It’s been more than a week since the impressing closing event of Berlinale, the award ceronomy, and we are still gladly looking back on all the great films that were part of the Berlinale Shorts Programme. Let us get a deeper insight in the new work of Vergine Keaton!
Born in Lyon, France in 1981, the filmmaker studied graphic design and film. Her short film ‚je criais contre la vie. ou pour elle.‘ (2007) was screened at countless festivals including Cannes as part of the ACID official selection. She followed it with ‚Marzevan‘which was shown at Les Sommets du cinéma d’animation in Montreal, in Belo Horizonte, at Animanima and Riverside. At this year’s Berlinale Vergine Keaton presents her new film ‚Le Tigre de Tasmanie‚:
‚A thylacine, also known as Tasmanian tiger, paces back and forth inside a zoo. The footage dates back to the 1930s. The last Tasmanian tiger passed away in 1936 – Benjamin. A glacier is gradually melting, there’s no stopping it. Everything is white. Fire follows ice, in the form of an erupting volcano. The forests buckle and collapse under the burden of the lava that spreads out on top of them. Nature exceeds the edges of the screen and reinvents itself. Keaton’s images take their bearings from Romantic-era painting and Symbolism. The sounds of the French musical collective Les Marquises, situated somewhere between neofolk and industrial, underscore the chance of the new inherent in the destruction: dark, sinister, driving, unique and fantastic. Can, must nature empower itself in order to pre-empt its own extinction?‘ (Maike Mia Höhne)
I wanted to work on increasing acuity: by the repetition of motifs, by the change of scale, I was aiming at gradually seeing the slightest movements and materials in the image. In other words, I wanted detail to become an event. See nature, its power, its character, infinitely lively. None of these forms seem frozen or permanent.
What do you like about the short form?
Short movies enable working on rapid and brutal forms. I also like the possibility it leaves for experimentation and research during the shooting phase.
What are your future plans?
I would like to promote the idea of exhausting movements and images. I would love to spread this idea to a longer period. Right now, I am working on an installation about Dante’s ‚Inferno‘ and I just started writing an animated feature film.
Adults and children at the same time, young people are confronted with a tradition that (still) does not belong to them. Between rebellion and joy, two parallel beings coexist within that temporary limbo that is the young body. Limbo or paradise? „The places of memory are the cities of others,“ writes Maike Mia Höhne when presenting the programme of the Berlinale Shorts 2018.
Still from ‚T.R.A.P‘
Ready for the ritual and the game, the three characters of „T.R.A.P„ (Manque La Banca, Argentina) cross a secret jungle, they dirty their boots in the mud, they make their way through the reeds, perhaps with the intention of conquering a city, that city of others. They are not casually dressed (wearing costumes?) as medieval warriors. They walk and play in the jungle, they visit a grave, they kiss. Is that a parallel world or an ideal world? The idyllic jungle is over, they talk about the present, they get into a car. On the radio, the voice of a journalist: news about the Santiago Maldonado case, dead in a river, killed by (para)police repression in the immense cold of Patagonia. The young warriors of „T.R.A.P“ can no longer be innocent. Something disquiet them. Something awakened them. It is the clash between the ideal universe and the brutal reality. That is: youth.
Still from ‚Imfura‘
In „Imfura“ (Samuel Ishimwe, Rwanda) there is also a young man and he is called Gisa. Gisa visits the village of his (dead) mother to witness a dispute surrounding an inheritance: nothing more than the ruins of a house destroyed during the genocide. Ruins in the jungle. Away from sentimental images, Samuel Ishimwe (cameraman, director and editor of the film) accompanies his protagonist with serenity and patience. And trusting that only filming those spaces, those landscapes, those faces, will reveal something about that dead mother, whom Gisa never knew. There is not much that can be told about her, they say to Gisa, but the memory is in his body, they also tell him. To exorcise the past he must visit the present. He has to witness a celebration, accompany the fishermen in their work, he has to witness the (exemplary) civic-legal debate about the inheritance, he has to wander around. Simply be there and be part. During youth, past and future mean present. Samuel Ishimwe trusts on the idea that cinema is the art of present.
There is no city in „City of Tales“, (Arash Nassiri, France) or, if there is one, it is imaginary, fictional, hybrid, and its name is spelled in Persian, although we are in Los Angeles. It is night, and it seems like an eternal night. A group of young people seem to prepare a night ambush, armed only with flashlights. But this colorful night is not magic. Although yes what happens. Linguistic colonization? Poetic justice? Young African-Americans are rapping, but in Persian, with a marked doubtful pronunciation; they have their headphones on, they are standing outside a mini-market, and they are singing memories (of others) of the Tehran of the 1960s and 1970s. A taxi driver repeats, while driving, sentences in Persian. Is he learning the language or is he possessed? Arash Nassiri tells it in a conversation with the spectators after the screening: several urbanizations and buildings of the Tehran from 1960-1970 were built in the image and likeness of the Los Angeles of that time. In some cases even architects from USA were hired. In this film, for one night, the memories and sounds of the past invade the streets and images of the present, in the city of others.
(Alejo Franzetti)
IDEAL TERRIBLE: JUVENTUD
Adultos y niños al mismo tiempo, los jóvenes se confrontan con una tradición que (aún) no les pertenece. Entre la rebelión y la alegría, dos seres paralelos conviven dentro de ese limbo pasajero que es el cuerpo joven. ¿Limbo o paraíso?
„Los lugares de la memoria son las ciudades de los otros“, escribe Maike Mia Höhne al presentar el programa de los Berlinale Shorts 2018.
