Film, unlike any other art form, has the power to connect us as human beings. It allows us to empathize with others and step into their shoes, to travel across borders, and even travel through time. As the new director of the Goethe-Institut in Los Angeles, I am proud to present some of the best new German cinema to the audiences of Southern California.
The 18th annual festival takes place from October 11th – 14th with screenings at the American Cinematheque and the Goethe-Institut. German Currents 2024 opens Friday, October 11th, at the Egyptian Theatre, with the exclusive red-carpet LA premiere of multi-award-winning writer-director Sonja Heiss’ German box office and festival favorite, WHEN WILL IT BE AGAIN LIKE IT NEVER WAS BEFORE, based on the best-selling novel of the same name by Joachim Meyerhoff and starring Devid Striesow (ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT, THE COUNTERFEITERS, AGE OF CANNIBALS). A gala reception at the Egyptian Theatre will follow the premiere.
The festival weekend continues with the US premiere of the popular short film showcase NEXT GENERATION SHORT TIGER 2024. The US premiere of director Sarah Neumann’s feature-length film debut, BEYOND THE BLUE BORDER, depicts the absurdities of life under East German rule and stars Lena Urzendowsky (FRANKY FIVE STAR, Netflix’s DARK, and HOW TO SELL DRUGS ONLINE (Fast). Writer-director Fabian Stumm’s relationship drama, BONES AND NAMES, dives into the Berlin art scene and into the relationship between two creatives. Come and see them at the Goethe-Institut.
At the American Cinematheque’s Los Feliz 3 theater, German Currents presents the LA premiere of multi-award-winning cinematographer-director Judith Kaufmann and director Georg Maas’s historical drama THE GLORY OF LIFE, capturing the final year and romance in the life of writer Franz Kafka, as well as US premiere of writer-director Aslı Özarslan’s ELBOW, based on the novel “Ellbogen” by Fatma Aydemir.
Completing the festival program, the annual German Currents children’s matinee returns to the Goethe-Institut on Sunday, October 13th. It will bring to the audience a free LA Premiere screening of Soleen Yusef’s winner of the German Film Award for best Youth and Children’s Film, WINNERS, that will also be presented as a special invite-only educational screening for LA area schools on Monday, October 14th, at the Gardena Cinema. A discussion with Soleen Yusef is planned following both events.
GERMAN CURRENTS FILM FESTIVAL 2024
WHEN WILL IT BE AGAIN LIKE IT NEVER WAS BEFORE
Presented on Friday, October 11th @ 7:00 PM at the American Cinematheque’s Egyptian Theatre.
Director Sonja Heiss
Screenplay Sonja Heiss, Lars Hubrich, based on Joachim Meyerhoff’s novel of the same name
Cinematography Manuel Dacosse
Cast Laura Tonke, Devid Striesow, Pola Geiger, Camille Loup Moltzen, Casper von Bülow, Merlin Rose
Producers Maren Ade, Jonas Dornbach, Janine Jackowski
Co-producers Jean-Yves Roubin, Cassandre Warnauts, Peter Schauerte, Magdalena Prosteder
Production Company Komplizen Film GmbH, Warner Bros. Entertainment GmbH
For Josse Meyerhoff (Loup Moltzen/von Bülow/Rose), growing up is anything but typical. His family lives on the grounds of Germany’s largest psychiatric hospital, where his father, Richard (Striesow), is the director, and the boundaries between the patients and the family’s private lives are blurred. His mother, Iris (Tonke), ignores the signs of her crumbling marriage by painting Italian vistas and escaping into memories of her youth. The youngest of three boys, Josse is prone to emotional outbursts and sadness but often finds comfort and a sympathetic ear among the clinic’s patients. As Josse grows from his childhood in the 1970s to adolescence, his first love, a taste of freedom abroad, tragic losses in the 1980s, and finally into adulthood and his return to his family in the 1990s, the search for a sense of belonging and a feeling of home travels with him.
Multi-award-winning writer-director Sonja Heiss and co-writer Lars Hubrich’s skillful adaptation of Joachim Meyerhoff’s best-selling autobiographical novel blends tragedy and comedy, coming to life through powerful performances by Tonka, Striesow, Geiger, and Loup Moltzen/von Bülow/Rose, who portray Josse throughout the years.
SELECT AWARDS:
German Film Award 2023 Nominated for Best Feature Film, Best Director
Günter Rohrbach Filmpreis 2023 Preis des Oberbürgermeisters, Best Performance – Laura Tonke
ELLBOGEN
Presented on Saturday, October 12th @ 10:00 PM at the American Cinematheque’s Los Feliz 3 Theatre.
Germany (2024) 86 min. DCP Projection. German/English/Turkish with English Subtitles
Director Aslı Özarslan
Screenplay Claudia Schaefer and Aslı Özarslan, Based on the novel “Ellbogen” by Fatma Aydemir
Cinematographer Andaç Karabeyoğlu-Thomas
Cast Melia Kara, Jamilah Bagdach, Asya Utku, Nurgül Ayduran, Jale Arikan, Mina Özlem Sağdiç,
Doğa Gürer, Ercan Karaçayli
Producer Jamila Wenske
Co-producers Delphine Schmit, Guillaume Dreyfus, Anna Maria Aslanoğlu, Julia Irene Peters, Jutta Feit
Production Company Achtung Panda!
