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Zubin Mehta is one of the most charismatic conductors of our time. A citizen of the world with many facets: Indian culture and Parsi spirituality, North American lifestyle and European musical tradition. The portrait accompanies Zubin Mehta to current places of activity and important stages of his life. [arte.de]

Documentary about twin brothers who go back to their childhood home to discover what happened to a Patrick Lurzing, a boy who disappeared who nobody else seems to remember.

Started in the summer of 1961, even before the Wall was built, the film becomes an explanation after this historical event as to why things can no longer go on as they were before. Unmistakably, as in almost all of Karl Gass' films, the passion with which he treats his subject is unmistakable. If you want to get to know the zeitgeist of the historically significant year 1961, which on both sides knew more the Cold War vocabulary than factual arguments, you can see the Eastern variant in this propaganda film.

Re-enactment of the attempt made in July 1961 by a french-italian group in order to climb Freney Pillar, in Mont Blanc massif. The expedition was composed by the frenchmen Pierre Mazaud, Robert Guillaume, Pierre Kohlmann and Antoine Vieille and by the italians Walter Bonatti, Andrea Oggioni e Roberto Gallieni. The groups arrived separatly to the camp of Col de la Fourche, but with the same aim. They united by chance to conquest the famous peak. The attempt is crushed by bad wheather and, during the descent, three French and an Italian will die.

This film was provoked by a trip on the overhead railway through the centre of Chicago in 1991. I filmed a twelve minute piece facing forwards in the direction we were driving. Three years later I came across the film material once more. The memory of it had faded, and its images were just as vague. So I worked on the material using a bleaching bath. The complex, cuboid-like architecture of the city came out in a test of the substantial and then sank back into the minority - dissolving to a lump of cosmic dust. I was first able to identify a projection of the experienced, within the undercurrent of disintegration. (Jurgen Reble)

In 1922, Max Ernst produced a painting entitled “The Rendezvous of Friends”. In surrealist style, it shows his friends from Paris - including Robert Desnos, Hans Arp, Paul Éluard and André Breton - all avant-gardists. The documentary follows the painting's journey from the artist's easel to the Museum Ludwig.

This short film depicts Omega, one of Hungary's most successful rock bands, on tour in the GDR.

Manfred Deix is a cartoonist an painter. Above all, his aggressive caricatures of politicians and political events in the Austrian provinces have made him notoriously famous far beyond national borders. His very personal chronicles of current events and portrayals of human calamities (Deix's people are generally obese and disproportionate) are also the contents of four books which are bestsellers. This documentary film of Peter Hajek describes the career and work of the Austrian, not only at work but among his numerous cats which, apart from his wife, mean very much to him.

The motorway roars in the background, darkness lies over the service area. One truck driver smokes; another turns on the light in his sleeper cab. A summer Sunday is dawning, everything is standing still. Precisely designed detail shots induce in us a state of waiting. This is what life on the road can also look like. Cooking, dozing, staring into space. Hair is shorn short, words are exchanged. Polish pop songs resound from one of the cabs.

CYCLING CITIES covers the most beautiful cycling cities in Europe and asks the question how they achieved to transform their mobility from car centric to bicycle centric. The film also covers measure how to become a more climate friendly and climate resilient city by looking at recent examples in Paris. At the end the movie sums up what other cities like in Germany can learn from the respective cycling cities.

Monolithic power plants; billowing columns of smoke; the backdrop of a red sun. Sirens is an experimental short documentary that captures Germany’s coal-fired power plants in their final years of generating energy. Shot entirely from helicopters, the film takes us on a journey through industrial wastelands, thus recalling the passage of Ulysses’ boat through the Sirens’ strait. An odyssey through the dystopian industrial world that has left a permanent mark on earth’s ecosphere.

