The film programme of DOK.fest München. At the cinema. At home.

3 to 14 May 2023 at the Munich venues
8 to 21 May 2023 @home

As always, DOK.fest München opens the view out to the world: with 130 of the best and most current international documentaries from 55 countries. Our goal is the greatest possible participation in our films, which is why we bring them to the big screen in Munich cinemas as well as to home screens throughout Germany: DOK.fest stays dual.

THIS IS EXILE: DIARIES OF CHILD REFUGEES (Lebanon, Switzerland, United Kingdom 2015, Mani Yassir Benchelah). Over half of Syrian refugees are children. Mani Y. Benchelah spent a year in camps in Lebanon making this portrait of five girls and boys aged between 7 and 16. A raw, sensitive and sometimes horrifying look at war and exile from the point of view of children.

#Middle East, #Migration

HERKULES – HERCULES (Germany 2016, Volker Meyer-Dabisch, DOK.deutsch Wettbewerb). A portrait of coal merchant, Ahmed Özdemir, and his family over 15 years in the Kreuzberg area of Berlin. The children grow up; weddings are celebrated. Problems, summer and winter come and go but there’s always coal to be sold.

#Migration, #BEST DOKS

MEINUNGSAUSTAUSCH (Germany 2015, Sophie Linnenbaum, Sophia Bösch, Student Award). Do you know them too? The casual right-wingers, who, over coffee and cake, like to begin their sentences with, “ I don’t have anything against them, but…” MEINUNGSAUSTAUSCH tracks prejudices and how they are spread, broken down and ultimately maintained ad absurdum.

#Migration

CAFÉ WALDLUFT (Germany 2015, Matthias Koßmehl, DOK.transit (up to 2018)). Moving destinies set against a picture postcard town. With a view of the Watzmann mountain and under the wing of an amiable hostess, young asylum seekers from Syria, Afghanistan and Sierra Leone live in the Café Waldluft hotel. A warts and all account of successful integration.

#Migration, #BEST DOKS

DÜGÜN – HOCHZEIT AUF TÜRKISCH – DÜGÜN – MARRIAGE THE TURKISH WAY (Germany 2015, Marcel Kolvenbach, Ayşe Kalmaz, DOK.transit (up to 2018)). The former industrial neighbourhood of Marxloh in Duisburg has become the Mekka of the German-Turkish wedding industry. Everything now revolves around the business of love. Ostentatious wedding ceremonies reveal the desire for happiness when you’re far away from home.

#Migration

FORGET ME NOT – VERGEET MIJ NIET (Netherlands 2016, Jan Jaap Kuiper, DOK.transit (up to 2018)). In a Dutch school, the children of failed asylum seekers wait - sometimes for years – to be deported to a foreign land. The teachers look on helplessly as their classes shrink. A stark and direct observation of everyday uncertainty.

#Migration

SEEFEUER – FUOCOAMMARE – FUOCOAMMARE (France, Italy 2015, Gianfranco Rosi, DOK.transit (up to 2018)). Lampedusa has become a synonym for the excessive demands facing the EU with the arrival of refugees by boat. By contrasting the everyday life on the Italian island with the humanitarian catastrophe in the water, filmmaker, Gianfranco Rosi, gives the tragedy a human face.

#Migration, #BEST DOKS

TRAPPED BY LAW – NAKHINO (Germany, Kosovo 2015, Sami Mustafa, DOK.transit (up to 2018)). Two brothers are deported overnight to Kosovo, the land of their parents. They have just 50 Euros in their pockets and they don’t even speak the language. Sami Mustafa closely follows the pair for three years on a rollercoaster ride between two worlds.

#Music, #Law and Crime, #Eastern Europe/Russia, #Migration