Co-production Company Tripode Productions, Istos Film, JIP Film und Verleih, ZDF (Das kleine Fernsehspiel)
17-year-old Hazal is a Turkish-German teen living in Berlin. Her biggest dream: to be given a chance at a future outside of her parents’ bakery. Despite her best efforts to find an apprenticeship, her mediocre grades and numerous rejected applications leave her with few options. For her 18th birthday she wants to escape the everyday grind and hit the clubs with her friends. But the night’s celebration is cut short after the girls are turned away by a bouncer at a dance club. When the teens are harassed in the subway on their way home, the situation escalates and Hazal’s frustration about her rejections erupts into a fatal incident. Forced to flee to Turkey, a country she hardly knows, Hazal must survive at all costs. Based on the award-winning-novel “Ellbogen” by Fatma Aydemir, Özarslan’s debut feature is a skillfully crafted and intense portrait of a young woman struggling to hold her ground in a society that seems to cast her aside.
FESTIVALS, AWARDS & NOMINATIONS:
Hessischer Film- und Kinopreis 2024 Frankfurter Buchmesse Award – Best Adaption
Goldener Spatz 2024 Audience Award, Best Youth Film
Internationales Frauen FF Dortmund+Köln 2024 Best Debut Director, Best Debut Feature
Lichter Filmfest 2024 Best Regional Feature
THE GLORY OF LIFE
Presented on Saturday, October 12th @ 7:00 PM at the American Cinematheque’s Los Feliz 3 Theatre.
Germany (2024) 98 min. DCP Projection. German/English with English Subtitles
Director Judith Kaufmann, Georg Maas
Screenplay Michael Gutmann, Georg Maas, based Michael Kumpfmüller’s novel
Cinematography Judith Kaufmann
Cast Sabin Tambrea, Henriette Confurius, Daniela Golpashin, Mira Griesbaum, Lionel Hesse, Manuel Rubey
Producers Helge Sasse, Solveig Fina, Tommy Pridnig
Production Company Tempest Film Produktion GmbH, Lotus Filmproduktion GmbH
Summer, 1923. The Baltic Sea. The writer Franz Kafka (Tambrea), seriously ill with tuberculosis, convalesces at a seaside resort in Müritz. By chance, he meets the 25-year-old Dora Diamant (Confurius) on the beach, a governess from the Jewish Volksheim Berlin. Though they seem from different worlds, it is love at first sight, and for Kafka, Diamant embodies the essence of life. As their love grows, Kafka follows Diamant to Berlin. When his condition worsens, the lovers leave Berlin for a sanatorium near Vienna, where, in Diamant’s arms, Kafka succumbs to his illness barely a year after they meet. Adapted by Gutmann and Writer-Director Maas from Michael Kumpfmüller’s best-selling novel of the same name and exquisitely lensed by multi-award-winning Cinematography and co-director Judith Kaufmann, THE GLORY OF LIFE blends fact and fiction to capture Kafka’s last love and year of life.
FESTIVALS, AWARDS & NOMINATIONS:
German Film Award 2024 Nominated for Best Costume Design, Best Director
Festival des deutschen Films 2024 Nominated for Rheingold Audience Award
Presented by German Films and the German Federal Film Board (FFA), the 14th edition of this beloved annual showcase presents the year’s most promising young directors and outstanding student short films to international audiences and the film industry. The program combines new talents – the NEXT GENERATION of German Cinema – together with the best German shorts under 7 minutes – the winners of the FFA’s SHORT TIGER Award 2024.
The 11 short films for NEXT GENERATION SHORT TIGER 2024 were selected by an expert jury: director Sophie Linnenbaum (THE ORDINARIES), Alexandra Gramatke (Kurzfilm Agentur Hamburg) and Dr. Christian Bräuer (Yorck Cinemas, CICAE). They had to choose from 98 submissions from 19 German film schools and 18 additional shorts (up to 15 min) by independent producers that were preselected by members from the AG Kurzfilm.
Representing Germany’s diversity of forms, genres, and skillful filmmaking talent that international audiences have come to expect from German shorts, these deeply personal and universal stories confirm the notion that short film is an independent art form deserving of the big screen and the awareness of audiences worldwide.
BONES AND NAMES
Presented as a free screening on Sunday, October 13th @ 5:00 PM
at the Goethe-Institut Los Angeles.