Listos para el ritual y el juego, los tres personajes de “T.R.A.P” (Manque La Banca, Argentina) atraviesan una jungla secreta, ensucian sus botas en el lodo, se abren paso entre los juncos, quizás con la intención de conquistar una ciudad, esa ciudad de los otros. No casualmente están vestidos (¿Disfrazados?) como guerreros medievales. Caminan y juegan en la jungla, visitan una tumba, se besan. ¿Es un mundo paralelo o un mundo ideal? La jungla idílica se termina, se habla del presente, se suben a un auto. En la radio, la voz de un locutor: noticias del caso Santiago Maldonado, muerto en un río, asesinado por la represión (para)policial en el frío inmenso de la Patagonia. Los jóvenes guerreros de “T.R.A.P” ya no pueden ser inocentes. Algo los inquieta. Algo los despabila. Es el choque entre el universo ideal y la realidad brutal. Es decir: la juventud.
En “Imfura” (Samuel Ishimwe, Ruanda) también hay un joven y se llama Gisa. Gisa visita el pueblo de su madre (muerta) para ser testigo de una disputa alrededor de una herencia: nada más que las ruinas de una casa destruida durante el genocidio. Ruinas en la jungla. Alejado de imágenes sentimentalistas, Samuel Ishimwe (camarógrafo, director y montajista del film) acompaña a su protagonista con serenidad y paciencia. Y confiando en que solo filmando esos espacios, esos paisajes, esos rostros, podrá revelarse algo sobre esa madre muerta, a quien Gisa jamás conoció. No hay mucho que pueda contarse sobre ella, le dicen a Gisa, pero la memoria está en tu cuerpo, le dicen también. Para exorcizar el pasado tiene que visitar el presente. Debe presenciar un festejo, acompañar a los pescadores en su trabajo, tiene que presenciar un debate cívico-jurídico (ejemplar), tiene que recorrer. Simplemente estar ahí y formar parte. Durante la juventud, pasado y futuro significan presente. En “Imfura”, Samuel Ishimwe confía en que el cine es el arte del presente.
No hay ciudad en “City of Tales”, (Arash Nassiri, Francia) o, si la hay, es imaginaria, ficticia, híbrida, y su nombre se pronuncia en Persa, aunque estemos en Los Angeles. Es de noche, y pareciera una noche eterna. Un grupo de jóvenes pareciera preparar una emboscada nocturna, simplemente armados con linternas. Pero esta noche colorida no es mágica. Aunque sí lo que sucede. ¿Colonización lingüística? ¿Justicia poética? Jóvenes afro-americanos rapean, pero en Persa, con una pronunciación marcadamente dudosa; tienen los auriculares puestos, están parados a la salida de un minimercado, y cantan recuerdos (de otros) de la Teheran de los años 1960 y 1970. Un taxista repite, mientras maneja, oraciones en Persa. ¿Aprende el idioma o está poseído? Arash Nassiri lo cuenta en una conversación con el público luego de la proyección: varias urbanizaciones y edificios de la Teheran de 1960-1970 fueron construidos a imagen y semejanza de la Los Angeles de ese entonces. En algunos casos se contrató incluso directamente a arquitectos norteamericanos. En este film, por una noche, los recuerdos y sonidos del pasado invaden las imágenes y las calles del presente, en la ciudad de los otros.
Samuel Ishimwe won the Silver Bear Jury Price (Short Film) with his work „Imfura„. Even though the festival is already over – we won’t hesitate and provide you with an interview of the filmmaker.
Born in Rwanda in 1991, Samuel Ishimwe worked as a journalist and photographer and attended several film workshops. His short films have been screened at various festivals including Durban International Film Festival in South Africa. In June 2017 the filmmaker completed a film degree at the Geneva School of Art and Design (HEAD). With „Imfura“ it is Samuels first time at Berlinale.
‘My mum left me when I was a baby, she never saw a celebration, and she’ll never see one. Oh generation of god.’ In Kinyarwanda „Imfura“ means first-born, the noble one, gentleman. Gisa, a young man, travels to his mother’s village. He never got to know her, since she disappeared in the genocide. Gisa wants to comprehend, to remember, so he meets those who remain. Much has changed. Various chants and rituals guide him in his search. The memory is inside him, the midwife says, has always been with him. He is not alone. He is alone however when he is suddenly forced to choose a position in a fight over an inheritance, a shell of a house. The ruins represent the visible remains of the genocide. The film’s hybrid form, its fusion of documentary and staged material, gives it a great sense of immediacy. Imfura is the first Rwandan production to be included in the competition of Berlinale Shorts. (Maike Mia Höhne)
Still from „Imfura“
What is your ambition in the film?
When I wrote the film I was living for the first time outside my country Rwanda. In the loneliness and quietness of Switzerland I was able to reflect on myself and people close to me in a deeper perspective for the first time. The goal was to express this perspective through the film, in the most dignifying and poetic way possible.
What do you like about the short form?
The great thing about short form is that it challenges the filmmaker to do something different and unique in order to stand out from thousands of other filmmaker making short films. The short form gives the freedom to explore the beauty in simplicity.
What are your future plans?
I’m currently developing a feature film which will share the cast, locations and environment with my short film „Imfura“. I developed a special relationship with the people I made my short film with and I want to create more with them.
Ach ja, diese Jugend! Onkel Oscar Wilde witzelte zwar, dass „das Problem mit der Jugend ist, dass sie an die Jungen verschwendet ist“, andererseits hat er älteren Semestern auch keinen Trost anzubieten: „Sobald die Leute alt genug sind, es besser zu wissen, wissen sie überhaupt nichts mehr.“ Jaja, die Erwachsenen wissen alles über das Leben, außer wie man eines führt. Verlassen wir also getrost die soziologisierende und pädagogisierende Talkshow-Runde (niemand ist hier unter 40plus) zum Thema „Die Zukunft unserer Jugend“ und geben uns einem Film hin, der das Innenleben und die Befindlichkeit dieses Lebensabschnitts ganz wunderbar erforscht.
