“...and the winners are...”

For the first time, the German Film Academy and the Goethe-Institut are joining together to exhibit award-winning German films around the world. All films selected were winners or nominees for either the prestigious German Film Awards 2018 or the First Steps Awards 2017. The Goethe-Instituts around the world continually present a wide spectrum of film programs, winning new fans for German cinema.
 
Just like their counterparts in the USA, the members of the German Film Academy vote to decide who will receive the German Film Award, one of the most prestigious cultural honors in Germany. As experts in their field, they decide which films are the most pioneering, innovative, moving and visually powerful, and therefore deserve to receive the award. This means that only the most artistically exciting films are awarded a “Lola,” as the prestigious German Film Award has been known for a number of years.
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Wednesday, 9 January 2019, 19:00
Stein Auditorium, India Habitat Centre

© Studiocanal GmbH / Julia Terjung The Silent Revolution (Das schweigende Klassenzimmer)
 
Nominations for Best Feature Film, Best Original Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design
 
Germany. Feature film, German with subtitles, colour, 111 min., 2017 | Cast: Leonard Scheicher, Tom Gramenz, Lena Klenke, Jonas Dassler, Ronald Zehrfeld, Florian Lukas, Jördis Triebel | Director and Screenplay: Lars Kraume | Camera: Jens Harant | Editing: Barbara Gies | Production: Akzente Film & Fernsehproduktion GmbH
 
Kurt and Theo are classmates and best friends. In 1956 they are about to finish school in Stalinstadt, one of the GDR’s flagship workers’ settlements. But during a secret excursion to West Berlin, Theo and Kurt see disturbing newsreel footage of the uprising in Budapest. Back in Stalinstadt, they have the idea of holding a minute’s silence in class for the victims of the Hungarian struggle for freedom. Little do they know how much trouble their seemingly harmless act of solidarity will mean for their future…
 
Thursday, 10 January 2019, 19:00
Gulmohar Hall, India Habitat Centre

© zeroonefilm / Klaus Staeck Beuys
 
Best Documentary | Best Editor | Nomination for Best Original Soundtrack
 
Germany. Documentary, German, English with subtitles, colour and black & white,107 min., 2017 | Director and Screenplay: Andres Veiel | Camera: Jörg Jeshel | Editing: Stephan Krumbiegel, Olaf Voigtländer | Production: zero one film/terz film
 
Beuys, the man with a hat, some felt and the Fettecke. Thirty years after his death, he still seems to be a visionary, way ahead of his time. With this congenial montage of countless previously untapped visual and audio sources, director Andres Veiel and his team have created a unique chronicle: “Beuys” is not a portrait in the common sense, but an intimate look at a human being, his art, and his world of ideas. In the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, he patiently tried to explain that “money shouldn’t be a commodity.” His work addressed a new, expanded concept of art that included the political shaping of society. Beuys boxes, parleys, lectures and explains pictures to a dead hare. He asks with a grin: “Do you want a revolution without laughter?” His expanded concept of art puts him smack in the middle of socially relevant discourse, even today.
 
Friday, 11 January 2019, 19:00
Stein Auditorium, India Habitat Centre

© Peter Hartwig / Rohfilm Factory 3 Days in Quiberon (3 Tage in Quiberon)
 
Best Feature Film (Gold) | Best Director | Best Lead Actress | Best Supporting Actress | Best Supporting Actor | Best Cinematography | Best Original Soundtrack | Nominations for Best Sound Design, Best Makeup Artist
 
Germany, Austria, France. Feature film, German with subtitles, black & white, 115 min., 2018 | Director and Screenplay: Emily Atef | Cast: Marie Bäumer, Birgit Minichmayr, Charly Hübner, Robert Gwisdek | Camera: Thomas W. Kiennast | Editing: Hansjörg Weißbrich | Music: Christoph M. Kaiser, Julian Maas | Production: Rohfilm Factory GmbH
 
1981, Quiberon, a small village on the coast of Brittany. Hilde arrives to visit her old friend, who has retreated to a spa hotel to escape the daily pressures of her life. Her friend is the world-famous star Romy Schneider, but together they come across as two ordinary women who are simply happy to be reunited. Shortly afterwards, the young journalist Michael Jürgs and Romy’s long-time acquaintance, photographer Robert Lebeck, arrive to conduct an interview for a large German publication. A cat-and-mouse game immediately ensues between the fragile diva and the ambitious author. The two embark on an emotional rollercoaster ride that fluctuates between tenderness and mutual manipulation. At the same time, Hilde tries to protect her friend from the journalists’ attempts to capture for their audience the innermost feelings of this fascinating woman. All of this keeps these four people deeply engaged for three days and nights.
 
Saturday, 12 January 2019, 19:00
Gulmohar Hall, India Habitat Centre

© Komplizen Film Western
 
Best Feature Film (Bronze) | Nomination for Best Director
 
Germany, Bulgaria, Austria. Feature film, German, Bulgarian, English with subtitles, colour, 119 min., 2017 | Director: Valeska Grisebach | Cast: Meinhard Neumann, Syuleyman Alilov Letifov, Reinhardt Wetrek | Screenplay: Valeska Grisebach | Camera: Bernhard Keller | Editing: Bettina Böhler | Production: Komplizen Film GmbH
 
A group of German construction workers begin building a hydroelectric power station in a remote region of Bulgaria. Even though relations with a nearby village’s inhabitants are difficult – not least because of language barriers that are initially almost impossible to overcome – Meinhard succeeds in making friends with the locals. His colleague Vincent tracks these rapprochements with jealous mistrust. With “Western,”Valeska Grisebach tells the story of migrant workers in foreign countries with the conditions reversed: the Germans here are foreigners, and overcoming borders is no easier for them than for their colleagues who come to Germany as outsiders.