Based on Michel Houellebecq's controversial novel, Atomised (aka The Elementary Particles) focuses on Michael and Bruno, two very different half-brothers and their disturbed sexuality. After a chaotic childhood with a hippie mother only caring for her affairs, Michael, a molecular biologist, is more interested in genes than women, while Bruno is obsessed with his sexual desires, but mostly finds his satisfaction with prostitutes. But Bruno's life changes when he gets to know the experienced Christiane. In the meantime, Michael meets Annabelle, the love of his youth, again.
As celebrated conductor Lydia Tár starts rehearsals for a career-defining symphony, the consequences of her past choices begin to echo in the present.
A young East German woman leaves her husband and business partner and relocates to a West German city to start anew as an accountant, but he soon catches up with her.
The story of three couples, one of which just broke up, one that seems to be about to, and one perfectly okay. They are all friends, and from time to time, they gather to talk about everything. One time, they gather for dinner at the second couple's "mansion“— the husband became rich with his business. We see each couple as they prepare themselves for the party and learn a lot about their relationships. At the dinner, they get to talking about recognizing each other's peer with closed eyes and decide to try it, naked.
A woman's life is destroyed when she discovers that her husband has another family.
Katja Flint, Hannelore Elsner and Heiner Lauterbach star in this German film about a woman who climbs the social ladder by sleeping with those she encounters on her way to the top. When she's discovered dead in her apartment in 1957, the police try to piece together the clues to find out who murdered her … but to no avail.
Bella Figura is a play where the stage direction "flottement" (a suspension, indeterminacy, or oscillation) occurs frequently, indicating a moment of silence when the characters and audience are left in ambiguous tension. The playwright Yasmina Reza wrote Bella Figura specifically for the Schaubühne director Thomas Ostermeier, and I imagine that she included these floating silences with him in mind.
An accompanying short film to TÁR (2022).
A girl, Carola, whose vacation in Kenya takes an interesting turn when she becomes infatuated with a Masai. Carola decides to leave her boyfriend to stay with her lover. There, she has to adapt to the Masai's way of life and get used to their food which includes milk mixed with blood. She also has to face her husband's attitude towards women and what he expects from a wife. Nonetheless, Carola is welcomed warmly into the tribe she has chosen to join.
In a small town in Northern Germany, a penniless German veteran is offered a job as a deliveryman by an alcoholic Turkish entrepreneur, through which the former meets the latter's wife.
Manuela is left behind when her husband Justo fights for his ideals against Franco's Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War. He is deported to a concentration camp, and upon his release, continues the fight against nationalism in the French resistance. Years pass without a word from him, but his wife never gives up hope of seeing him again.
A woman tries to survive the invasion of Berlin by the Soviet troops during the last days of World War II.
The documentary sketches the essence and impact, history and present of the Berlin drama school "Ernst Busch". It takes the move of the school in 2018 as an opportunity to capture the contradictions between artistic and economic interests in post-reunification Berlin and in the present. After the end of the GDR, the school was threatened with extinction: the building was dilapidated, Berlin was broke, the search for a new location threatened to fail. The students themselves finally fought their way to the new location under the motto "Bitte nach Mitte!" ("Let’s move to the center").
Georg Stefan Troller, born in Vienna in 1921, crossed half of Europe as a refugee only to return with the US army in 1945 . As a filmmaker he became a chronicler of his time and with this film he engages in some bold and self-ironic navel gazing.
One night, 18 year old Lena is bitten by Louise, leader of a female vampire trio that are as deadly as they are beautiful. Her newfound vampiric lifestyle is a blessing and a curse at the same time. At first, she enjoys the limitless freedom, the luxury, the parties. But soon the murderous blood lust of her comrades in arms proves too much for her, and she falls dangerously in love with Tom, a young undercover cop.
Eva and Dieter danced together for the first time in the winter of 1952. They got married, built a house and had three children. They argued, doubted, overcame crises and grew old together. Now Eva's strength is beginning to wane. They embark on a new path as a couple for the very last time, looking back on the happy moments, but also on the inevitable that lies ahead. How will this life as a couple work out?
Hedda Gabler finds herself torn between the lingering ache of a past love and the quiet suffocation of her present life. Over the course of one charged night, long-repressed desires and hidden tensions erupt—pulling her and everyone around her into a spiral of manipulation, passion, and betrayal.
