A film by Arjun Talwar. In Polish with German and English subtitles.

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A street in cen­tral Warsaw is the focus of this wit­ty and per­so­nal por­trait of Poland. Filmmaker Arjun Talwar immi­gra­ted to the coun­try a deca­de ago but still strug­gles to fit in. Ulica Wilcza, the street whe­re he lives, has not real­ly hel­ped mat­ters. In an attempt to acce­le­ra­te his inte­gra­ti­on, he beg­ins film­ing his neigh­bours, sound­ing out his rela­ti­onships with them and see­king ways to over­co­me his own fee­lings of ali­en­ati­on. With the help of his fri­end Mo, ano­ther immi­grant-tur­ned-film­ma­ker, Arjun unco­vers the hid­den secrets of the street, reve­al­ing a host of char­ming inha­bi­tants. He finds other peo­p­le like hims­elf who are living bet­ween the past and pre­sent, bet­ween an ima­gi­ned home­land and the real one. The street con­nects them all like an invi­si­ble thread, offe­ring solace in the melan­cho­ly of ever­y­day life. Along this kilo­met­re-long stretch, a pic­tu­re of modern Europe emer­ges, expo­sing a kalei­do­scope of con­tra­dic­tions and anxie­ties as a for­eign film­ma­ker holds up a mir­ror to a coun­try that is often per­cei­ved as homo­ge­neous, unwel­co­ming and poli­ti­cal­ly right-wing.

Credits:

PL/DE 2025, 97 Min., pol­ni­sche Originalfassung mit deut­schen und eng­li­schen Untertiteln
Regie & Kamera: Arjun Talwar
Schnitt: Bigna Tomschin, Arjun Talwar & Sabina Filipowicz

Trailer:

nach oben

A film by  Emanuel Pârvu. In Romanian with German subtitles.

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Adi (17) is spen­ding the sum­mer in his home vil­la­ge in the Danube Delta. One night he is bru­t­ally atta­cked on the street, the next day his world is tur­ned upsi­de-down. His par­ents no lon­ger look at him as they did, and the see­ming tran­qui­li­ty of the vil­la­ge starts to crack.

Credits:

TREI KILOMETRI PÂNĂ LA CAPĂTUL LUMII
RO 2024, 105 Min., rumä­ni­sche OmU
Regie: Emanuel Pârvu
Kamera: Silviu Stavilã
Schnitt: Mircea Olteanu
mit: Ciprian Chiujdea) · Bogdan Dumitrache · Laura Vasiliu · Valeriu Andriutâ · Ingrid Micu-Berescu 

Trailer:

nach oben

A film by Christina Tournatzés. In German with English subtitles.

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1962 – Twelve-year-old Karla is a wit­ness in court. She files char­ges against the very per­son who was sup­po­sed to pro­tect her: Her father. Judge Lamy is the hope at her side.

Credits:

DE 2025, 104 Min., deut­sche Originalfassung mit eng­li­schen Untertiteln
Regie: Christina Tournatzés
Kamera: Florian Emmerich
Schnitt: Isabel Meier
mit: Elise Krieps, Rainer Bock, Imogen Kogge, Torben Liebrecht, Katharina Schüttler

Trailer:

nach oben

A film by Brandon Kramer. In English aud Hebrew with German subtitles.

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A film that is shot tru­ly open-endedly, in the thick of it, even though – at the out­set – it was impos­si­ble to pre­dict what would hap­pen. Liat is for­ci­b­ly abduc­ted from her kib­butz by mem­bers of Hamas on 7 October 2023 and short­ly after­wards Brandon Kramer starts film­ing with her fami­ly. He’s right the­re with them, up clo­se, as the par­ents Yehuda and Chaya try to deal with their fear – or to sway the fate of their adult daugh­ter and her hus­band in dia­lo­gue with the aut­ho­ri­ties. As a US citi­zen, Yehuda flies to the USA, accom­pa­nied by Liat’s son, who is bur­den­ed by more than the public atten­ti­on, and Liat’s sis­ter, who will try to cushion Yehuda’s tem­per and anger. Because even within this fami­ly views are pola­ri­sed: despi­te his pain, the father takes a cri­ti­cal view of Israel’s role in the Middle East con­flict. He is a paci­fist and will not be dis­sua­ded from the path of recon­ci­lia­ti­on, even at the geo­po­li­ti­cal epi­cent­re of diplo­ma­cy and trau­ma. He per­sis­t­ent­ly swims against the tide, takes issue with hims­elf and ever­yo­ne else and bera­tes the Israeli govern­ment. A can­did film of the hour. Insights don’t come from poli­tics, but from Liat’s family.

Credits:

US 2025, 97 Min., Englisch, Hebräisch OmU
Regie: Brandon Kramer
Kamera: Yoni Brook, Omer Manor
Schnitt: Jeff Gilbert

Trailer:

Im Kino mit deut­schen Untertiteln.

nach oben

A film by Marie Luise Lehner. Starts October 2nd at the fsk. In German, German Sign Language & English with German subtitles.

