Press Release – 20 October 2025
exground filmfest 38: Thematic Focus “Courageously Utopian”
From 14 to 23 November, exground filmfest offers a wide range of opportunities for guests to expand their film horizons. Whether it’s through the extensive supporting program or in direct conversation with filmmakers from all over the world, the possibilities are plentiful. Following a time-honoured exground tradition, the festival is once again adding special accents and contours to its programming with its beloved Focus section. This year the festival is devoting its attention to films that can be deliberately and imaginatively grouped under the slogan “Courageously Utopian”.
But why feature such a motto at this particular moment in time? Since the very beginning, exground filmfest has been a platform for socio-political exchange and dialogue. Whereas last year’s thematic focus on “Flight and Expulsion” aimed to expose the causes of deepening crises around the globe, the films of exground filmfest’s 38th edition will present alternative visions. Climate change, armed conflicts, hunger and famine, human rights violations, the absence of the rule of law, persecution, neo-colonial exploitation and the lack of economic prospects remain among the major challenges facing the world today. Now, in a fine selection of international productions, including both fictional and documentary works, the festival is placing a close look at diverse approaches to dealing with these challenges centre-stage.
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
On 14 November at 7 pm, the 38th edition of exground filmfest will open with a screening of a brilliant production from this year’s Focus program. In the presence of Hesse’s State Minister for Science and Research, Arts and Culture, Timon Gremmels, MEMORY OF PRINCESS MUMBI (CH/KE/SA 2025) will be presented in the Atelier of Apollo Kinocenter. Damien Hauser‘sfilm transcends genre and convention. In what is essentially an intense examination of our current relationship with AI technology, this film paints an Afrofuturistic vision of the future based on the tragic life of the actress Mumbi.
European Film Award nominee ANCESTRAL VISIONS OF THE FUTURE (FR/LS/DE/QA/SA 2025) proves that utopian visions can also be conceived in a completely different way. With this work, Lemohang Mosese has created a visually stunning associative kaleidoscope composed of documentary scenes and poetic arrangements. The director reflects on his own childhood in Lesotho, the social experiences of domination and violence, as well as his own intimate feelings of alienation in Berlin, where the artist currently resides. Underpinned by the life philosophy of Ubuntu, this personal journey unites past, present and future in a lyrical declaration of love to cinema.
The drama CACTUS PEARS (IN/CA/GB 2025) also plays with the tension between origins, tradition and one’s own personal feelings. With his father’s death, Anand is obligated to take part in a ten-day burial ceremony that couldn’t be further removed from his everyday life. He seeks refuge in a secretly budding romance with his neighbour Balya, which brings both of them, as gay men, into conflict with their families’ traditions. Inspired by his own experiences, Rohan Parashuram Kanawade‘s serene directorial debut depicts an approach to queer lifestyles based on love and acceptance.
The struggle for acceptance is also a key theme in Ivette Löcker‘s documentary OUR TIME WILL COME (AT 2025). Löcker follows Siaka and Victoria, a couple, in their attempt to build a future for themselves between Austria and Gambia. In front of the camera, the two partners reflect on differences in culture and character and grappling with circumstances. For their path to a little piece of private utopia is repeatedly beset with obstacles, whether rooted in red tape, racism or unprocessed trauma. With great sensitivity, the film documents the struggle for recognition and the will to grow, on both a personal and societal level.
By contrast, Karim Dridi‘s LAZY GIRLS (FR 2024), a genuine punk-rock road movie, brings a little levity to the Focus program. After the police tear apart the squat they call home, Nina and Djoul cruise off towards the sun. On their way to who-knows-where they repeatedly ask themselves fundamental questions: Where do we go from here? Who can we trust? And most of all: How does love fit into a life like this? A story of unbridled freedom and friendship on the highways and byways of France.
Co-incidentally, the documentary film RED FOREST (FR 2025) was shot just a few kilometres away, in Western France. Director Laurie Lasalle portrays a community that managed to prevent the construction of an airport in an effort to preserve biodiversity. However, this is by no means the end of the story: even after the government abandoned the construction project in 2018, the state’s power is omnipresent and threatens to destroy the co-operation and solidarity present in the region. In an era of ecological dystopias, this film clearly sympathises with the activists’ unflinching will to resist.
Constanze Ruhm‘sessay film IT IS AT THIS POINT THAT THE NEED TO WRITE HISTORY ARISES (AT/ PT 2024) is also filled with the spirit of resistance. Together with a handful of fellow seekers, the director sets out in search of an alternative historiography. Full of striking images, her film travels through time and, in sensual re-enactments, brings to light the work of proto-feminist groups throughout history. A film that encourages us to explore the past and question existing historiography in equal measure.
Brandon Kramer‘s profoundly personal documentary HOLDING LIAT (USA 2025) tears us back to the present. This work documents the fate of a family within the Israel-Palestine conflict. Liat and her husband Aviv were considered missing from 7 October 2023, suspected of having been taken hostage by Hamas. The film bears witness to Liat’s extended family’s efforts to cope in the period of political tension and uncertainty. Her father Yehuda and her son Netta travel all the way to Washington to advocate for empathy and reconciliation on both sides. A moving yet universal documentary film that remains highly relevant, especially considering the development of the conflict.