In 1980s East Germany, Barbara is a Berlin doctor banished to a country medical clinic for applying for an exit visa. Deeply unhappy with her reassignment and fearful of her co-workers as possible Stasi informants, Barbara stays aloof, especially from the good natured clinic head, Andre.
Philipp Gerber is a smart, but self-satisfied car salesman. In an inattentive moment at the wheel of his car, he runs over a boy on a bike and, instead of helping him, he drives away. As he has feelings of guilt, he tries to find out more about the accident’s victim.
Juliane's happiness seems perfect. She is head over heals in love and has just begun a new life with August. One morning, however, she wakes up to find that she has been unexplainable thrown back into her past - to the time before she met her new love. Is what seems at first glance a cruel setback in reality actually a second chance?
A Chechen Muslim illegally immigrates to Hamburg and becomes a person of interest for a covert government team tracking the movements of potential terrorists.
Middle-aged lawyer Thomas meets Leyla at the pool. After their paths keep crossing, he asks her out on a date. Somewhat to his surprise she agrees. The next morning Thomas awakes to find Leyla and his laptop, which contains vital case files, missing.
Canada, the summer of 1898. A group of German settlers travel towards the far north in covered wagons with packhorses and their few possessions in tow. The seven travellers set off from Ashcroft, the final railway station. Along with their leader, flamboyant businessman Wilhelm Laser, they are hoping to find their fortune in the recently discovered goldfields of Dawson, but they have no idea of the stresses and dangers which lie ahead on their 2,500 kilometre journey. Before long uncertainty, cold weather and exhaustion begin to take their toll and conflicts escalate. The journey leads these men and women deeper and deeper into a menacing wilderness. (Berlinale.de)
On behalf of a multinational company, a production assistant drives around the Romanian city of Bucharest, interviewing various citizens who have been injured due to work accidents to cast one of them in a “safety at work” video.
A picturesque blonde beauty constructs an impenetrable emotional wall that neither her parents, her boyfriend, nor her colleague can penetrate. Hannah may appear perfect on the surface, but her inner demons are slowly consuming her. A photo lab developer who rarely ventures out of her well-fortified apartment, Hannah finds that her repressed memories are unexpectedly jogged by a series of old photographs.
Feuerreiter is an elegant period drama that begins in Frankfurt in 1796. Through his friend, Baron von Sinclair, romantic and rebellious poet Friedrich Hölderlin secures the position of a private tutor in the home of a banker named Gontard. He is soon torn between his passion for poetry and his love for Susette, the lady of the house. To top it all off, Baron von Sinclair is in love with him. Hölderlin's most beautiful poems are written during this trying time. However, he becomes a total recluse when he loses Susette. The film examines the effects of conflicting demands, both emotional and sensual, that may inspire art. Feuerreiter was screened as part of the New German Films at the 49th International Berlin Film Festival, 1999.
German-Jewish cabaret singer Nelly survived Auschwitz but had to undergo reconstructive surgery as her face was disfigured. Without recognizing Nelly, her former husband Johnny asks her to help him claim his wife’s inheritance. To see if he betrayed her, she agrees, becoming her own doppelganger.
Between 1924 and 1934, six children grow up in an apartment building in the Munich suburbs. Among them is the rather inconspicuous and melancholy Leo Knie, who has been in love with the pretty Marilli Kosemund since early childhood. Marilli is not averse to the young man's advances, but she wants to be conquered. But that is exactly what shy Leo finds difficult. So he escapes into harmless dancing with his buddies, pursues other girls - rather unsuccessfully - and resigns himself to his predetermined fate.
During the Second World War, women were for the first time allowed to work as war correspondents. Based on reports, letters and diary excerpts, filmmaker Luzia Schmid sketches a personal portrait of three fearless women and their unique attempts to report on the war.
A singer flees from Nazi Germany, travels to Paris and befriends a young writer, his lover and a professor.
The German tourist Kiki and the Swiss tour guide Marlies are kidnapped by Contra rebels from Nicaragua while on vacation in Costa Rica. While Kiki's friend Markus fights for her release together with her mother, Kiki begins an affair with one of the kidnappers. When the two women were released after 72 days on payment of ransom, the police suspected that they had colluded with the kidnappers.