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Slowly, 12-year-old Anna and her deaf mum are start­ing to feel a bit cram­ped in their flat. It’s not just the lack of pri­va­cy that’s caus­ing fric­tion – Anna has just star­ted secon­da­ry school and quick­ly rea­li­ses what’s important now: brand-name clo­thes and a sen­se of belon­ging. She quick­ly gets hold of a fake Ralph Lauren jum­per, but money’s still tight. In her debut, direc­tor and aut­hor Marie Luise Lehner stages a con­fron­ta­ti­on with clas­sist struc­tures, which Anna tack­les with a mix­tu­re of shame and grit. She finds an ally in Mara, who chal­lenges others with femi­nist issues and who also lives alo­ne with her que­er father. Lehner stands by her heroes uncon­di­tio­nal­ly, giving them space for intro­s­pec­tion and out­bursts, allo­wing them to row back and recon­ci­le. Not fit­ting in allows them to get to know and app­re­cia­te who they are. Lehner flies the flag of soli­da­ri­ty, quite natu­ral­ly and with ple­nty of refe­ren­ces to pop cul­tu­re. And clo­ses with a libe­ra­ting “Fuck you, Vienna”, high abo­ve the city’s rooftops.

Credits:

AT 2025, 87 Min., Deutsch, Deutsche Gebärdensprache, Englisch OmU
Regie: Marie Luise Lehner
Kamera: Simone Hart
Schnitt: Jana Libnik, Joana Scrinzi, Alexandra Schneider
mit: Siena Popović, Mariya Menner, Jessica Paar, Daniel Sea

Trailer:

nach oben

A film by Mascha Schilinski. In German.

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Four girls, Alma, Erika, Angelika, and Lenka, each spend their youth on the same farm in nor­t­hern Germany. As the home evol­ves over a cen­tu­ry, echo­es of the past lin­ger in its walls. Though sepa­ra­ted by time, their lives begin to mir­ror each other.

Cannes 2025 – Jury Prize

Credits:

DE 2024, 149 Min.,
Regie: Mascha Schilinski
Kamera: Fabian Gamper
Schnitt: Evelyn Rack
Darsteller*innen: Luise Heyer, Lena Urzendowsky, Claudia Geisler-Bading, Lea Drinda, Hanna Heckt

Trailer:

nach oben

A film by Scandar Copti. In Arabic and Hebrew with German subtitles.

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A midd­le-class Palestinian fami­ly in Haifa sees life spi­ral out of con­trol under the oppres­si­ve rea­li­ty of con­tem­po­ra­ry Israeli society.

The daugh­ter, Fifi, is stu­dy­ing in Jerusalem and gets into a car acci­dent; the son, Toufic, is invol­ved in secret roman­tic liai­sons and must con­t­end with an unwan­ted pregnan­cy; and the father is embroi­led in what could amount to insu­rance fraud. 

Oscar nomi­nee Scandar Copti (Ajami, 2009) pres­ents a grip­ping fami­ly dra­ma as his second fea­ture film. Led by an ensem­ble of non-pro­fes­sio­nal actors, it inter­wea­ves the sto­ries of mul­ti­ple cha­rac­ters who­se fates are unde­ni­ably – and res­entful­ly – inter­lin­ked. The cha­rac­ters in this mas­terful­ly writ­ten screen­play, groun­ded in inti­ma­te por­tra­yals of moral rela­ti­vism, walk a fine line bet­ween con­ce­ding to and resis­ting the sta­tus quo of Israeli sta­te vio­lence. The film pre­mie­red at the Venice Film Festival in 2024 and won the Horizons Award for Best Screenplay.

Credits:

PS/DE/FR/IT/QT 2025, 123 Min., Arabisch, Hebräisch OmU
Regie & Schnitt: Scandar Copti
Kamera: Tim Kuhn
mit: Manar Shehab, Wafaa Aoun, Meirav Memorsky, Toufic Danial

Trailer:

nach oben

A film by Marcin Wierzchowski. In various lan­guages with German subtitles.

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The film tells the sto­ry of the 2020 racist attack in the city of Hanau in the German sta­te of Hesse from the per­spec­ti­ve of the bere­a­ved rela­ti­ves and the sur­vi­vors. Within the space of just a few minu­tes, the per­pe­tra­tor shot nine young peo­p­le dead becau­se he did not con­sider them to be German. What are the direct and long-term con­se­quen­ces of such an attack on peo­p­le and their city? Director Marcin Wierzchowski accom­pa­nied the prot­ago­nists for four years as they faced their grief and stri­ved to come to terms with the loss of a loved one. But the film also reve­als their strugg­le for reco­gni­ti­on and a sen­se of belon­ging in the coun­try they call home. The rela­ti­ves feel aban­do­ned by the aut­ho­ri­ties and poli­ti­ci­ans ali­ke becau­se, despi­te many words of sym­pa­thy, they them­sel­ves are left to unco­ver the cir­cum­s­tances of the crime. In the pro­cess, they encoun­ter the cold bureau­cra­cy of a sys­tem that is woeful­ly unpre­pared for such an attack – even though right-wing ter­ror is a tra­gi­cal­ly com­mon­place part of German history.

Credits:

DE 2025, 132 Min., Deutsch, Rumänisch, Türkisch, Englisch OmU
Regie: Marcin Wierzchowski
Schnitt: Stefan Oliveira-Pita
Kamera: Marcin Wierzchowski, Peter Peiker

Trailer:

nach oben

Sorry, this ent­ry is only available in Deutsch.

Vom 10. –  17. September fin­det die­ses Jahr zum 20. Mal das größ­te pol­ni­sche Filmfestival außer­halb Polens statt (mehr, Katalog). Im fsk zei­gen wir alle sie­ben Wettbewerbsbeiträge und zwei Specials:

• vorbei