German language films and coproductions at the 23rd European Film Festival in Malaysia.
sisters apart
Director: Daphne Charizani | greece & Germany | 2020 | 93 min
Rojda, a German soldier and native Kurd, volunteers for a mission to train female Kurdish soldiers in Iraq to fight ISIS. No one must know that she is actually looking for her missing sister.
Gods of molenbeek
Director: Reetta Huhtanen | Finland, belgium & Germany | 2020 | 73 min
The Molenbeek district of Brussels. A believed jihadi capital to some but familiar home to the 6 year-old boys Aatos and Amine. This is where they listen to spiders, discover black holes and quarrel over who gets to command the flying carpet that is to take them to the lands of their ancestors. They live in the same building, yet come from different worlds. Together they search for answers to the big questions. Aatos wants a god of his own, as Amine already has Allah but the question is complicated by his friend Flo’s belief that people who believe in God have gone crazy.
Never Gonna Snow Again
Director: Małgorzata Szumowska, Michał Englert | Poland & Germany | 2020 | 116 min
A masseur from the East enters the lives of the rich residents of a bland, walled off community. Despite their wealth, the residents emit an inner sadness, a longing. The mysterious newcomer’s hands heal, his eyes seem to penetrate their souls. To them, his Russian accent sounds like a song from the past, a memory of their seemingly safer childhood. Zhenia, for this is his name, changes their lives.
Oskar & Lilli – Where No One Knows Us
Director: Arash T. Riahi | Austria | 2020 | 103 min
The Chechen refugee kids Oskar (8) and Lilli (13), who have been living in Austria for six years, are about to be deported along with their mother. When their mother attempts suicide, it results in the short-term suspension of the deportation – but also in the forced separation of the family. The children’s hope that they will be reunited with their mother is nourished by their love for each other and challenges all bureaucratic obstacles with passion and poetry. A bitter-sweet odyssey about the many ways of perceiving the world around you in order to survive.
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