Filmforum: North German cinema highlights and exceptional documentaries

This year’s Filmforum, the North German section at Nordic Film Days Lübeck, features more than 40 films: the highlights of the feature film programme include “The Prodigal Son” starring Katja Flint and Kostja Ullmann. The film by Nina Grosse is about a mother who fights for her son’s rehabilitation – but has the self-confessed Islamist really renounced the “Holy War”? In Bernd Fiedler’s “Kein Kinderspiel” a retired lecturer and a paraplegic young woman decide to enter into a partnership of convenience for the purpose of becoming parents. Filmforum presents the latest films by North German filmmakers before they are released in the cinema. These include Fatih Akin’s Hamburg comedy “Soul Kitchen” and Anno Saul’s mystery thriller “The Door”, starring the Danish actor Mads Mikkelsen. Hans Erich Viet’s “Fast à la Carte” stars Dietmar Bär as a gourmet critic who loses his sense of taste and henceforth faces fasting programmes, ex-lovers and vengeful journalists. Hannu Salonen’s crime film “Tatort: Tango für Borowski” features Kiel police inspector Borowski (Axel Milberg) investigating in Finland.

The Filmforum documentary film programme includes the new film by director Sung-Hyung Cho, whose film “Full Metal Village” was a great success three years ago. In “Home from Home” three women return to South Korea after spending 30 years in Germany: a humorous quest for the notion of “home”, which transcends continents. Frank Müller’s “What an Ocean Struggle” is a bizarre documentary film about the annual “Wadden Olympiad” – and about what motivates its initiator. Rasmuch Geröach’s “Aldi – Mother of all Discount Stores” dares an investigative glance behind the scenes of Germany’s most successful trade enterprise – with statements made by critics as well as supporters.

Within the framework of the anniversary of the Fall of the Wall, Filmforum shows productions that treat border experiences made by people in the East and the West, including “The Ropedancers”, “Insellicht” and “Land in Sight”. The film “Frontier” from 1965 is a particular rarity – director Uve Behrens co-founded Lübecker Filmclub with Rolf Hiller, which later became Nordic Film Days Lübeck. A discussion round on the special show thematizes the experiences and shooting conditions of filmmakers in the East and the West. The participants include the filmmakers Heinz Brinkmann, Lars Büchel and Anne Thomschke as well as Bernd-Günther Nahm, Director of the Cultural Film Funding Association of Schleswig-Holstein, and a representative of a funding institution from Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. As Cultural Film Funding Schleswig-Holstein is also celebrating its twentieth anniversary this year, the discussion will include the topics professional training and support of young talents. The event takes place on Friday, 6.11. at 2pm in Kino 4. Admission is free of charge.

For the third time now, the Filmforum script workshop offers an opportunity for cultural exchange between Germany and Scandinavia. The two-hour event, hosted in cooperation with Filmförderung Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein and www.drehbuch-sh.de, takes place on 7.11.2009 at 2pm in Kino 4 at CineStar Filmpalast Stadthalle. Scriptwriter Arne Sommer will be welcoming three colleagues with their films and texts, including Steen Bille (Denmark, “To verdener”). The film authors will discuss amongst themselves and with the audience, thus supporting the interlinking of Scandinavian and Schleswig-Holstein film culture. The event takes place in the English language. Admission is free of charge, tickets must be collected prior to the event at the cinema box office.