José “Pepe” Mujica, the president of Uruguay from 2010-2015, is nothing like your regular politician. He drives a VW Beetle, lives on a farm and donates 70% of his earnings to charity. He is considered one of the most charismatic politicians in Latin America. Old and young believe in him thanks to his humble lifestyle and his unconventional manners, especially where political protocol is concerned. Now in his 80s, Mujica, a former guerrilla fighter who was imprisoned for 13 years for fighting with the Tupamaros against the dictatorial regime in Uruguay in the 1970s, believes in democracy, socialism, women’s rights and the legalization of cannabis. An inspiration to thousands of people all over the world, he grows flowers in his garden and defines life as his religion.

A satirical examination of the ways the influx of German tourists to Spain affects the local population.

Based on French media theorist Paul Virilio's thesis that weapons and film technology inextricably influence human perception, the film interviews cameramen from German propaganda companies during World War II. It also features cinematic miniatures, including ones about the future of electronic media.

Dennis, an American private eye, is sent to Germany to find out as much as possible about typical Germans and typically German behaviour. Disguised as a TV reporter he sets sail for Germany where we follow him interviewing a wide variety of people, from politicians and intellectuals to policemen, demonstrants and ordinary people in the street. All this, however, is not what the film is really about, for "Deckname Dennis" is actually a satirical documentary about all those extremely odd people, groups and societies whose attitudes and behaviour are far too outrageous for anybody to take seriously. Therefore ALL the documentary bits are real, i.e. the people really thought they were being interviewed by an American reporter, and so they gladly presented an insight into their beliefs, ideas and goals.

A portrait of the music scene in the city of Hamburg and its influence on German music culture. Contributors include musicians Schorsch Kamerun (Golden Lemons), Frank Spilker (Die Sterne), Bernadette La Hengst, Tocotronic and Dendemann.

Year 1763, the Seven Years' War is about to end. August III, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, has died, leaving empty the royal treasury and an extraordinary collection of paintings, sculptures, jewelry and goldsmith masterpieces, which he considered a symbol of his greatness, and that of Dresden, one of the European capitals of Baroque art.

Four men from different professions, all around 50 years old (including a pastor and a stage designer), are interviewed about their childhood in fascist Germany. In individual conversations, they recall childhood experiences and reflect on them from today's perspective.

An exploration of how the U.S. military employs video game technology to train troops for war. Three Dead depicts a military exercise within a mock Iraqi town built on the outskirts of Twentynine Palms, California, blurring the line between computer simulation and reality.

Years ago, the two Poles Juliusz (92) and Krzysztof (77) decided to drop out. Since then, the wilderness on the shore of the Polish Lake Solina - far away from civilization - has been their home. In his small apartment in Masuria, Juliusz, 91, dreams of summer. All he wants is to escape to his cabin in the Carpathians, on the shores of Lake Solina, where he lives a simple, rustic life. Krzysztof, at 77, is a youngster by comparison. He came to the forest in 1981 to escape political repression and never left. He believes his life in the countryside is the key to happiness.

In the remote village of El Echo that exists outside of time, the children care for the sheep and their elders. While the frost and drought punish the land, they learn to understand death, illness and love with each act, word and silence of their parents. A story about the echo of what clings to the soul, about the certainty of shelter provided by those around us, about rebellion and vertigo in the face of life. About growing up.

Sascha’s name wasn’t always Sascha. But now it is. Sascha doesn’t identify as a man or as a woman, but as trans non-binary. A story about what it means to live in a society that wasn’t expecting you. A glimpse into a life that allows us to question our own categories. And a film about what it means to be oneself.

An analysis of the rise of the European far-right, increasingly present in both politics and everyday life: an inquisitive journey through France, Germany and Belgium.

In Italy and Germany, numerous people die in bomb attacks in the 1960s to 1980s. Clues prove certain connections, the traces lead to a secret structure called "Gladio".

How much do you know of nuclear power plants where pets wander around? Olga built a farm inside the reactor. Sergey hides in the station labyrinths from reality, and Vitaly, who for many years supervised the construction of nuclear power plants, settled near on a home-made ship. The Crimean nuclear power plant does not let go of those who built it, or those who lived nearby. It was the most expensive project of the Soviet Union, but the nuclear power plant did not work for a single day. The empire collapsed, the annexation of the Crimea changed the fate of Russia. But which way? People live here, as if in a different dimension, hoping for something and waiting for something. But what?