„Onde o Verao vai (episodios da juventude)“
Ein zärtlicher, zu nichts verpflichtender, wie aus der Zeit gefallener (völlig handyfreier!) bukolischer Sommertag. Süßer Vogel Jugend … Vier junge Männer und zwei junge Frauen machen einen Ausflug zu einem kleinen Fluss in einem Wäldchen. Nichts Besonderes geschieht, und dennoch alles. Ein konventioneller Plot ist nicht zu erkennen. „Onde o Verao vai (episodios da juventude)“ von David Vicente ist ein lyrisches Filmpoem, so als hätten sich Eric Rohmer, André Téchiné und ein altersmilder Robert Bresson (der in seinen letzten Filmen nur noch junge „Modelle“ – wie er seine SchauspielerInnen nannte – einsetzte) zusammengetan, um das Aroma, die Essenz eines bestimmten jugendlichen, flüchtigen Zustandes in dem Bewusstsein einzufangen, dass es kein Entkommen aus der Falle der Zeit gibt. Den Tag also einfach in goldene Splitter zerschlagen … Träge Verspieltheit also, eine Art süßer Betäubung, ein Schuss Überdruss und auch Langeweile, drängendes Verlangen und eine alles, auch die Natur animistisch durchdringende Erotik. Steht diese Gruppe etwa kurz vor der Einschiffung nach Kythera, der Insel der Liebe (wie auf den entsprechenden Gemälden von Watteau)? Auf diesen sorgfältig komponierten Tableaux vivants fällt aber auch der Schatten des Sündenfalls, die anstehende abendliche Vertreibung aus diesem Paradies. Hier wird nicht viel geredet, da teilt der Film bezüglich der menschlichen Sprache den Pessimismus Bressons, wie er am radikalsten in „Le diable probablement“ zum Ausdruck kommt. So bewegen sich diese jungen Menschen hin zu einer unbekannten Zukunft, und die dunklen und die hellen Augenblicke werden vorüberziehen und vielleicht ein Geheimnis enthüllen, dessen Namen sie noch nicht kennen …
Die Einschiffung nach Kythera Jean-Antoine Watteau, 1710
Congratulations to our wonderful winners of the Golden Bear for Best Short Film and the Silver Bear Jury Prize (Short Film), the Audi Short Film Award as well as the Berlin Short Film Nominee for the European Film Awards!
Impressive Ines Moldavsky got the Golden Bear for Best Short Film with „The Men Behind the Wall“!
„Everything could be so simple if she weren‘t in Isreal and the guys nearby that Tinder suggests in search mode weren‘t in the Westbank. Israeli filmmaker Ines Moldavsky makes herself the subject of her own investigation.“ (Maike Mia Höhne / Curator of Berlinale Shorts)
Silver Bear Jury Prize (Short Film) for the first Rwandan production in the competition of Berlinale Shorts: „IMFURA“ by Samuel Ishimwe!
“In the loneliness and quietness of Switzerland I was able to reflect on myself and people close to me. The goal in the film was to express this perspective in the most dignifying and poetic way possible.“ (Samuel Ishimwe)
Congrats! Audi Short Film Award 2018, endowed with € 20,000, enabled by Audi for “Solar Walk” by Réka Bucsi.
„It was to make a movie, that just gets the viewer out of their skin for the time they are watching it. I wanted to create a careless journey through mind and space.” (Réka Bucsi)
The Berlin Short Film Nominee for the European Film Award 2018 goes to “Burkina Brandenburg Komplex” by Ulu Braun!
„A presumably African village, inhabited by Germans. The Film describes a geographical construction that makes use of “our” medial and collective image of Africa and puts it to the test through inaccuracies.” (Ulu Braun)
Bárbara Wagner and Benjamin de Burca are back at Berlinale Shorts and gave us an impression of their ambition in the new film and told us about future projects.
Born in Brasilia, Brazil in 1980, Bárbara Wagner graduated from the Dutch Art Institute in Arnhem in 2012. Since 2011 Bárbara has been collaborating with Benjamin de Burca, who was born in Munich, Germany in 1975 and studied fine art at the Glasgow School of Art and the University of Ulster. Their work has featured at festivals and in exhibitions including at VideoBrasil, the Panorama de Arte Brasileira and the Biennale, all in São Paulo, and at the 2017 Skulptur Projekte Münster. Now based in Recife, Brazil, their collaborative film „Estás vendo coisas“ screened in the 2017 Berlinale Shorts.
This year the filmmaker duo is back with their new work „Terremoto Santo“ – A film about the historically Pernambuco state in the northeast of Brasil that was characterised agriculturally by the sugarcane industry. Today there is a new sector in the economy: various evangelical Christian groups are on the rise. The mantra of the evangelicals is the attainment of improvements in one’s personal and economic situations through adherence to an extreme religious practice. „Terremoto Santo“ focuses on a young generation of priests, producers and singers who hail from a rural area and make gospel music. The filmmakers take into account the environment of the protagonists in order to make ethics, morality and life visible in an aesthetic agglomeration.
Still from „Terremoto Santo“
What is your ambition in the film?
We are interested in cinema as a form of conversation, which means we don’t think of our films as being ‚about‘ a subject, but ‚in a negotiation with‘ the players of the music genre we are looking at. In ‚Terremoto Santo‘ (as was also the case in ‚Estás Vendo Coisas‘, 67th Berlinale Shorts) we come closer to artists of a young generation who are transforming popular traditions into a contemporary social-media oriented phenomenon. It’s a musical informed by the aesthetics of Gospel songs in a moment when we see the rise of the evangelic church reflected in a massive shift of values in Brazilian society. If it’s important to talk about them, it’s even more crucial to be able to talk to them.
