Magazine

Portrait

“Limited Possibilities Create Freedom” –
The Animation Filmmaker Sonja Rohleder

21. September 2023

Columbus gazes happily from the wings of the dove that carries him over and through the world. Visualised by a papercut, a profile that seems to consist only of a nose and a single eye, he appears as an anti-version of the explorer – mischievous, down-to-earth, completely without ambitions of wanting to claim ownership. It’s an unusual protagonist Sonja Rohleder has animated here in co-direction with Veronika Samartseva for Keimzeit’s song Kolumbus, and yet, it’s prototypical of Rohleder’s animation style and production process. Read More

Portrait

The X Factor, Birgit Hein – writing, filmmaking, and curating in the 1970s

24. August 2023

Birgit Hein was among the most important figures of avant-garde film culture in Germany and Europe. Along with her ex-husband and collaborator Wilhelm Hein, she led film into radical and uncharted territories, concerning herself unreservedly with the development, criticism and dissemination of avant-garde film.
She passed away in February 2023 at the age of 80, leaving behind a trail of pioneering accomplishments, singular in their scope and significance. Read More

Talks and Topics

Interview with Anna Roller

16. June 2023

Anna Roller is a director and writer from Munich, she already experimented with the camera as a child and teenager. Since 2014 she studied at the University of Television and Film.

With Borjana Gaković Anna Roller talks about her short films PAN (2017) and GÖR (2021), which successfully screened at festivals worldwide and won awards. Read More

Talks and Topics

Interview with Betina Kuntzsch

26. April 2023

As an artist, Betina Kuntzsch has developed the genre of video drawing, often combining hand-drawn animations with historical film, photo and archive material to create animated, documentary short films. Betina Kuntzsch talks with Borjana Gaković about her short film HALMASPIEL (Chinese Checkers, 2017) – which tells the story of her mother. Read More

Portrait

Volker Schlecht: Seeking the Right Image

19. April 2023

An image that fits to a T – what is that exactly? And what precedes it – perhaps another image, one before the inner eye, or merely just a vague thematic hunch? These are questions that arise quickly when you explore and engage yourself with Volker Schlecht, who pivots back and forth between the moving and the non-moving image. Read More

Portrait

Nikita Diakur
An Avatar to Combat Fakes

20. December 2022

The avatar trembles, barely able to stay up on its legs, then it falls over, its arms flailing. “Attempting a backflip is not safe. You can break your neck, or land on your head, or land badly on your wrists. None of that is nice, so my avatar does the trick,” an emotionless voice explains. The voice is that of animation director Nikita Diakur, distorted using voice cloning software. Yet its dry humour does manage to penetrate even through the manipulative software coils. Read More

Talks and Topics

“We believe in short film”
Interview with Giona Nazzaro and Eddie Bertozzi of Locarno Film Festival

7. October 2022

The Locarno Film Festival, one of the most important of all the international film festivals, has a tradition of supporting short films. Not only does it host competitions for national and international shorts, but also Shortsweek, which takes place online in February. When Giona Nazzaro took over as artistic director in 2021, he further strengthened this commitment. Together with Eddie Bertozzi, who is responsible for Pardi di Domani, the festival’s short film program, they launched a new competition for films by established directors: Corti d’autore. Shortfilm.de met them both shortly before this year’s edition to discuss their visions regarding short films and their efforts at integrating them into the overall ecosystem of the festival. Read More

Portrait

Nervous landscapes.
On the films of Ojoboca.

5. October 2022

Ojoboca (Anja Dornieden und Juan David González Monroy) machen zugleich mehr und weniger als „Kurzfilme“. Mehr, weil sie neben Filmen auch Performances und Installationen entwickeln, derzeit an ihrem zweiter Langfilm arbeiten und Texte von einer eigenwilligen Literarizität fast alle ihre Bewegtbildarbeiten begleiten. Read More

Portrait

Jonatan Schwenk
The Story First, Then the Animation

27. June 2022

Enraptured, the two-legged creature picks the blissfully smiling axolotl up from the earth and pops it in its mouth. Sheer joy. Doing so, its hands – filigree stick-puppet hands – initially reach out tentatively then greedily for the tasty stop-motion being. In Jonatan Schwenk’s ZOON, over and again we encounter so many nuances and animation techniques, all at the same time. Read More

Portrait

Chemnitz Filmworkshop

2. June 2022

Little effort is required when gleaning facts from the available databases. We soon discover here that the non-profit Chemnitz Filmworkshop is a media-education institute that “promotes young filmic talent”. Its headquarters and official address is the Clubkino Siegmar cinema, which was entrusted to the association in 1996. But what exactly lies behind these sobering facts and figures, behind these ideas, which is far greater than them and has already been lived out for decades by the out-and-out filmmakers from Chemnitz? Read More

Guest Contributions

Who knows what short films are?

12. May 2022

Zwanzig Jahre AG Kurzfilm, zwei Jahrzehnte Medienwandel

In der goldenen Zeit des Kurzfilms reichte man das Dessert vor dem Hauptgang: Nicht wenige Zuschauer kauften ihre Karte für zwanzig Minuten Chaplin oder sieben Minuten Mickey Mouse und kümmerten sich erst in zweiter Linie um den Hauptfilm danach. Kurzfilme brachten Zeitstimmungen auf den Punkt, bedienten populäre Dramaturgien noch effektvoller als die Langfilme und standen für den Reiz des Neuen. Read More