Jochen Epstein is released from prison after serving 15 years for murder. He is determined to emigrate from Germany and leave the past behind him forever. But familiar places, repressed memories and a never-forgotten girlfriend break the armor that the old man has built around himself. It all began on his last night in freedom: during a chance visit to a Christian service, Epstein believes he recognizes his former concentration camp tormentor Giesser in the parish priest.
Two young and attractive social workers/nuns bring fresh air into a city missionary station, but are also challenged by lust and money, offered by a millionaire.
Fanny, a shy and lonely teenager, goes on a language exchange to Germany. In Leipzig, she meets her pen pal, Lena, a teenager eager to become politically active. Fanny is troubled. To win over Lena, she invents a life for herself, to the extent of becoming trapped in her lies.
TV adaptation of Michael Thalheimer's production at the Deutsches Theater Berlin.
New conversation between director Christian Petzold and actor Nina Hoss
Behind-the-scenes look at making the film adaptation of John le Carré's A Most Wanted Man.
The story of a friendship between two dissimilar women: On the one hand, single mother Anja, who tries to keep herself and her daughter afloat with various jobs. On the other, Isabell, who looks after her parents in need of care and whose relationship with her husband Philipp is put to the test.
2014 documentary featuring interviews with Petzold, Hoss, actors Nina Kunzendorf and Ronald Zehrfeld, and production designer K. D. Gruber
Author Max Zorn, now in his early 60s, is on a promotional book tour in New York when he encounters the woman he could never forget. They spend a weekend together, seventeen years have passed. Can there be a future for their past?
Freya Deichmann's life undergoes a radical change when she meets Helmuth James von Moltke at the age of 18. "I saw him and my heart stood still." He is the love of her live, a love which begins in the summer of 1929 and has to withstand the Third Reich. The dramatic climax is Helmuth's arrest. It is a time torn between hope and parting. Every day could be the last. Her great happiness: almost everyday they write each other letters, smuggled by the prison chaplain Harald Poelchau. A love in resistance, one which doesn't end with the execution of the beloved.
Kleist's death at Wannsee - a spectacular case that has disturbed and fascinated posterity to this day. The German poet is found shot - what does that mean? What exactly happened on the afternoon of November 21, 1811 at Kleiner Wannsee? What do you know about the woman who died with him?
Wiebke, a professional horse trainer, faces a unique challenge when she adopts Raya, a five-year-old girl, who is prone to violent outbursts because of her traumatic past.
Based on archive holdings from nine decades, director Hannes Rossacher has created a complete Jedermann performance and thus a unique cultural-historical puzzle from Alexander Moissi to Nicholas Ofczarek. The success story of the phenomenon "Everyman" is told in an unprecedented way.
Anna teaches violin at a music school, her husband is an instrument-maker. They have a 10-year-old son, Jonas. At school, Anna champions young Alexander, in whom she alone sees great talent. She devotes much energy and attention preparing him for the next stage exam to prove she was right. Soon Anna devotes more time to him than to Jonas, bringing the two boys into rivalry. At the same time her marriage is collapsing, she withdraws increasingly from her own family and starts an affair with her colleague Christian, who is encouraging her to join a quartet. When she fails during their joint concert, the pressure mounts. With Alexander now her vehicle, she drives him ever onwards and upwards. Come the day of the exam, events take a tragic turn...
Berlin playwright Lisa follows her husband Martin to Switzerland, where he manages a private school. However, when her twin brother Sven’s leukaemia begins to wreak havoc on his health, she decides she must return to her roots, which has significant consequences for her relationship.
After being involuntarily discharged from the U.S. Special Forces, James Harper decides to support his family by joining a private contracting organization alongside his best friend and under the command of a fellow veteran. Overseas on a covert mission, Harper must evade those trying to kill him while making his way back home.
A short story about the incestuous relationship of brother and his sister Agatha returns to the seaside resort of her childhood in Normandy with her six-year-old son Honoré after years of absence.
Since losing her family, a woman is living alone in the wilderness — far away from society, which is dominated by mistrust and fear after the outbreak of a fatal disease. When she is forced to leave this life behind, she not only experiences a boundless freedom, but also remembers the importance of human closeness and the feeling of belonging.
German adaptation of the Ibsen play, filmed live at the Deutsches Theater (Berlin).
Julia, a gifted mathematician navigates the cutthroat world of academia. Pascal, a teaching assistant, recruits her to join an exclusive training program for the prestigious and notoriously difficult Putnam mathematics competition.