What do you like about the short form?
The nature of short films suits the experimentation we are trying to develop in our practice between visual art and cinema. So, it’s more about how our works reach people whether they are in a museum or in a cinema than about the duration of the short form: a bad film can seem long, while a good film can seem too short regardless of the length it has.
What are your future plans?
We are soon joining a group of poets who are changing how hiphop is perceived in Canada in the production of a new short film that will be exhibited in Front International in July. Back in Brazil, we are further developing a script that might result in a more operatic piece… a feature maybe?
Let us introduce you to the indian director Payal Kapadia, who is participating in this year’s Berlinale Shorts competition.
Born in Mumbai, India in 1986, she is a filmmaker who initially studied economics and worked in advertising before, in 2012, taking up a degree in film directing at the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune. Payals short films have already screened at various festivals including the Cinéfondation at the 2017 Festival de Cannes. With her shortfilm „And What Is the Summer Saying„, the director is represented for the first time at Berlinale Shorts.
The film tells the story of an indian village: The summer has its own songs. Whispering softly, they make their way to us from the depths of the jungle. Once a tiger prowled the village. The father doesn’t tell his son about this, as he holds him tight. In calm takes that concede the jungle its beauty, stature and deep serenity, the images move between the immediate and the totality, between the all-too-human and the awareness of the gods who will protect the village. The stories that the villagers tell the director follow a similar order in their sequencing. One leads to the next by association, thus opening up a village cosmos in which the old coexists with the new. Suddenly they appear, the forest creatures – only to vanish the next moment. A strange smoke exudes from the ground, like a dream from a bygone era. ‘People only sing, when they are in love with someone,’ the woman whispers – the day is done. For a brief moment the film is bathed once again in colour.
Still from „And What Is the Summer Saying“
What is your ambition in the film?
I am interested in that which is not easily seen or cannot be spoken about in the open. Secret desires, anxieties, and unspoken love are difficult for women to openly talk about in India. But if you sit quietly, waiting for the wind in the courtyard of the village, you might hear a whisper of a long lost love. I spent many days in this village, waiting for the wind to bring with it some strands of stories like leaves that fall in the forest floor.
What do you like about the short form?
What is exciting about the short film format is that it’s closest to poetry. Like a haiku, or a short poem, that has seemingly unrelated lines – where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. It doesn’t need to be explained. You look it at it, as it is. No need to ask: ‚And then?‘
What are your future plans?
The short format really excites me as it is so flexible and open. I am looking forward to try out the possibilities in feature films but also expanding to a cinematic experience which is not limited to the cinema.
Clément Pinteaux was born in Paris, France in 1992 and studied literature and philosophy. The young filmmaker took up an editing course at La Fémis film school in Paris in 2013. His films blend fictional, documentary and mythical narratives. „Des jeunes filles disparaissent (Young Girls Vanish)“ is Cléments graduation film and at the same time his first film to be screened at Berlinale.
„De jeunes filles disparaissent (Young Girls Vanish)“ tells the story of 58 girls that were devoured by a wolf in French Essonne between 1652 and 1657. Four centuries later, young women are disappearing again in the same region. Clément Pinteaux sets out in search of clues. Crosses on a map mark the locations where the girls were attacked and found back then. A young woman talks about the one who vanished – a woman similar to her and yet different, whose work she continues. Pinteaux observes the girls in their surroundings, together, on the job. Who will be next? Will there be a next time? Situated between staging and documentation, the film meets the girls on an equal footing – tracing moments of potential threat.
Still from „Des jeunes filles disparaissent (Young Girls Vanish)“
What is your ambition in the film ?
Initially I wanted to make a film from the legends about the wolf in France. Then I discovered this historical episode of the XVII century which tells that a wolf had devoured 58 girls in Gâtinais, France. I knew nothing about the girls, only their name, the date of their death, and the way they had been killed. Returning to the site, I met the girls who lived there today and through them I tried to find these girls of the seventeenth century, to revive them. There is a bridge between all these girls who disappear.
What do you like about the short form ?
The short form interests me because it allows to make films that only hold on a feeling, an impression.
What are your future plans ?
I’m currently writing a film about modern miracles. Otherwise, I work mainly as editor, I have several upcoming film projects with directors that I like very much.
Réka Bucsi is back at Berlinale Shorts and answers some questions about herself and her new shortfilm.
She was born in Filderstadt, Germany in 1988 and studied animation at the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design (MOME) in Budapest between 2008 and 2013. Furthermore the filmmaker attended Animation Sans Frontières (ASF) in Viborg, Denmark, where she also participated in the Open Workshop’s artist-in-residence programme. Réka Bucsi has also been artist in residence at Q21 in Vienna, Austria and presented „Symphony no. 42“ (2014) and „LOVE“ (2016) at Berlinale Shorts previously.
This year the director from Denmark is participating in the Berlinale Shorts Competition with her film „Solar Walk“, wich follows the journey of individuals and their creations in space. Flags are planted. Hands are held. First steps are taken on new worlds. And then the giant lets out a stream of black piss and pees a brand new universe. Two creatures jump into the new blackness of space. They become one with the new world. “Whoever you are. Where you are. And whatever you are. You are in the middle,” Alan Watts reflects in David OReilly’s ‚Everything‘ (Berlinale Shorts 2017). Bucsi pursues this question further, entering into a dialogue.
Still from ‚Solar Walk‘
What is your ambition in the film?
It was to make a movie, that just gets the viewer out of their skin for the time they are watching it. I wanted to create a careless journey through mind and space.
