edition of exground youth days, round out the national and international film selection.

Country Focus: Chile 

This year, exground filmfest is devoting its focus section to the country of Chile. In eleven fiction features and various documentary formats, plus a short film program, all drawn from the current or past production year, the Country Focus places young Chilean filmmakers centre-stage. The films featured here also revisit the country’s past, including the tragic year of 1973, as the Chilean government was toppled by Pinochet’s putsch. The resulting military dictatorship, which remained in power until 1990, left Chilean society deeply scarred, and has doubtlessly had a lasting impact on Chilean film culture as well. This grim legacy is still being processed today, in the hope of overcoming it. The present program examines important questions, from both serious and humorous angles, in an amalgamation of lived democracy and the will to create emancipatory art. 

Opening Film: 1976 by Manuela Martelli 

exground filmfest 36 will open with Manuela Martelli’s precisely staged political thriller 1976 (CHI 2022), which is set in the midst of the Chilean state terror of 1976. A housewife and spouse of a respected doctor, Carmen leads a well-heeled, solidly middle-class existence. The children have left the nest, and the couple has come to terms with the military dictatorship. While overseeing remodelling work on her summer house by the sea, Carmen asks a friend of hers, a priest, to help a wounded man, before resolving to leave her sheltered life behind by secretly taking on the responsibility of caring for the shooting victim herself. Manuela Martelli’s highly regarded debut demonstrates her mastery of a steady-handed directorial style that is also rich in metaphors. Her images are opulent, accentuated with atmospheric music and elegant performances. 

Opening Film at exground youth days 

The opening for this year’s edition of exground youth days also features a high-calibre work from a female filmmaker: Inari Niemi’s coming-of-age drama LIGHT LIGHT LIGHT (FIN 2023). In spring 1986, an atomic power plant went into meltdown in Soviet Chernobyl. A girl named Mimi arrives in a village in Southern Finland and proceeds to brighten up the life of 15-year-old Mariia for a moment. Twenty years later, after her life has reached an impasse, grown-up Mariia revisits her childhood home and recalls that youthful summer and the tragic autumn that followed. Amid a flood of memories, Mariia is forced to face her past. 

Highlights from the Program 

In addition to Chilean cinematic art, in the Made in Germany series exground filmfest is showing the award-winning drama EMPTY NETS (D/IRN 2023). Director Behrooz Karamizadeh employs a strong visual language to depict inequalities in society. The young Iranian Amir hires on with a fisherman on the raw coast of the Caspian Sea, with the aim of saving up the money he needs to marry his true love Narges. In the process, he becomes entangled in the criminal machinations of illegal caviar poaching. An oppressive parallel world reveals itself, altering Amir’s relationship to Narges and ultimately closing the door on the marriage that has for so long been his deepest wish. 

The political thriller MINSK (EST 2022) from director Boris Guts is a particular stand-out in the European Cinema series. In the film, set in August 2020 in the days following the manipulated presidential election in Belarus, while out for an evening stroll in downtown Minsk a newly-wed couple gets caught up in clashes between protestors and masked, heavily-armed thugs from the state security forces, who begin to beat up and arrest everyone without warning, including random passers-by. Shot in real time in a single take, Guts’ virtuoso outing unfolds into a dynamic choreography of horror.

Nicholaus Goossen’s comedy DRUGSTORE JUNE (US 2022) is screening in the American Independents series. After the pharmacy in her small town gets robbed, a young woman who still lives with her parents takes it upon herself to solve the case, while simultaneously attempting to get over her ex-boyfriend and become more mature.

Exhibition at Murnau-Filmtheater and Video Art at Nassauischer Kunstverein 

Alongside the traditional photo exhibition at Murnau-Filmtheater, in the scope of the supporting program Nassauischer Kunstverein Wiesbaden is showing the film LOS HUESOS (2021), directedby Joaquín Cociña and Cristóbal León, which New York City’s MoMA has already acquired for its collection. The exhibition runs from 20 October to 17 December. Featuring classic stop-motion effects and puppet animation and inspired by Władysław Starewicz’s animated film experiments with insects, the film depicts two “corpses” and a puppet as they are brought to life. The story itself, told in black and white, plays with Chile’s past, as the fates of Diego Portales, a representative of the oligarchy, and Jaime Guzmán, a henchman of the dictator Pinochet, both lie in the hands of a little girl.

The complete festival program will be announced following the press conference (2 November, 11 am, Caligari FilmBühne) and available online at www.exground.com.

 exground filmfest would like to thank all its supporters and co-operation partners! 

 ex36_Partner_Sponsoren_2023.pdf

——– 

Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 

presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com 

exground filmfest Opens 37^th Edition with Numerous International Guests

This evening, exground filmfest will celebrate its opening in Wiesbaden in the presence of the city’s Head of Cultural Affairs Dr. Hendrik Schmehl and Karin Wolff, CEO of Kulturfonds Frankfurt RheinMain. Joined by a host of special local and international guests, the festival will be kicking off its 37^th edition at Caligari FilmBühne with a screening of the French film THE STORY OF SOULEYMANE (FR 2024), directed by Boris Lojkine. This haunting drama about a bicycle deliveryman in Paris – the exploited refugee Souleymane of the film’s title – is also a worthy start to this year’s thematic focus on flight and expulsion – even more so, as lead actor Abou Sangare has just recently been nominated for a European Film Award for his gripping performance.

exground filmfest recommends a look at the following overview to get an impression of the multi-faceted program that awaits over the coming festival days.

