April 26-28 | Corus Quay, Toronto

VR Artists Erin Gee and Li Alin @ Digifest

At the invitation of the Goethe-Institut, curators Tina Sauerländer and Erandy Vergara have selected VR works for this year's Toronto Digifest, including two recent pieces by Berlin-based Canadian artist Li Alin and Montreal-based artist Erin Gee, in collaboration with South Korean-born, US-based Alex M. Lee. The artists use humour and irony to engage in controversial topics.

Presented by the Goethe-Institut Toronto
Curated by Tina Sauerländer (Berlin) and Erandy Vergara (Montreal)

May 3 | 6:30 PM | Goethe-Institut Toronto

Culture Talks @ Goethe: Christoph Terhechte

Christoph Terhechte, director of the Berlinale Forum and on this year's Hot Docs jury, introduces and contextualizes Philip Schaffner's "slow cinema" film Havarie, currently installed at the Goethe Media Space. Terhechte hosted the film's world premiere in Berlin in 2016, as well as many of Scheffner's previous films.

Christoph Terhechte is a guest of the Goethe-Institut at Hot Docs

until May 31 | during library hours | Goethe-Institut Toronto

Philip Scheffner: Havarie

A damaged dinghy with 13 people on board, adrift in the Mediterranean. Berlin documentary filmmaker Philip Scheffner (“Revision”) stretched a 3-minute clip shot by a tourist on a cell phone to create a 90-minute video. Feeling like a photo with a soundscape, the refugee crisis and response are rendered in slow motion.
 
Presented by the Goethe-Institut Toronto with Hot Docs Festival, Images Festival, and Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival

April 26 - May 6 | Various locations

German Films @ Hot Docs

As every year, the Goethe-Institut Toronto is happy to partner with Hot Docs in presenting the innovative German documentary scene, represented this years through 19 films and co-productions.

As a guest of the Goethe-Institut, head of the Berlinale Forum program Christoph Terhechte will be part of this year's Hot Docs jury. Also, the Goethe-Institut is thrilled to co-present "Global Family" by Andreas Köhler and Melanie Andernach, which tells the migration drama of a Somali family, as part of the Hot Docs program "The Changing Face of Europe".

The Goethe-Institut supports German initiatives at North America's biggest documentary film festival
 

May 3 - 13 | various locations, Toronto

German Films @ Toronto Jewish Film Festival

As every year, the Goethe-institut Toronto is happy to partner with TJFF in presenting German films in Toronto. A particular highlight is the 1923 silent film The Ancient Law, which will be screening in a recently restored version that premiered at this year's Berlinale. This important piece of German-Jewish cinematic history about Jewish life in 19th-century Europe will be shown with live musical accompaniment by pianist Donald Sosin and Klezmer violinist Alicia Svigals, who are guests of the Goethe-Institut. Other, more recent German films shown during the festival are Claus Räfle's The Invisibles (2017) and Bye Bye Germany (2017) by Sam Garbarski.

The Goethe-Institut co-presents German films at TJFF

May 10 + 15 + 17 | TIFF Bell Lightbox, Toronto

GOETHE FILMS: Schlingensief: Approach those you fear

Iconoclast, enfant terrible, agent provocateur. While many would call German filmmaker-performer-activist Christoph Schlingensief (1960-2010) fearless, he himself said shortly before his untimely death that to make good work, “I have to approach those I fear”. GOETHE FILMS features core Schlingensief projects that tackle the ghosts of Europe's past, present and future – fascism, capitalism, division and reunification – in his signature no-holds-barred splatter style.    

Series co-presented with the Laser Blast Film Society & KinoVortex

May 10 | 6:30 PM | TIFF Bell Lightbox, Toronto

"The 120 Days of Bottrop" by Christoph Schlingensief & Oskar Roehler

The survivors of the old Fassbinder crew (actors Carstensen, Hermann, Spengler and many others, playing themselves, alongside cameos by Kitten Natividad, Roland Emmerich and Helmut Berger) get together one last time to make the very last New German Film: a remake of Pasolini's "Salò". Schlingensief approaches Fassbinder with endless references both open and obscure, taking the process of de- and reconstruction just far enough to completely demystify as well as pay tribute to an era and its heritage.

Introduced by Bruce LaBruce

May 15 | 6.30 PM | TIFF Bell Lightbox, Toronto

"Foreigners Out! Schlingensief's Container" by Paul Poet

When in 2000 the “Austrian Freedom Party” was the first extreme right-wing party since WWII to become part of the government, Christoph Schlingensief decided to express his protest in the touristy heart of Vienna. Outside the opera house, he installed a public concentration camp that cynically reflected media culture: a “Big Brother” container with a dozen asylum seekers in it, surveilled by cameras, giving passers-by the opportunity to watch and to feed them. Via online voting the public could chose two asylum seekers a day to be kicked out of the country.

Co-presented by the Images Festival
 

May 17 | 6:30 PM | TIFF Bell Lightbox, Toronto

"German Chainsaw Massacre" + "The Holding of Skulls is not my thing!"

October 3rd, 1990: the official celebration of German reunification: fireworks light the sky, the masses sing the national anthem. Schlingensief focusses the camera away from the festivities to “Ossi” woman Clara, who flees to the promising West in her Trabant car, leaving her husband behind with his throat cut. Arriving in the West, she becomes the target of a butcher’s clan hunting for fresh meat from the East. “German Chainsaw Massacre” is a radical comment on German reunification, comparing the capitalist market to a meat market and an homage to trash movies like Hooper’s “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, or Hitchcock’s “Psycho”.

“The Holding of Skulls is not my Thing!” documents a phone conversation between philosopher-author Kluge and Schlingensief, talking about the latter’s controversial 2001 Hamlet production in Zurich for which he staged a classical Shakespeare – but then made a radical cut to the present: into the setting of robes, crowns and daggers, he throws a group of six former extremists, who interrupt the play and announce to the audience why they broke with their neo-Nazi past.

May 6 - 24 | various locations

German jazz ensemble "Subtone" on tour across Canada

Subtone stands at the forefront of today's young innovative Jazz ensembles. Founded in 2005 in Berlin, its members now live on both sides of the Atlantic, in St. John's, Newfoundland, Berlin and Cologne. After more than 10 years of band history, numerous prizes and more than 300 performances all over the world, Subtone is certainly not just a short-term musical trend. In May 2018 the band will travel across Canada for two weeks to introduce their music to Canadian audiences for the first time.

Supported by the Goethe-Institut

until May 13 | The Power Plant, Toronto

Kader Attia: The Field of Emotion

Over the last few years, the notion of “repair” as both a physical and symbolic act has been at the core of Kader Attia’s practice. His research on the nature of reparation and re-appropriation is frequently driven by exchanges with thinkers from the fields medicine, music, psychoanalysis, natural science, political science and architecture. For his first exhibition in Canada, Attia will develop a new context-specific work around the notion of “repair” as it is manifested in a particularly Canadian/North American history.
 
The Power Plant & the Goethe-Institut Toronto present Kader Attia's first solo exhibition in Canada

German Film @ Canada

Follow our festival news, reviews and background stories on the latest in German film, including this week:

"Christopf Schlingensief & his Films" (complete film!)
Documentaries in times of crisis
Christoph Schlingensief: Approach those you fear (& win tix!)
Doc attendance: heavy users & sophisticated audiences