I find it hard to focus on individual subject matters smaller than the universe itself. Creation, and the question of motivation and ambition were my ambitions.
What do you like about the short form?
I like that shorts have an easy approach to the experimental form of storytelling. You can do pretty much anything that challenges classical narrative forms.
I enjoy that tiny details can play the lead role.
What are your future plans?
I want to make a feature film that enhances what I like about short films.
It is the second time that Jayisha Patel will be part of Berlinale Shorts and we have had the chance to hear a few words about her film ‚Circle‚ and future plans.
Born in London, UK in 1987, Jayisha Patel first studied economics at Nottingham University and then film at the Escuela Internacional de Cine y TV in Cuba and the National Film and TV School in the UK. Her short films have screened at renowned international festivals. Jayisha Patel first participated in the Berlinale Shorts Competition in 2014 with her documentary film ‚A Paradise‘. Her work seeks to give a platform in particular to women of colour who are fighting stereotypes. ‚Circle‚ is a film about present-day India. Three men sit at the edge of a field smoking. A woman is crouched in the field working. Another is cleaning the floor in the house. Two young women are shucking peas. One of them tells her sister about her rape and who she blames. It’s her own grandmother’s fault. The fire blazes away out in the field. A film about the cycle of violence and the possibility of escaping it.
22 films from 18 countries will be competing for the Golden and the Silver Bear, as well as the Audi Short Film Award, worth € 20,000, and a nomination for the European Film Awards.
Still from ‚Circle‘
What is your ambition in the film?
With ‚Circle‘, I wanted to take viewers into Kushbu’s internal world. This is a world that is not seen, but rather felt. The intention was to juxtapose the stunning rural landscapes of Utter Pradesh, with the dark reality of her internal life, so as to challenge the viewer in a visceral way. I hope by doing so, viewers can tap into the unspoken within themselves.
What do you like about the short form?
I love how short films have this particular type of emotional charge to them. They can be a force of nature, entering with a huge amount of energy and then out of nowhere, disappear, leaving embers behind. They are an opportunity to close a chapter rather than a book, leaving the viewer with many questions unanswered. This is a wonderful thing because it enables the viewer to linger on the film long after they have left the cinema. For me, a short film is also an opportunity to invite a viewer to inhabit a space, rather than explaining all of that space. This is because there is no time to explain everything so the short form becomes this beautiful space to just connect and translate pure emotion. I also love how the limitations associated with making a short film can also force the film to find an inner language. It’s this inner language that I feel can enable a film to take on unconventional approach, leading to potentially bolder pieces of filmmaking. Lastly, I love that structurally, you cannot afford to digress in the same way you can with a feature will. This means you have to have a very rigorous approach to understanding your character and translating that onto the screen. There is nowhere to hide and therefore in doing so, you also confront yourself a lot as a creator, in the hope that the viewer can in turn do so, too.
What are your future plans?
I am currently an artist in residence at Somerset House in London, where I am working on an emotionally responsive virtual reality experience, called ‚After The Fire‘. It is supported by Anidox and the Danish Film Institute. I work a lot at the intersection of documentary filmmaking and technology and this project has really pushed me to explore both forms to their maximum. I am also developing my first narrative feature. A cinematic hybrid set in London dealing with race and womanhood. Coming from a minority background, I feel that a lot of our narratives have been appropriated, which can be painful at times, and told from a Eurocentric/western gaze so the film is essentially about taking that narrative back, owning it and telling it with nuance from a place of solidarity.
22 films from 18 countries will be competing for the Golden and the Silver Bear, as well as the Audi Short Film Award, worth € 20,000, and a nomination for the European Film Awards. ‚T.R.A.P.‚ is one of them. Filmmaker Manque La Banca is answering to some questions in this interview about ‚T.R.A.P‘, the special about shortfilms and his future plans.
Born in Bariloche, Argentina in 1990, Manque La Banca studied film at the Facultad de Bellas Artes in La Plata and photography at the Sindicato de la Industria Cinematográfica Argentina (SICA) in Buenos Aires. In 2012 he and his brother, Antu La Banca, set up the Parquee label for films and music. He has directed various shorts and a feature film and works with Super 8 and 16mm; also released several albums with his band ‚Nunca fui a un parque de diversiones‘. Manque La Banca develops all his films at his own film lab at home.
So he did with ‚T.R.A.P‚ – A film about a mystical place telling an enchanted story: A group of knights go ashore on the banks of the Río De La Plata. They are searching for a grave to perform a ritual. As they pass through the jungle, things happen that cause them to land in the present day. This past summer an individual disappeared during altercations with the police and demonstrations in southern Argentina. “Never again” has been the widespread sentiment since the end of the dictatorship in Argentina, now the old threat seems to be looming again. The filmmaker takes up prevalent stereotypes and breaks them open in order to tell his own story free of hegemonial interference.
Still from ‚T.R.A.P‘
What is your ambition in the film?
I wanted to tell a story that started on a romantic universe and ended up becoming an intimist contemporary tale, showing a facet of young dissidents in this current Argentina governed by the most conservative political party that the country has had in the last 40 years.
Another interesting point that we explore on ‚T.R.A.P‘ are related to sexual diversity as a form of resistance to dominant discourse. With ‚PARQUEE‘ our audiovisual label, we have been investigating the breaking of stereotypes through images. We are convinced as audiovisual artists that in order to disarm the power structures that govern the world, it is necessary to create stories that question from the heteronormative logics.
What do you like about the short form?
The short form allows to experiment with small ideas that can be the germ of something bigger. There is a kind of liberty on the short films that is difficult to find in other kind expressions. In my case this liberty is achieve with lot of planification, when I start a project of a short film I immerse myself in a meditative state, I draw a lot of images and I write in a free poetic way. For me is very important to find the axis of ideas on paper, because I have a limited amount of time.