The plot of the next film is also determined by a personal destiny. In the character drama SORRY, BABY (US 2025), a visit from Agnes’ best girlfriend reveals her own traumatic past. Non-binary US-American blogger Eva Victor plays the lead role in their own directorial debut with emotional depth and humour. A film about the utopian potential of friendship, about an emancipatory way of dealing with sexualised violence, about the serpentine paths of healing and the varied forms of standing up: for each other and for oneself.
A final recommendation goes to the drama SUÇUARANA (BR 2024), from directorial duo Clarissa Campolina und Sérgio Borges. In this film, Dora, accompanied by a stray dog, sets off in search of a mythical homeland known as Suçuarana. Her life is one of constant motion, though when she witnesses an assault and subsequently encounters a group of workers, she considers settling down for the first time. Together, they live according to principles of solidarity. On a small scale, a utopian alternative to the capitalist logic of exploitation seems possible, but Dora feels the inexorable pull of the road. Whether it is a place or a community, even utopia is subject to constant change.
Exhibitions, Reading and Discussion
As in the previous years, exground filmfest has assembled an extensive supporting program for the thematic focus. From 15 November, starting at 6 pm, until 23 November, an award-winning photography exhibition will be presented at Murnau-Filmtheater. In her series of pictures entitled “Underneath the Calm Streets of Iran”, photojournalist Forough Alaei portrays resistance to prevailing social constraints in the Middle-Eastern country. In rich colours, her photographs capture the work of women who, whether as motorcyclists or mechanics, are breaking down Iran’s patriarchal norms and contributing to social change. Admission to the exhibition is free!
The festival’s co-operation with Nassauischer Kunstverein Wiesbaden (nkv) also continues this year. In the scope of the supporting program, exground filmfest is delighted to present a work by Georgian video artist Tekla Aslanishvili under the title SCENES FROM TRIAL AND ERROR, which will be on display at nkv from 17 October 2025 to 11 Januar 2026.The piece, which received a Special Mention at Videonale.18, documents the conditions within the failed city of the future, Anaklia. Tekla Aslanishvili takes an ambivalent look at the construction project in the Georgian city, which fell through due to allegations of money laundering, among other things. In documentary mode, she gives various voices within the project a chance to speak and reveals why the constructed utopia on the Black Sea fell apart before it could even be realised.
Alongside films and photographs, literature has also been a long-standing component of exground filmfest. On Friday, 21 November at 7:30 pm, Literaturhaus Villa Clementine will host a reading by Sascha Reh, from his novel”Biotopia”. The conversation will be moderated by Dr. Viola Bolduan – and organised by Förderverein Wiesbadener Literaturhaus Villa Clementine e.V. in co-operation with exground filmfest. In his science-fiction novel, the multi-award-winning author examines the conditions inside the community-oriented vertical-farm Biotopia. However, there appears to be much more hidden behind the façade of this ecological paradise than one might initially assume. In a tension-filled dystopian scenario, Sascha Reh takes up contemporary developments and the effects of external technological control on individual humans and thinks them through to their logical endpoint.
The PANEL DISCUSSION ON THE THEMATIC FOCUS “COURAGEOUSLY UTOPIAN”, which takes place at 3 pm on Saturday, 22 November, at Murnau-Filmtheater, offers an ideal opportunity to reflect on the impressions gathered throughout the Focus program. What utopian potential lies within cinematic narratives? How do people talk about it? What aesthetic means can be used to depict visions of the future or utopias that have already been realised? Why are dystopian scenarios so popular, and where might positive visions be hiding in other forms of expression? Amos Borchert, curator of the thematic focus “Courageously Utopian”, will be discussing these questions with art scholar and theoretician Sebastian Mühl (“Utopien der Gegenwartskunst”, 2020) and several of the filmmakers featured in the section. Admission to the panel discussion is free!
Sunday Matinee Featuring Cult Solarpunk Classic from Japan
Our traditional Sunday Matinee concludes this year’s “Courageously Utopian” thematic focus with a screening of a true classic of the solarpunk genre. At twelve noon on 23 November at Murnau-Filmtheater, NAUSICAÄ OF THE VALLEY OF THE WIND (JP 1984) promises to transport the Matinee audience far into the future, to a magical world long after the fall of civilization as we know it. In this early-period work from renowned director Hayao Miyazaki, humanslive in harmony with nature and technology. Alas, when toxic spores and gigantic insectoid creatures begin to spread across neighbouring regions, Princess Nausicaä sets out in search of the source of this menacing development. A gem of Japanese animated film art.
New Audience Award in Thematic Focus “Courageously Utopian”
This year marks the first appearance of an audience award for the best feature film in the Focus section, made possible with the generous support of stadtmobil Rhein-Main GmbH and endowed with 1,000 euros in prize money.
The focus program is already available here.
The full festival program will be announced following the annual festival press conference (29 October, 11 am, in room 107 of Rathaus Wiesbaden) and subsequently available online at http://www.exground.com.
exground filmfest would like to thank all of its supporters and co-operation partners!
ex38_Partners_Sponsors_2025.pdf
Press contact:
Wiesbadener Kinofestival e. V.
exground filmfest
Marta Moneva-Enchev
presse@exground.com
www.exground.com