Program Highlights

On Saturday, 16 November, exground filmfest is showing Mahdi Fleifel‘s extraordinarily authentic thriller TO A LAND UNKNOWN (GB/FR/GR/NL/QA/SA 2024), which is set in Athens. Cousins Chatila and Reda pursue petty crime and sex work to scrape together some cash and obtain fake passports in order to continue their journey to Western Europe. Mahdi Fleifel has managed to create a compelling buddy movie about the melancholy nature of exile.

Johanné Gómez Terrero‘s SUGAR ISLAND (DO/ES 2024), an anti-racist, decolonial manifesto honoured with multiple awards in Venice, will give viewers the opportunity to immerse themselves in a spiritual world on Sunday, 17 November. Makenya, a Dominican-Haitian teenager who lives with her grandfather, an activist for workers’ pension rights, and her mother, a devotee of Afro-Dominican spirituality, in a community surrounded by sugar cane fields, is forced to grow up when she experiences an unwanted pregnancy. Editor Raúl Barreras will be on hand for the film screening.

Also screening on the second day of the weekend, fittingly, is the bittersweet comedy MOST PEOPLE DIE ON SUNDAYS (AR/IT/ES 2024), with director Iair Said in attendance. David, an overweight gay man in his mid-thirties who is afraid of flying, returns to Buenos Aires from Europe for his uncle’s funeral. When his mother reveals that she plans to switch off his father’s ventilator, he vacillates between the close bond he shares with her and the strong, perhaps selfish desire to overcome his existential fears.

On Monday, 18 November, Jannis Alexander Kiefer, who has previously been honoured at exground filmfest for several of his short films,will be making a return to the festival to present his quirky, magnificently cast feature-film debut. ANOTHER GERMAN TANK STORY (DE 2024) takes the audience to Wiesenwalde, where there is normally nothing going on – that is, until a Hollywood film crew shows up to shoot a series about the Second World War. The villagers chase their dreams, though a sudden power outage threatens to nix all of their plans and causes old stories to resurface.

The Iranian drama THE OLD BACHELOR (IR 2024), directed by Oktay Baraheni, will also be shown on Monday, with the film’s producer Hanif Sorouri in attendance. In an economically depressed Iran, two middle-aged brothers live with their tyrannical father. The man, prone to outbursts of rage and driven by male chauvinism, was left by his second wife, who he subjected to abuse. Now he bullies his eldest son, while the younger brother contemplates how he might be able to kill his father. A Greek tragedy in a modern guise.

Last but not least, Monday evening the beloved exground GONG SHOW is back again at Caligari FilmBühne – everyone is warmly invited to attend (admission is free!), whether with their own films or as fans of trashy cinema.

On Tuesday, 19 November, director Justine Bauer will personally present her work MILCH INS FEUER (DE 2024) and field questions from the audience. The film revolves around three generations of female farmers living under one roof. Anna is pregnant and thinking about castration, while Katinka, who wears her bikini in the milking parlour, may not be able to become a farmer at all. A summer spent on fading farms. Justine Bauer’s feature-film debut is more than just a drama shot in dialect, it is also a compelling tale of a life lived close to animals and nature – and of a young farmer searching for her own path between self-discovery and family tradition. Janis Schmidt, director of the supporting film ESSEN BESTELLEN (DE 2024), will also be making a guest appearance at Murnau-Filmtheater.

On Wednesday, 20 November, director Benjamin Pfohl will also be present for a Q&A following the screening of his film JUPITER (DE 2023). The comet is coming! At least that is what his film’s protagonists believe. 14-year-old Lea is torn from the life she’s accustomed to in a flash when her parents take her and her brother off to the mountains. Her family has become enmeshed in a cosmic cult promising salvation on a higher plane of existence on Jupiter. Little by little, Lea’s memories reveal her family’s struggle to find stability in life, while she is forced to choose between death and a life of self-determination on Earth. The star-studded debut film is based on the short film of the same name which won an award at exground filmfest in 2019.

Cinema fans should make sure not to miss Marcelo Gaetano‘s gripping drama BABY (BR/FR/NL 2024) on Wednesday. The director will also be participating in a Q&A. After his release from juvenile detention, Wellington finds himself alone on the streets of São Paulo. His parents have moved away without leaving any contact information, and he has neither a place to stay nor the money to build a new life. While frequenting an adult movie theatre, he meets Ronaldo, an older escort. The experienced hustler takes Wellington under his wing and introduces him to the ins and outs of the scene.

On Thursday, 21 November, Oksana Karpovych’s INTERCEPTED (CA/FR/UA 2024) takes the audience along to the warzones of Ukraine. A film talk with producer Olha Beskhmelnytsina will take place following the screening. A child on a swing, seemingly carefree and light, then burned-out tanks on the side of the road. Suddenly we hear voices in Russian. “Hi Mama, can you take a moment to talk?” – the first in a series of phone calls between Russian soldiers and their families. Combined with often tableau-like footage of destroyed Ukrainian cities and villages, they generate a haunting sort of friction.

Tickets for the 37^th edition of exground filmfest are available online at www.exground.com. They can also be found here in the exground filmfest app.

Please feel free to contact us regarding press accreditation for exground filmfest 37.

exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners! 

ex37_Partners_Sponsors_2024.pdf

——– 
Press contact: 
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V. 
exground filmfest 
Marta Moneva-Enchev 
presse@exground.com 
www.exground.com