What are your future plans?
At the moment I’m writing a new feature film called ‚JERMANS‘. It is a film whose story is derived from ‚T.R.A.P‘ the short film that I am presenting at the Berlinale. I’m exploring the mix between adventure genre films and experimental cinema.
Audi Short Film Award: Maike Mia Höhne In Conversation With Karam Ghossein
Sunday, February 18, 4-5pm
Director Karam Ghossein received the Audi Short Film Award for „Street of Death“ in 2017. Maike Mia Höhne, curator of Berlinale Shorts, meets Ghossein at Berlinale Open House for a talk about his work.
Venue: Audi Berlinale Lounge, Marlene-Dietrich-Platz
Open to the public, no pre-registration required.
U-/S-Bahn Potsdamer Platz
Bus M41, M48, 200
– The talk will be in English language –
Notes on Cinema #68: Between Staff Pick, Market & Archive Thursday, February 22, 2-4pm
In cooperation with the Embassy of Canada
A panel discussion on the longevity and visibility of films on the internet and in archives.
How can we expand the film canon? How can we access films which are no longer viewable? Is digitization a possibility to (re-)access films which have been lost or overshadowed?
With Mark Toscano (Academy Film Archive), Jeffrey Bowers (Vimeo), Lauren Howes (Canadian Filmmakers Distribution Centre) and Jayisha Patel (filmmaker).
The short films Le Tigre de Tasmanie by Vergine Keaton (Berlinale Shorts), Circle by Jayisha Patel (Berlinale Shorts) and Nuuca by Michelle Latimer (Generation) will be screened. Followed by a Q&A. The panel discussion will begin at 3pm.
Venue: Embassy of Canada, Leipziger Platz 17, 10117 Berlin
Free admission.
Auf der Suche nach den interessantesten Einreichungen
Im Sichtungsraum herrscht mittlerweile Stille: Die Kaffeetassen sind weggeräumt und der Projektor stößt keine warme Luft mehr aus. Auch Alejo Franzetti, Anna Henckel-Donnersmarck, Egbert Hörmann, Maria Morata, Saskia Walker, Simone Späni und Wilhelm Faber, die mit all ihren individuellen Erfahrungen und Expertisen mit Maike Mia Höhne zusammensaßen, finden sich morgens nicht mehr im Büro ein. Als siebenköpfiges Gremium lieferten sie der Berlinale Shorts Kuratorin bei der Filmauswahl einen inspirierenden Rahmen und standen ihr mit kritischer Unterstützung beiseite.
Durch die immer größer werdende Zahl der Einreichungen in den letzten Jahren hat sich zur 68. Berlinale auch das Gremium der Berlinale Shorts erweitert. „Es geht auch darum, die Vielfältigkeit der Perspektiven weiter ausschöpfen zu können“, so Maike Mia Höhne.
(v. l. Egbert Hörmann, Kuratorin Maike Mia Höhne, Simone Späni, Wilhelm Faber, Maria Morata, Anna Henckel-Donnersmarck, Alejo Franzetti, Saskia Walker)
Lasst sie uns kurz genauer vorstellen:
Der Filmemacher Alejo Franzetti war Mitbegründer und Kurator des in Berlin veranstalteten INVASION – das argentinische Filmfestival, nachdem er Filmregie an der Universidad del Cine studierte sowie Meisterschüler bei Thomas Arslan an der Universität der Künste Berlin war. Seit fünf Jahren wohnt er nun in Berlin und bereichert das Auswahlgremium der Berlinale Shorts erstmals mit seinen Blicken.
Anna Henckel-Donnersmarck ist klassisch ausgebildete Filmemacherin und realisiert heute vorwiegend Videoinstallationen für Bühneninszenierungen, Musikperformances und Ausstellungen. Sie ist als Dozentin für Film und Video tätig und arbeitet seit nunmehr 20 Jahren in Auswahlkommissionen und als Moderatorin für eine Vielzahl von Filmfestivals – für die Berlinale Shorts schon seit 10 Jahren. Nach Stationen in Indonesien, Japan, England, New York und Ludwigsburg lebt sie jetzt in Berlin.
Egbert Hörmann ist ein altbewährtes Gesicht bei der Berlinale. Begonnen 1995 für die Sektion Panorama, ist er seit ihrem Bestehen Gremiumsmitglied der Sektion Berlinale Shorts. Er ist Kulturjournalist, Autor von zwei Büchern mit Essays und Herausgeber von Anthologien – studierte Amerikanistik, Anglistik und lebt hauptsächlich in Berlin, gerne auch in Sankt Petersburg.
Schon seit 2009 ist die freiberufliche Kuratorin und Universitätsdozentin Maria Morata Mitglied der Auswahlkommission. Sie hat in Madrid, Paris und Berlin studiert. Mit dem Schwerpunkt in experimentellem und Avant-Garde Film trägt sie zu den diversen Perspektiven bei, die bei der Auswahl der Filme von hoher Bedeutung sind.
Die Filmemacherin, Kuratorin und Übersetzerin Saskia Walker studierte und arbeitete in Frankreich und Russland und ist seit 2011 stetiges Mitglied des Auswahlgremiums der Sektion Berlinale Shorts. Neben der Arbeit im Gremium ist sie außerdem Mitherausgeberin von Revolver – Zeitschrift für Film.
Für Filmkuratorin Simone Späni ist es das erste Jahr im Gremium der Berlinale Shorts. Die Erfahrungen, die sie als Mitglied der Auswahlkommission und Vorstandsmitglied bei den Internationalen Kurzfilmtagen Winterthur gesammelt hat, lässt sie in ihre Arbeit einfließen. Des Weiteren ist sie Mitunterstützerin von REALNESS – An African Screenwriter Residence in Südafrika und arbeitet in den Bereichen Filmproduktion, Musik und Theater in Zürich, Genf und Kigali.
