Synopsis:
‘New York City 1940. A ship arrives filled with exhausted refugees desperate to begin a new lives. Alfred “Freddy” Wolff, a young Austrian Jew, dreams of starting anew in the mythic American West, but instead struggles to overcome the piercing alienation of immigrant life. In Brooklyn, an émigré community tries to recreate their European café life in a local coffee shop, but nothing can disguise their feelings of loneliness and profound loss.Read More »
Austria
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Axel Corti – Wohin und zurück – Teil 2: Santa Fé AKA Santa Fe (1986)
Axel Corti1981-1990AustriaDrama -
Axel Corti – Wohin und zurück – Teil 3: Welcome in Vienna AKA Welcome in Vienna (1986)
Axel Corti1981-1990AustriaDramaSynopsis:
‘In the conclusion of Axel Corti’s trilogy Freddy, a Viennese Jew who emigrated to New York after Hitler’s invasion, and Adler, a left-wing intellectual originally from Berlin, return to Austria in 1944 as soldiers in the U.S. Army. Freddy falls in love with the daughter of a Nazi, and Adler attempts to go over to the Communist Zone. But with the advent of the Cold War and continuing anti-semitism, the idealism of both characters is shattered as they find themselves surrounded by cynicism, opportunism, and universal self-deception.’
– National Center for Jewish FilmRead More » -
Sandra Wollner – Das unmögliche Bild AKA The Impossible Picture (2016)
Sandra Wollner2011-2020ArthouseAustriaDramaQuote:
Vienna in the 1950´s. A childhood captured on 8mm film, documented by 13-year-old Johanna. A childhood as it might have been. We see fragments of family life and family secrets, an apartment regularly visited by women, centered around grandmother Maria Steinwendner who holds weekly cooking clubs in her kitchen. But somehow, the women never actually seem to do any cooking.
“Papa always said you have to be quick if you want to see anything. Because everything vanishes so quickly”, Johanna says to herself as she films the dead body of a cat on the pavement. “But I don´t think that´s true. I think you just have to keep looking”. And Johanna keeps looking. Until the camera´s gaze suddenly turns on herself. (production note)Read More » -
Claudia Müller – Elfriede Jelinek – Die Sprache von der Leine lassen AKA Elfriede Jelinek – Language Unleashed (2022)
Claudia Müller2021-2030AustriaDocumentaryQuote:
ELFRIEDE JELINEK: “Language Unleashed” Child prodigy, scandal writer, traitor of the fatherland, theatre fury, feminist, model lover, communist, pessimist, language terrorist, rebel, enfant terrible, defiler of the nest, brilliant, vulnerable artist, Nobel Prize winner.Read More » -
Claus Peymann – Thomas Bernhard: Heldenplatz (1989)
1981-1990AustriaClaus PeymannDramaPoliticsthis is a recording of Claus Peymann’s original and legendary staging of Thomas Bernhard’s most political play that broke with the austrian myth that austria
was supposedly the first victim of the nazis and caused quite an uproar among (mostly the conservative parts of the) austrian public.Read More » -
Werner Herzog – Filmstunde (1991)
Werner Herzog1991-2000AustriaDocumentaryTVIn 1991 Werner Herzog is the director of Viennale (Vienna International Film Festival), during that days he organizes a series of meetings, a series of lessons about cinema. In these lessons he doesn’t speak about manuals, books of cinema or techniques but about the determination of a subject to do something and the various competences he must have to realize his projects. One guest per day to talk about cinema and everything else. He interviews his guests on the art of filmmaking including clips, lectures and paintings.
The guests are: the tightrope walker Philippe Petit, the magician Jeff Sheridan, the filmmakers Michael Kreihsl and Volker Schloendorff, the writer Peter Turrini, the cosmological physic Kama Saiful Islam and the journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski.Read More »
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Michael Glawogger & Monika Willi – Untitled (2017)
Michael Glawogger2011-2020AustriaDocumentaryMonika WilliSynopsis
“I want to give a view of the world that can only emerge by not pursuing any particular theme, by refraining from passing judgment, proceeding without aim. Drifting with no direction except one’s own curiosity and intuition.” (Michael Glawogger) More than two years after the sudden death of Michael Glawogger in April 2014, film editor Monika Willi realizes a film out of the film footage produced during 4 months and 19 days of shooting in the Balkans, Italy, Northwest and West Africa. A journey into the world to observe, listen and experience, the eye attentive, courageous and raw. Serendipity is the concept – in shooting as well as in editing the film.Read More » -
Ursula Puerrer & A. Hans Scheirl & Dietmar Schipek – Rote Ohren fetzen durch Asche AKA Flaming Ears (1992)
1991-2000A. Hans ScheirlAustriaCampDietmar SchipekQueer Cinema(s)Sci-FiUrsula PuerrerFlaming Ears is a pop sci-fi lesbian fantasy feature set in the year 2700 in the fictive burned-out city of Asche. It follows the tangled lives of three women – Volley, Nun and Spy.
FLAMING EARS is a pop sci-fi lesbian fantasy feature set in the year 2700 in the fictive burned-out city of Asche. It follows the tangled lives of three women — Volley, Nun and Spy. Spy is a comic book artist whose printing presses are burned down by Volley, a sexed-up pyromaniac. Seeking revenge, Spy goes to the lesbian club where Volley performs every night. Before she can enter, Spy gets into a fight and is left wounded, lying in the streets. She is found by Nun–an amoral alien in a red plastic suit with a predilection for reptiles, and who also happens to be Volley’s lover. Nun takes her home and subsequently must hide her from Volley. It’s a story of love and revenge, and an anti-romantic plea for love in its many forms. An avowedly underground film which was shot on Super 8 and blown up to 16mm, FLAMING EARS is original for its playful disruption of narrative conventions (the story is a thread rather than a backbone in the film), its witty approach to film genre, and its visual splendor.Read More »
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Harald Reinl – Bergkristall (1949)
Harald Reinl1941-1950AustriaDramaRomanceThe Tyrolean mountain farmer’s son Franz loves the beautiful Sanna. A hunter who is also interested in her catches Franz poaching, shoots him and leaves him alone. On the run, he falls fatally into a crevasse. When Franz returns home badly injured, he is believed to be the murderer of the missing hunter. Although he is acquitted in court for lack of evidence, the village community turns their backs on him. Only Sanna sticks by him. Years later, their children get lost in the mountains at Christmas time and come across the hunter’s body, unharmed from gunshot wounds. So Franz is finally rehabilitated.Read More »