With 20 new productions, German feature films are prominently represented at the 50th Hof International Film Festival. We’d like to give you a preview of further program highlights which the curators of the Hof International Film Festival – Alfred Holighaus, Linda Söffker and Thorsten Schaumann – have selected among the German feature films:
The festival will open on Tuesday, 25 October 2016 with the European premiere of THE BLOOM OF YESTERDAY by Chris Kraus. Dominik Graf, who has often been a guest in Hof, most recently in 2014 with SMOKE ON THE WATER – DIRECTOR’S CUT, will present his new film AM ABEND ALLER TAGE. Based on the Henry James novella The Aspern Papers, Graf and his screenwriter Markus Busch develop a story around a missing work of art in which love and guilt dangerously intermingle. Johannes Leistner will have his debut with DAS DUNKLE HAUS AM RANDE DES WALDES / THE DARK HOUSE BY THE WOODS in which the love of two young people is mystically put to the test. Feo Aladag is coming to Hof with DER ANDERE – EINE FAMILIENGESCHICHTE. The film describes the touching story of how the life of a refugee from Mali becomes unexpectedly connected to a Berlin police officer and his father. Dito Tsintsadze will be represented with DER FREUND and Sebastian Stern with his second feature DER HUND BEGRABEN, a comical family story with Justus von Dohnányi, Juliane Köhler and Georg Friedrich in the leading roles.
Jan Krüger’s DIE GESCHWISTER is about closeness and loneliness and how a solidary community of fate is put to the test by a romantic relationship. DIE HAUT DER ANDEREN / THE SKIN OF THE OTHERS by Thomas Stiller describes a love story between two people who are trapped within their own sexual obsessions. Axel Ranisch and Andreas Arnstedt, who won the 2014 German Cinema New Talent Award for DER KUCKUCK UND DER ESEL, are presenting their new films, the comedy FAMILIE LOTZMANN AUF DEN BARRIKADEN and SHORT TERM MEMORY LOSS starring Veronica Ferres as the fed up wife of a dement former boxer. Wim Wenders will be on hand to present his film DIE SCHÖNEN TAGE VON ARANJUEZ / THE BEAUTIFUL DAYS OF ARANJUEZ and Christian Schwochow will once again be represented at the festival with PAULA. Felix Charin debuted in Hof in 2011 with his short film LEBEN LASSEN and is returning this year with his first feature, THERAPIE, starring Dominic Raacke as the psychotherapist of a young ex-prisoner who develops an especially intensive relationship to his patient.
Sherry Hormann’s TÖDLICHE GEHEIMNISSE is a fascinating thriller about whistleblowers, lobbyists and TTIP. Aelrun Goette brings together the Fassbinder divas Hanna Schygulla, Irm Hermann and Margit Carstensen as well as Eva Matthes and Mathias Habich in the exciting thriller WOFÜR ES SICH ZU LEBEN LOHNT. Tini Tüllmann’s first feature FREDDY EDDY raises the question of credibility and one’s own fantasy in a fascinating psycho-thriller, and Markus Mörth’s first fiction feature, GESCHWISTER, tells the story of the odyssey of Bebe and her brother Mikhail on their journey from Moldavia to Germany. Dren Zherka’s EHO / STILLES ECHO is also about loss, loneliness and the invisible bond which joins two people in different countries. After his acclaimed debut in 2010, BERGBLUT, Philipp J. Bamer will present his new film IM NESSELTAL, a mystery thriller based on Italian Neorealism, about how a birthday party in a mountain cabin becomes unglued when the guests get into an argument and are confronted with a secret.
Many of the films this year deal with family structures, relationship stories and sociopolitical subjects. The filmmakers are in touch with the times and transpose topics which interest and move people.
In addition to the depiction of current reality there is also a tendency toward mystical and mysterious stories beyond the real world. Fantasy and naked truth are held in close balance. In addition to the feature films, some 25 German short films have also been invited this year’s festival.