Seit nun mehr 25 Jahren arbeitet auch Wilhelm Faber für die Berlinale. Neben Programmkoordination und Organisationsentwicklung ist die Auswahl von Kurzfilmen im Gremium beständiger und immer anregender Teil seiner Arbeit.
Gesichtet wird immer von mindestens zwei Personen, bevor die Filme, die es auf die Warteliste geschafft haben, in großer Runde vom gesamten Gremium besprochen werden. Und wie im Leben abseits des Berlinale-Trubels auch, prallen unterschiedliche Ansichten gerne mal aufeinander und es herrscht nicht immer Einigkeit. Manchmal aber auch doch, dann gibt es diese magischen Momente und Entdeckungen, bei denen es kaum noch Diskussionsbedarf gibt: „Das passiert, wenn wir eigentlich alle vor lauter Hingucken gar nicht mehr denken können – was natürlich ein wunderbarer Moment ist, weil der Film einen dann im Ganzen ergreift. Warum das so ist, wird natürlich dennoch hinterfragt.“
Für dieses Jahr ist ihre Arbeit vollbracht – sie haben einander ein letztes Mal tief in ihre 16 Augen geblickt und sich für 24 Filme entschieden – zwei davon laufen außer Konkurrenz. Die ausgewählten Filmemacher*innen konkurrieren nun mit ihren neuen Werken um den Goldenen und Silbernen Bären sowie den mit 20.000€ dotierten Audi Short Film Award und die Nominierung für den besten Kurzfilm für die European Film Awards.
22 films from 18 countries will be competing for the Golden and the Silver Bear, as well as the Audi Short Film Award, worth € 20,000, and a nomination for the European Film Awards. The Nigerian film Besida by Chuko Esiri and the Austrian film The Shadow of Utopia by Antoinette Zwirchmayr will be screened out of competition. This year’s Berlinale Shorts competition includes films by João Salaviza, Réka Bucsi, Bárbara Wagner & Benjamin de Burca, Manque La Banca, Sylvia Schedelbauer, Ulu Braun, Arash Nassir, João Viana, among others. In addition the Berlinale Shorts will present a special programme about 1968.
The short films in this year’s international competition look reality in the eye and actively contribute to the current socio-political discourse. Different strategies of empowerment are brought to bear. Self-determinedly, the filmmakers capture small moments, local stories and topics, and connect them to events of great impact. Whether the films are animated, documentary or fiction – experimentation is the order of the day. The performative element is part of the strategy. Gender relations and power structures are still far from being equal or balanced, but they are the subject of these works.
In City of Tales by Arash Nassiri, a polyphony of Persian dialects can be heard that turns Los Angeles into Teheran. The sites of memory are the cities of others. In Onde o Verão Vai (episódios da juventude), Portuguese director David Pinheiro Vicente stages a queer exodus from the Garden of Eden and so rethinks the beginnings of humankind. In her documentary Circle, Jayisha Patel shows how the family can be a breeding ground for the trafficking of women. It is the grandmother who accepts money for her granddaughter’s rape. For the first time, a film from Rwanda will be shown in the competition, the co-production Imfura by Samuel Ishimwe.
Berlinale Shorts is interested in fictional narratives that go beyond the usual formats, and is open to creative means that find new dramaturgical forms for elevating tension and suspense.
In 2018, the members of the International Short Film Jury are Portuguese filmmaker and winner of the Golden Bear for Best Short Film at the Berlinale 2017, Diogo Costa Amarante; US filmmaker and curator Mark Toscano; and South African filmmaker and academic Jyoti Mistry (see press release from ).
Farbtest Rote Fahne by Gerd Conradt
50 years since 1968: The Berlinale Shorts special programme “1968 – Red Flags for Everyone” will present aesthetic strategies that are still relevant to this day. “Without raising the question of social unrest, it would be impossible to examine 1968 – the subjective gaze in its aesthetic diversity is the kaleidoscope that makes the conditions then accessible today. By radically reducing everything to the material itself, the artists free film from any sort of narrative and allow a new reality to become apparent,” states Berlinale Shorts curator Maike Mia Höhne.
In Programmhinweise, Christiane Gehner ponders gender roles: “I’m not sure, but sometimes it feels like it might be better to just comply with men’s demands – for isolation is even worse than suppression.” In Antigone, Ula Stöckl discloses the structures involved in imbalances of power. In Na und…?, Marquard Bohm and Helmut Herbst reveal – at the home of Bohm’s own family in Hamburg – the often-depicted fustiness hidden beneath the academic gown. Dore O. describes her film Alaska as a dream about herself, as a consequence of interacting with society. In 1968, Helmut Herbst and Dore O. were founding members of the first Hamburg Filmmakers’ Cooperative, which radically influenced contemporary social discourse with their films.
