KOMMUNE DER SELIGEN

"Practice what you preach!" Far away from big cities and major roads – in the vast expanse of the Northern Prairies of Canada – a withdrawn community practises its headstrong way of life and beliefs. The German rooted Hutterites are direct descendants of radical Anabaptists from the days of the Reformation in Europe. After hundreds of years of fierce persecution, having moved about from country to country, they now choose to live apart from the modern world.

Until today, they have been able to preserve their spiritual heritage and oppositional way-of-life by rejecting modern media. They still speak an odd Alpine dialect and wear their traditional medieval clothes: the men in trousers with suspenders and the women in old-fashioned kerchiefs. For Commune of Bliss, it took 6 difficult years of preparation before the film-makers could gain the trust of the community and were finally permitted to "take the picture". For the Hutterites, film and photography are part of worldly sins like fostering vanity and „"the lust of eyes".

The Hutterites have always held non-violent beliefs and have followed the Early Christian ideal of a commune where everyone lives together and shares all their property. It has brought them wealth and success to this day. But taking a closer look, one can also sense the first signs of curbed freedom within the community...

"What's it like to see the course of history seemingly halted centuries ago, encountering a people who manage to sustain their Utopia as a long term vision? In Commune of Bliss, we are able to see a radical, fundamentalist vision in practise – a people who are hardly known even though they have been living in this way for almost 500 years." (Klaus Stanjek)

Awards: Best Documentary, Bozner Filmtage 2005