Traces of power leave deep marks on people and their relationships with their surroundings. Exploratory, poetic, and searching, the five short films address the question of how violence, ideology and historical trauma become inscribed in the collective memory. Spanning the Vietnam War, internet addiction camps, the militarization of animals, the escape from Bucha and found archive footage, they shed light on the tension between personal experiences and state control. How do we hand down memories when the unspeakable struggles to find expression and appears to be indelible? (Joey Arand)
IN FRONT OF ME is a documentary-animated short film by Qianmei Ni. Based on the memories of her grandfather Yang Chenjie, who served from 1964 to 1967 and was involved in missions related to the Vietnam War, the film explores how experiences of war are narrated, remembered, and passed on within a family.
Between domestic everyday life, documentary observation, and animated imagination, the film reflects on heroism, military belonging, and the traces of political narratives within personal memory.… >>>
Premiere:
World Premiere
Nominated:
Goldener Hercules
CN: Violence
The film begins with the traumatic recollections of a survivor from an internet-addiction camp, weaving fragments of online spaces with oral testimonies. Through this montage, it exposes the institutional traces still operating in the shadows. What emerges is not merely an echo of personal experience, but the dense mechanisms by which society, under the guise of control, inscribes itself onto bodies and wills.
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Premiere:
World Premiere
- Director: Zirui Chen, Youqing Qiu
CN: Violence
The video work and the corresponding paintings connect autobiographical memories of dogs as emotional points of reference with historical research into their instrumentalization during World War II. Navigating the tension between intimacy and violence, it examines animals as ambivalent actors: on the one hand, companions, objects of projection, and social attachment figures; on the other, means of military control and psychological torture. The work thus reflects on the political appropriation of closeness, loyalty, and physicality.
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- Director: monia pieniążek
TRACING REELS explores how found film footage can engage in a dialogue with contemporary images and how they can be related to a past that initially only exists in the form of visual fragments without context or explanation.… >>>
Premiere:
World Premiere
Nominated:
Goldener Hercules
- Director: Emeline Cau, Lucy Hartstang, Charlotte Ella Bouchon
CN: Violence
The film is a personal reflection by the director on her experiences as a Ukrainian refugee who came to Germany after the occupation of Bucha. In a continuous, unedited text, thoughts, memories, and inner dialogues become visible. The past and the present merge, as the chaos within connects with the chaos of the world. The film unfolds at a deliberate pace and invites us to follow the words, to linger among them and to open a space for the unspeakable.
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- Director: Yuliia Sachenko
