The documentary BERLINIZED describes this very Berlin-specific attitude in a reflection on and a journey to mid-1990s' Berlin. Filmmaker Lucian Busse, an active protagonist of the period, documents the transformation of Berlin after the Wall. But Berlinized represents more than just the 1990s - it is a metaphor for this virally catching creative feeling, the slightly rough directness, spiced up with a big dash of typical Berlin humor. Berlinized lets the former protagonists reflect how that temporary feeling of freedom shaped their individual lives, and to what degree that freedom can still be found among the neat order of today's Berlin. These reflections are as diverse as the interviewees and as multifaceted as the changes in those times.
plant portals: breath (2020)
"plant portals: breath" is an experimental meditation on the unspoken history many queer and trans people of colour carry daily, connecting bumblebees, colonial trauma, alternate universes and the complicated concept of "rest" to ask: Can nature heal us? Shot entirely on an iPhone, the film is intentional in imagining what is possible, and manifests a reality rooted in mindfulness.“
Prinzessinnenbad (2007)
A film about three teenagers - Klara, Mina and Tanutscha - from the Berlin district of Kreuzberg. The trio have known each other since Kindergarten and have plenty in common. The three 15-year-olds are the best of friends; they are spending the summer at Prinzenbad, a large open-air swimming pool at the heart of the district where they live. They're feeling pretty grown up, and are convinced they've now left their childhood behind.
Berlin: Symphony of a Great City (1927)
A day in the city of Berlin, which experienced an industrial boom in the 1920s, and still provides an insight into the living and working conditions at that time. Germany had just recovered a little from the worst consequences of the First World War, the great economic crisis was still a few years away and Hitler was not yet an issue at the time.
Stabbed in the Face: The Rise and Fall of the World's Most Violent Band (NaN)
An alternative documentary following the trail of blood and carnage of Philadelphia’s own Deathmatch Rock n’ Roll pioneers, Eat the Turnbuckle, from beer-soaked bars to the largest stage in the world of metal.
Queens Don’t Cry (2002)
Bosom buddies BeV StroganoV, Ovo Maltine, Ichgola Androgyn and Tima die Göttliche are four Berlin drag queens who met in the mid 1980s. These four queens became Germany’s most popular drag performers and have been busy fertilizing the German cultural scene. Besides being performers, they are also political activists – in AIDS awareness, anti-gay violence, the sex workers movement and the struggle against the extreme right and racism. The film tells their story.
Sex, Death & Eyeliner (1999)
Documentary directed by W.K. Border, that which dives into the aspects of contemporary Gothic subculture, vampirism, and BDSM culture. Filmed in 1997 in California.
Iragan gunea Berlin (2016)
'Iragan gunea Berlin' follows five people from different origins as they move anonymously around the streets of Berlin. Each of them with another life somewhere else, trying to ascertain where to go.
Grenzpunkt Beton (2015)
Documentary short film about the afterlife of the remnants of the Berlin Wall.
Köy (2022)
KÖY (Turkish for village) is about the longing for home, for belonging and the freedom of the self. Three women from three generations are united by their Kurdish roots.
The Wall (1962)
Like the best USIA films, The Wall distills political events into an emotionally clear and compelling ideological "story". In 1962 Walter de Hoog gathered footage from U.S. and German newsreel sources and crafted this taut short film about the first year of the Berlin Wall. Straightforward, keenly balanced narration portrays Berliners as "accepting the wall but never resigned to it". The extraordinary footage of the first escapes was propaganda enough-- His challenge was to make the politics human.
In der glanzvollen Welt des Hotel Adlon (1997)
The documentary tells the story of the Berlin luxury hotel, which was built by the director's great-grandfather and fell victim to a fire shortly after the end of the Second World War.
The Other Line (2016)
Druga linija aka The Other Line is a product of many years of research of neo-avant-garde cultural and art scene in Novi Sad, Serbia (late 60s and 70s), which has been marginalized until today. This artistic movement was directly connected not only with important art centers of the former Yugoslavia, but also with existing flows of world art during its brief and productive activities (7e Biennale de Paris, 19th Berlinale). The cultural and artistic emancipation of that time had implied individual freedom of expression and strong reaction to established boundaries. This avant-garde movement had become threat to communist establishment, the authors' work were sabotaged, the films were sealed off, five artists were taken to trial, two were sent in prison. How is it that the retrograde mechanism of shutting down and removing the most creative and representative progressive impulses of our surrounding is still so current to this day?
Jean Paul Gaultier : Freak & Chic (2018)
Inspired even as a boy by the Folies Bergere, the legendary Paris cabaret venue, couturier Jean-Paul Gaultier always wanted to stage a show there. "But what story can I tell?" he muses in this doc about the six months of preparation that went into the show. "Mine." Combining fashion with film, dance, theater, and unapologetic over-the-top-ness, the revue offers a 40-year career retrospective of the designer who is practically never spoken of without using the phrase enfant terrible. Notorious among cinephiles for his costumes for The Fifth Element and The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover and among pop fans for Madonna's pointy cone brassiere, he also incorporated teddy bears and S&M fetish gear as design motifs. In the show, the fanciful and outrageous meets the naughtily witty (a skit sending up Vogue dragon lady Anna Wintour) and the poignant (a tribute to his partner Francis Menuge, who died in 1990).
White Terror (2005)
A video about Neo-Nazis originating in Sweden provides the starting point of an investigation of extremists' networks in Europe, Russia, and North America. Their propaganda is a message of hatred, war, and segregation.
Heimatkunde (2008)
Former "Titanic" satire magazine editor Martin Sonneborn takes an undercover trip around Berlin and discovers the East-German mentality and what is left of the socialist German Democratic Republic.
SubBerlin - Underground United (2008)
The original Tresor was in many ways the quintessential Berlin club: located in an unrenovated vault beneath a bombed out department store, it opened its doors amidst the general confusion and ecstasy that swept across the city when the wall fell. Its low ceilings, industrial decor and generally unhinged atmosphere created an unprecedented platform not only for techno in Berlin, but also for the scene taking shape across the Atlantic in Detroit.