Films screening in the Berlinale Shorts 2018:
After/Life, Puck Lo, USA, 15’ (WP) Alma Bandida, Marco Antônio Pereira, Brazil, 15’ (WP) And What Is the Summer Saying, Payal Kapadia, India, 23’ (WP) Babylon, Keith Deligero, Philippines, 20’ (IP) Besida, Chuko Esiri, Nigeria, 12’ (WP) – out of competition Blau, David Jansen, Germany, 15’ (WP) Burkina Brandenburg Komplex, Ulu Braun, Germany, 19’ (WP) Circle, Jayisha Patel, Great Britain / India / Canada, 14’ (WP) City of Tales, Arash Nassiri, France, 21’ (WP) Coyote, Lorenz Wunderle, Switzerland, 10’ (WP) Imfura, Samuel Ishimwe, Switzerland / Rwanda, 36’ (IP) Imperial Valley (Cultivated Run-Off), Lukas Marxt, Germany / Austria, 14’ (WP) Des jeunes filles disparaissent, Clément Pinteaux, France, 16’ (IP) Madness, João Viana, Mozambique / Guinea-Bissau / Qatar / Portugal / France, 13‘ (WP) The Men Behind the Wall, Ines Moldavsky, Israel, 28’ (WP) Onde o Verão Vai (episódios da juventude), David Pinheiro Vicente, Portugal, 20’ (WP) Russa, João Salaviza & Ricardo Alves Jr., Portugal / Brazil, 20’ (WP) The Shadow of Utopia, Antoinette Zwirchmayr, Austria, 23’ (IP) – out of competition Solar Walk, Réka Bucsi, Denmark, 21’ (WP) Terremoto Santo, Bárbara Wagner & Benjamin de Burca, Brazil, 20’ (IP) Le Tigre de Tasmanie, Vergine Keaton, France, 14’ (WP) T.R.A.P, Manque La Banca, Argentina, 16’ (WP) While I Yet Live, Maris Curran, USA, 15’ (IP) Wishing Well, Sylvia Schedelbauer, Germany, 13‘ (WP)
Berlinale Shorts special programme “1968 – Red Flags for Everyone”
Alaska, Dore O., Federal Republic of Germany, 18‘, 1968 Antigone, Ula Stöckl, Federal Republic of Germany, 9‘, 1964 Farbtest Rote Fahne, Gerd Conradt, Federal Republic of Germany, 12‘, 1968 Fundevogel, Claudia von Alemann, Federal Republic of Germany, 22‘, 1967 I Ruhrområdet, Peter Nestler, Sweden, 34‘, 1967 Ja/Nein, Ernst Schmidt jr., Austria, 3‘, 1968 Kunst & Revolution, Ernst Schmidt jr., Austria, 2‘, 1968 My Name is Oona, Gunvor Nelson, USA, 10‘, 1969 Na und…?, Marquard Bohm & Helmut Herbst, Federal Republic of Germany, 33‘, 1966 Programmhinweise, Christiane Gehner, Federal Republic of Germany, 10‘, 1970 Rohfilm, Birgit & Wilhelm Hein, Federal Republic of Germany, 20‘, Tapp und Tastkino, VALIE EXPORT, Austria, 2‘, 1968
We are more than happy to officially announce the members of our 2018 International Short Film Jury: Diogo Costa Amarante, Jyoti Mistry and Mark Toscano!
Portuguese filmmaker and winner of the Golden Bear for Best Short Film at the Berlinale 2017, Diogo Costa Amarante; US filmmaker and curator Mark Toscano; and South African filmmaker and academic Jyoti Mistry will make up the International Short Film Jury in 2018. They will award the Golden and the Silver Bear, as well as the Audi Short Film Award. In addition, they will nominate a film for the European Film Awards in the category European Short Film 2018. “The diverse perspectives that Mark Toscano, Jyoti Mistry and Diogo Costa Amarante bring to the jury portend a well-versed, young and contemporary discussion on the 2018 selection,” comments Maike Mia Höhne, curator of Berlinale Shorts.
Diogo Costa Amarante (Portugal)
Diogo Costa Amarante completed his Master of Fine Arts at New York University / Tisch School of the Arts in 2016 with his film Cidade Pequena, which celebrated its international premiere at the 67th Berlinale in 2017 and received the Golden Bear for Best Short Film. Amarante is a member of the widely acclaimed third generation of Portuguese filmmakers, whose works have established an impressive position for Portugal in the cinematic world. His first film Jumate/Jumate received accolades at many festivals, and in 2007 he received a scholarship for documentary film and cinematography at the School of Cinema and Audiovisuals of Catalonia (ESCAC). In 2009, he was a participant at Berlinale Talents, and shot his second documentary film In January, perhaps.
Filmmaker Jyoti Mistry is an Associate Professor and Deputy Head of Division at the Wits School of Arts in South Africa. She received the CILECT Teaching Award (The International Association of Film and Television Schools) in 2016 in recognition of her outstanding achievements in film pedagogy and film practice research. Her research areas include cultural policy, questions of identity, and multiculturalism. Her experimental film The Bull On the Roof (2010) celebrated its debut at the Durban International Film Festival and was presented at the Galerie nationale du Jeu de Paume in Paris, among other institutions. Her feature film Impunity (2014) celebrated its premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, and her most recent short film When I Grow Up I Want to Be a Black Man was a competition selection at the short film festival Winterthur in 2017. Her publications include “’we remember differently‘: Race, Memory, Imagination” (2012), “Gaze Regimes: Film and Feminisms in Africa” (2015) and “Places to Play – Practice, Research & Pedagogy” (2017) which was adapted for the screen.
Mark Toscano has functioned as curator and presenter of stand-out programmes for many noted institutions such as The Museum of Modern Art, Arsenal – Institute for Film and Video Art, EYE Filmmuseum, Tate Modern, Los Angeles Filmforum, as well as for festivals in Rotterdam, London, Oberhausen, Zagreb and Bangalore. In addition, he lectures on experimental film and archiving at numerous universities. At the California Institute of the Arts, he is an instructor in the history of experimental animation. A distinguished filmmaker and curator, Mark Toscano has been a contributor to the conservation of cinematic heritage at the Academy Film Archive since 2003, where he specialises in the restoration of independent, experimental and documentary films, maintaining exchange with over 100 international filmmakers.
AFTER THE FILMS: ARTIST TALKS
