Sometimes it seems as if everyone wants to be special. However, standing out from the crowd often serves primarily to connect with like-minded people. The longing for a network makes us all the same. After all, who are we when we’re far from the places and people to whom we feel we belong? Five short films explore this longing for belonging through a wide variety of protagonists: a mushroom spore, a face among the faceless, people standing apart, suffering from stereotypes, or those fitting them while embracing their inner square. (Anna Bell)
In this animated film, a mushroom spore embarks on a magical journey of self-discovery. Guided by mysterious mushroom creatures, it overcomes its self-doubt, discovers newfound self-confidence in the hidden realm of the mycelium, and experiences the transformative power of a supportive network.… >>>
A young man, with no particular destination in mind, stumbles upon a remote valley. It appears on no map and is known to no one, as though forgotten by the world. Within the valley stands a quiet town whose inhabitants have smooth, featureless faces. Mysterious forces begin to emerge: slow, indistinct, without warning, yet charged with the unsettling sense of an unseen control. Step by step, they compel him to confront a question: what does a “face” truly mean?
… >>>The lights of a carnival. Happy crowds among the rides. Amid the hustle, yet standing apart, a lone observer. After migrating to a new country during his adolescence, the narrator recites a simple poem that reflects his questions about identity and belonging.… >>>
The 3D-animated short film follows a man in his late twenties, who wakes up one morning to a quiet horror: overnight, he has become a bourgeois. He slowly manages to embrace his inner square. Set within the aesthetic matrix of German petit-bourgeois culture the film unfolds through a hybrid structure of five animated music video sequences and three interview fragments. Deliberately elliptical in its narration it leads the audience through a hyper-stylized world. Saturated with bourgeois kitsch, it traces the thoughts of the filmmaker, who wrote, composed and performed all five songs.… >>>
CN: Discriminatory Language
A satirical short film about identity, background, and the feeling of being caught between different labels. At its heart is an exaggerated, absurd, and at the same time melancholic character who is confronted with prejudices, expectations, and everyday experiences of feeling like an outsider. The short film combines personal memories with social observation, moving between documentary elements, performative scenes, and satirical exaggeration: “Speak German!”