Germany (2023) 104 min. Digital Projection. German/French with English Subtitles
Writer-Director Fabian Stumm
Director of Photography Michael Bennet
Cast Fabian Stumm, Knut Berger, Marie-Lou Sellem, Susie Meyer, Magnús Mariuson,
Doreen Fietz, Alma Meyer-Prescott
Producers Fabian Stumm, Nicola Heim
Co-producer Nele Schallenberg
Production Company Postofilm
Boris (Stumm) is an actor. Jonathan (Berger) is a writer. Together, they are a couple, but their relationship has reached a point of routine domesticity that some might call comforting, but others stagnant. As he immerses himself deeper into rehearsals for a new film with an unpredictable director, Boris begins to confuse real and fictional characters; meanwhile, Jonathan tries to redefine his voice as a writer by any means necessary. During these days spent struggling with emotional distance and closeness, trust, desire, and fear of loss, Boris’s niece Josie flits about like Shakespeare’s Puck, testing her boundaries as she navigates the approaching end of her childhood.
Stumm’s directorial and screenplay feature-length debut unfolds in humorous yet tender sequences centered on people searching for their place in life and offers an intimate reflection on the dissonances in relationships that connect and distance us.
AWARDS
Deutscher Schauspielpreis 2023 Best Dramatic Supporting Role
Neiße Filmfestival 2023 Neiße-Fisch, Best Screenplay
IFF Berlin 2023 Heiner-Carow-Preis
BEYOND THE BLUE BORDER
Presented as a free screening on Sunday, October 13th @ 3:00 PM
at the Goethe-Institut Los Angeles.
Director Sarah Neumann
Screenplay Sarah Neumann, Based on the novel “Jenseits der blauen Grenze” by Dorit Linke
Director of Photography Nikolaus Schreiber, Felix Gänsicke (Underwater Camera)
Cast Lena Urzendowsky, Willi Geitmann, Jannis Veihelmann, Winnie Böwe, Ronny Miersch,
Stefan Mocker
Producers Nicola Pantzke, Jasper Philipp Mielke, Karoline Henkel, Felix Schreiber, Arto Sebastian Buhmann
Co-producers Delphine Schmit, Guillaume Dreyfus, Anna Maria Aslanoğlu, Julia Irene Peters, Jutta Feit
Production Company Wood Water Films
Co-production Company Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg GmbH (Ludwigsburg),
Südwestrundfunk (SWR), Arte Deutschland TV GmbH
August 1989, East Germany. Hanna (Urzendowsky) is a talented swimmer who dreams of becoming an Olympic champion. When not training, she’s with her best friends Andreas (Geitmann) and Jens (Veihelmann). Andreas comes from an abusive home and has never fit into the rigid GDR system. When Hanna and Jens learn that Andreas is to be “socialistically re-educated” in a youth work camp, they know they must help him. Andreas sees only one way out: to swim 50 km west, across the Baltic Sea to freedom. But in a society that demands conformity, Hannah’s friendship with Andreas threatens her Olympic dreams. Suddenly, she is faced with the decision of her life: does she leave her secure place in socialist society, or let Andreas swim alone, knowing that he will never make it without her help? Neumann’s multi-award-winning debut feature, based on Dorit Linke’s novel, “Jenseits der blauen Grenze,” looks to Germany’s recent past to explore timeless themes of self-sacrifice, friendship, and the search for freedom.
AWARDS
Filmfest Bremen 2024 Audience Award, Best Regional Film
Max Ophüls Preis 2024 Best Young Actor, Audience Award – Feature Film, Prize of the Ecumenical Jury
WINNERS | SIEGER SEIN
Presented as a free Family Matinee screening on
Sunday, October 13th @ 11:00 AM at the Goethe-Institut Los Angeles.
Germany (2024) 119 min. DCP Projection. German/English with English Subtitles
Writer-Director Soleen Yusef
Cinematographer Konstantin Kröning
Cast Dileyla Agirman, Andreas Döhler, Tamira Bwibo, Sherine Ciara Merai, Yumin Hannah Cho, Anisa Perk, Artemis Kostopoulou
Producers Sonja Schmitt, Marc Schmidheiny, Christoph Daniel
Co-producers Dario Suter, Joel Brandeis, Detlev Buck, Claus Boje
Production Company DCM Pictures GmbH
Co-production Company Boje Buck Produktion
The first day at a new school can be tough for any kid, but for 11-year-old Mona it’s downright chaotic. She and her Kurdish family have fled their home in Syria and ended up in Germany in search of a better life, but Mona is having a hard time fitting in. She’s still learning German and misses her hometown and playing soccer with her friends. Chaos is the order of the day at her new school, where most of the teachers are worn to a frazzle and the students are just as frustrated with their teachers. When Mr. Che, the coach of the girls’ soccer team sees Mona’s soccer skills, he puts her on the team. Although they are training for an upcoming tournament for all of Berlin’s schools, the team is anything but harmonious. Mona is singled-out and is blamed for the team’s troubles. With the tournament quickly approaching, they realize that if they want to win, they must stop fighting, treat each other as equals, and learn the true meaning of teamwork. Winner of the 2024 German Film Award for Best Children’s Film, Yusuf’s second feature is an inspirational, fast-paced coming-of-age film with a fresh, young perspective on the importance of family, friendship, and belonging.
AWARDS
German Film Award 2024 Best Children’s Film
Giffoni Film Festival Best Film Elements +10
FBW 2024 Seal of Approval: Highly Recommended
Deutsches Kinder Medien Festival Goldener Spatz 2024 Best Screenplay