Film screening Oberhausen on Tour:
German Competition, Artist Film & Video 2014

Founded in 1954, the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen has been one of the premier showcases for short and experimental films for 60 years and counting. Famous as the site of the Oberhausen Manifesto, which transformed German cinema and helped launch the New German Cinema movement, the festival continues to draw filmmakers, curators, critics, and cineastes to the Ruhr region every May. In addition to the annual event itself, the Festival also operates one of the largest, oldest, and most highly respected short film archives in the world. Today the collection encompasses nearly 2,000 titles, among them many unique prints and works by major filmmakers such as Kenneth Anger, Santiago Álvarez, Maya Deren, Werner Herzog, Alexander Kluge, Jan Lenica, George Lucas, Matthias Müller, Roman Polanski, Alain Resnais, and Jan Švankmajer. And following each festival, a selection of highlights from the most recent edition, as well as classics from the collection, are presented at cinemas throughout the world as part of the “Oberhausen on Tour” program.

This year, the Goethe-Institut and Anthology Film Archives join to host Oberhausen’s annual touring program in New York. On June 16 Anthology will showcase classic Latin American films from the Festival’s archive, while on June 18 the Goethe-Institut will present some of the highlights of the 2014 festival.
 
This programme containing works from the German Competition 2014 centers on family, as well as alternative forms of communal living. While Das satanische Dickicht – EINS mischievously parades before our eyes the details of how a small and exemplary middle-class family begins to fray at the edges, Udita Bhargava takes us on a sensory journey right to the heart of an Indian Carrom Club, a fascinating mix of arcade and demimonde. Loretta Fahrenholz makes classical genre distinctions seem outdated when Uli Lommel, undeterred in the midst of a seemingly odd family situation, maintains his usual nonchalant air. And finally, Susann Maria Hempel recalls with unerring acuity an experience unique to East Germany after 1989, portrayed as an exploded doll’s house. She has received many important awards for her work, including the prize for the best contribution to the 2014 German Competition
at Oberhausen.

Das satanische Dickicht – EINS
THE SATANIC THICKET – ONE
Germany 2014
29 minutes, BluRay, color
German with English subtitles
by Willy Hans

A chicken is slaughtered, a song is sung, a lake crossed and the female hitchhiker never knew where she was heading in the first place. But one thing is for certain: It’s no easy task to try and understand other people.

IMRAAN, C / O Carrom Club
Germany 2014
13 minutes, BluRay, color
Hindi with English subtitles
by Udita Bhargava

Imraan, an 11 year old, looks after a 'Carrom Club' in Mumbai, where men of all ages gather to play carrom. A tiny glimpse into Imraan's life in the club.

My Throat , My Air
Germany 2013
17 minutes, BluRay, color
German with English subtitles
by Loretta Fahrenholz

A semi-fictional family drama, shot in Munich’s petty-bourgeois Westend, starring former Fassbinder actor, Warhol collaborator and horror movie director Ulli Lommel.

Birds
Germany 2014
15 minutes, BluRay, color
no dialogue
by Ulu Braun

There it stands, the vulture. Majestically spreading its wings. The other birds scrutinise their territory as well. Quo vadis, bird?

Sieben Mal am Tag beklagen wir unser Los und nachts stehen wir auf, um nicht zu träumen
SEVEN TIMES A DAY WE COMPLAIN ABOUT OUR FAITH AND AT NIGHT WE GET UP TO AVOID OUR DREAMS
Germany 2014
18 minutes, BluRay, color
German with English subtitles
by Susann Maria Hempel

A cinematic devotional book. Based on interviews with an unemployable sufferer (and his fellows), living in the East German countryside. Who lost his memory in 1989 and woke up into several nightmares.
 
Five films between Black Box and White Cube that confront the past and ask in diverse ways “What remains?”. Whilst Lior Shamriz both literally and figuratively investigates a bygone picture of Berlin, Josef Dabernig shows us in brilliantly composed black-and-white images people sitting on the banks of an Italian river who simply appropriate the landscape – regardless of its inhospitality. La estancia, winner of this year’s Grand Prize of the City of Oberhausen, depicts a massacre sparked by the battle for land rights in Paraguay, reconstructed as a series of subtle tableaux. The directors in this film programme employ a range of very unusual techniques and aesthetics, and some of their works have been shown to great acclaim in art exhibitions. Taken together, these films, some of them awardwinning, give viewers an insight into the current state of international artist films.

L’Amour sauvage
Germany 2014
26 minutes, BluRay, color
English with German subtitles
by Lior Shamriz

xx-xx-xx-gewobenes papier
Germany 2014
6 minutes, BluRay, color
no dialogue
by Michel Klöfkorn

River Plate
Austria 2013
16 minutes, BluRay, b&w
no dialogue
by Josef Dabernig

False Twins
Portugal 2014
21 minutes, BluRay, color
English
by Sandro Aguilar

La Estancia
Paraguay 2014
14 minutes, BluRay, color
no dialogue
by Federico Adorno

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