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The Week in Germany: Culture

October 20, 2006

Longing and Lebenslust: New German Films Hit the Hamptons, Take Manhattan

A cornucopia of German films will be on view over the next few weeks at two festivals in New York, showcasing strong new writing and directing talents and celebrating the return of veterans such as Andreas Dresen, Romuald Karmakar and Michael Verhoeven.

The magical "Exploding Buds" by Petra Schröder is on at the Hamptons.

Nine German films are being screened at the Hamptons International Film Festival from October 18 to 22, including "Requiem" by Hans-Christian Schmid with rising star Sandra Hüller, "I Am the Other Woman" by Margarethe von Trotta and "The Front Line", an Irish-German-British-Swedish co-production by David Gleeson.

Following hot on the heels of the Hamptons festival, eight films and a short program highlighting the work of ten filmmakers from leading German film schools will be showcased at the Museum of Modern Art's annual Kino!2006 festival.

Moreover, the most comprehensive retrospective of East German cinema ever screened in the United States will be showing from November 6 to December 7 at the Goethe Institut Washington, the American Film Institute and the National Gallery of Art. Called Rebels with a Cause, the films for this retrospective were assembled in 2005 by MoMA, the Goethe Institut New York and the DEFA Film Library at the University of Massachusetts.

A scene from Margarethe von Trotta's "I Am the Other Woman", shown recently at the Toronto Film Festival, with German star Katja Riemann.

Among the films on show at Kino!2006 by new talent, Valeska Grisebach's "Longing" was lauded at the Berlinale 2006, Hans Steinbichler's "Winter Journey" brings Hanna Schygulla back to the German screen, and Chris Kraus' "Four Minutes" took the top prize at the Shanghai Film Festival. Axel Koenzen's suspenseful "Firn" and Robert Thalheim's cheering "Netto" meanwhile portray two quite different father-son relationships, one of betrayel, the other of reunification, according to the festival's program.

A scene from Andreas Dresen's "Summer in Berlin".

Dresen meanwhile presents his new comedy "Summer in Berlin", Karmaker puts forward his record of pre-9/11 lectures at the Al Quds mosque (Hamburg Lectures) and Michael Verhoeven delves into the darkest recesses of the 20th-century with his documentary about the complicity of the ordinary German soldier in the murder of civilians (The Unknown Soldier). The Center for German and European Studies at Brandeis University last April presented its first Conscience and Courage Award to Verhoeven after a screening of the film.

Acclaimed German director Michael Verhoeven

"In its eight separate programs moving among intelligent light comedies, searing dramas of loss, and new views on modern history Kino!2006 provides a broad perspective of contemporary German filmmaking," Laurence Kardish, senior curator of MoMA's Department of Film and Media states in the festival's program.

Kardish organized MoMA's German film survey in collaboration with Munich-based German Films Service + Marketing, and its New York representative Oliver Mahrdt. It is being presented with the support of the Goethe Institut New York and the German Consulate General in New York.

A scene from Chris Kraus' "Four Minutes", the Kino!2006 opening film starring Tehran-born, German-Iranian actress Jasmin Tabatabai.

Links:

The Hamptons International Film Festival

About the Kino!2006 films (MoMA)

The Goethe Institut Washington (Rebels with a Cause)

The Goethe Institut New York

German Consulate General New York

German Federal Film Board (FFA)

germanyinNYC.org

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