On our doorstep

The hamburg documentary film week has been attracting visitors from the surrounding area to the Hanseatic city for 15 years now. The most recent average attendance was around 2500. Film enthusiasts in search of special films who not only want to consume but also exchange ideas. A local meeting place, just as Rainer Krisp and Rasmus Gerlach intended when they founded it in 2004. The only difference is that word of the quality of the programme has spread over the years and audiences now come to Hamburg from all over Germany. With the three segments "Film Programme", "Positions" and "Retrospective", the event offers enough space to approach the subject of Documentary from different angles. We would like to introduce you to what is behind the individual points below.

"Together with our team, we have chosen topics for the film selection that we consider relevant and that are happening on our doorstep," reveals Lili Hartwig, who has been part of the core team for several years. It is therefore hardly surprising that around a third of the films at the hamburg documentary film week have a regional connection, albeit in very different ways: For example, the Schleswig-Holstein filmmaker Malte Blockhaus follows a regional theme inFollowing Habeck (14 April, 6.30 pm, Candlemas) follows Green politician Robert Habeck during his election campaign for the office of his party's top candidate and shows a cross-section of a top politician's diary - without many private moments, always on the way to the next appointment. Like a programme of contrastsFrom a year of non-events (15 April, 2 pm, Metropolis): Almost 90-year-old Willi lives alone with his cats, chickens and geese on a wild farm in Schleswig-Holstein. The filmmakers Ann Carolin Renninger and René Frölke use this absolute deceleration to focus on what surrounds him: The sunshine on the crumbling house wall, the green moss on the garden chair, the blossoms of the fruit trees - everyday calmness in its purest form.

Rosa Hannah Ziegler has just returned from the Berlinale with her feature film debutFamily life (15 April, 4.30 pm, Metropolis). Even though the Hamburg-born filmmaker's film is also set on an abandoned farm, the basic tenor is different: the filmmaker from the Wendland Film Cooperative paints a sensitive portrait of a family of four on the margins of society. In his film, Hamburg filmmaker Martin Prinoth accompaniesThe fifth cardinal point (12 April, 9 pm, Candlemas) follows his cousin Markus, an adopted child from Brazil, in search of his past. Markus follows in the footsteps of his adopted brother Georg, also from Brazil, who died in an aeroplane crash while searching for his biological mother. Directors Gerd Kroske deals with a political movement that is unknown to large parts of the population inSPK Complex (14 April, 6.30 pm, Metropolis). The Berlinale film about the "Socialist Patient Collective" (SPK) founded by assistant doctor Wolfgang Huber in Heidelberg traces the emergence and end of the political movement in the 1970s, talks to numerous contemporary witnesses - and precisely reconstructs the social climate in the German autumn before autumn - seven of 32 days of filming took place in Hamburg.

Two up-and-coming Hamburg filmmakers are also part of this year's programme: HFBK graduates Marvin Hesse and Salka Tiziana have made their debut withEveryone in Hawaii Has a Sixpack Already (14 April, 9.30 pm, Metropolis) has delivered one of the most beautiful youth films of recent years, according to Lili Hartwig. The film follows four young people on the Canary Island of La Gomera a year before they finish school Giada, Omar, Jorge and Aaron live almost like in paradise - but after tenth grade, their schooling on the Canary Island ends and the four friends are scattered in all directions. In Landscapes of war, landscapes of peace (14 April, 6.30 pm, B-Movie), Directors and HFBK graduate Aron Sekelj embarks on a journey in search of existing and vanished material traces of the war in Kosovo. There are no people to be seen, only the consequences of their actions at the sites of the events.

Of course, not all of the films are set in a northern German context - but what many of them have in common is an unagitated approach that shows the everyday far removed from the superlatives of our digital world and subtly reminds the viewer that there is a world beyond mobile phones and computer screens. The films are shown in the Metropolis, B-Movie and Lichtmess cinemas. At most events, the filmmakers or members of the film team will be present and available for discussions afterwards.

You can find the complete film programme here.

Positions

This year, the "Positionen" series of events will feature lectures, discussions and films on image policy issues for the third time. "Especially in times of fake news and the like, it is important to understand the power of moving images and how they are used for different purposes," says Lili Hartwig. One focus of the series is on last year's Hamburg G20 summit, which will be shown on Friday (13 April, 2 p.m. and 6 p.m.) there will be two events. Lina Paulsen and Julia Cöllen from the festival team will devote Saturday (14 April, 2 pm), who will discuss the possibilities and limitations of voice-over with filmmakers and the audience on the basis of various films. The installation "Eine Kneipe auf Malle" by Hamburg artist Marian Mayland will be shown on all festival days and deals with both right-wing and left-wing political movements. The Documentary is about moving images from crisis areasSand and blood by Matthias Krepp and Angelika Spangel, which will take place on Thursday (12 April, 7 pm, B-Movie) will be shown in the presence of the two Directors. All events from the "Positions" section (except the film "Sand and Blood") will take place at the Frappant festival centre near Holstenstraße S-Bahn station, where you will also find the documentary film week team during the festival. And if you don't want to go home straight away after a long day of documentary films, come to the dokfilmclub in the Frappant's party cellar (fuxilirium) from 10 pm to end the evening dancing, relaxing or discussing over a drink.

The complete position programme is available here.

Retrospective

Not light fare, but very entertaining and with extremely good music - this is how Lili Hartwig describes the films by American filmmaker Travis Wilkerson, who was selected for this year's "Retrospective" section. The festival will be showing a total of eleven short and feature-length films by the filmmaker, who is still relatively unknown in this country, from Thursday to Sunday. But who is this filmmaker, who is often referred to in the USA as "the political conscience of American Documentary"?

Retrospective

Before Travis Wilkerson dedicated himself to filmmaking, the son of a Vietnam veteran grew up in Montana and studied foreign languages and literature. Inspired by the revolutionary cinematic work of Santiago Álvarez and a meeting with him in Cuba, Wilkerson made his first film "Accelerated Under-Development: In the Idiom of Santiago Alvarez", in which a clear political stance and an essayistic approach were already apparent, which were to characterise his later works. His debut will be released on Thursday (12 April, 9 pm) will be shown at the opening of the retrospective at the Metropolis cinema. Wilkerson will be present at all screenings of his films.

You can find the complete programme of the retrospective here.