Filmmaker and author Helke Sander is an icon not only of the women's movement, but also of new German cinema. Historical upheavals sometimes only need a small impulse to suddenly set petrified conditions in motion. Helke Sander triggered such a landslide-like change in Germany many years ago.

Documentary about the merging of the Communist Party of Germany and the Socialist Unity Party of Germany in the Soviet occupation zone, a merger that would lead to the creation of the Socialist Unity Party that would rule the soon-to-be-created East Germany until 1989.

Each night the only border crossing between India and Pakistan on a 1000km stretch becomes the sight of an extraordinary event. Thousands of people gather to witness the ritual closing of the border, after which the masses get as close as possible to the gate to greet their former neighbors. This "festival" is therefore on the one hand a celebration of the partition, but on the other hand also the only connecting element. What do the terms separation, home and proximity mean to the people on both sides?

A look back at one of the biggest espionage cases of the post-war period, which in 1974 led to the resignation of West German Chancellor Willy Brandt.

The title comes from a poem of a German poet, Heine. The 9/11 event was so beyond my comprehension – you can understand and react to a death of one, or two persons‚ but I could not react to the death of 2500 people – it was an abstraction, a fairy tale – that’s why I framed my 9/11 film (shot from my roof) with the fairytale, with the image watching this story, the story of 9/11. Like any other fairy tale coming from the past – by this girl this child dreaming, listening, and dreaming about the tales coming from the past. ―Jonas Mekas

North of Neuruppin lies the Ruppiner Schweiz, the smallest “Swiss” area on German soil. Fontane loved the seclusion and enigmatic appeal of this region’s landscape. As an idyllic recreational and holiday region, it attracts countless tourists every year. But the industry has left its mark: what were previously common sights in the wild can only now be found by vacationers in museums or small zoos. A film about a regional landscape, its history, and how people treat it.

The stories of The Arabian Nights (One Thousand and One Nights) have captivated mankind for centuries. However, two of its most famous tales do not belong to the original canon.

Rebels without a cause in a globalized world. Kevin, David and Dominik, three troubled teenagers who were deemed too difficult to be “re-educated” at home, are shipped off to Romania by the German authorities. There, they live with local families while hoping to go back to Germany as soon as possible. Exiled from their previous lives and country, they try to adapt as well as possible to their new environment.

The Mona Lisa by the Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci is the most famous painting in the world. What is the secret behind the "real" Mona Lisa? It draws legions of visitors to the Louvre in Paris to contemplate her enigmatic expression. In this "detective story," historians tell us how Leonardo developed the painting and uncover the long-hidden identity of the smiling woman.

A German Film Award commended short documentary.

Using some unique documents and pictures, this colour film shows the life and work of Martin Luther in the context of his own time and his relevance to our time. Most of the places associated with Luther, the great Reformer and translator of the Bible, are in the GDR. Thousands upon thousands of tourists visit these places every year and learn how his legacy is kept alive and how it is protected today and for the future.

Senad and Edis live in a small remote village on Bjelasnica, a mountain just outside Sarajevo. During the war their village, being situated on the front, was evacuated - both Senad’s and Edis’ families returned just a short time ago.

Three East German female photographers talk about their experiences making art in the East, and what it was like to work during time when every photographer working on their own in the GDR had entire photographic works and book projects hidden away in drawers, certain that they would probably never be shown publicly.

Five German directors celebrate the influence that famed filmmaker Rosa von Praunheim has had on their careers in honor of his 70th birthday. After discussing Praunheim's inspiration, each protégé presents an original short drawn from the experience.

In 1937, on behalf of Hitler, a competition was announced among the most important architects in Germany. The task was the redesign of the Hamburg Elbe bank. The face of the city was to be moved from the Alster to the Elbe. In addition to Berlin, Linz, Nuremberg and Munich, the Hanseatic city was thus declared a "Führerstadt". Representation and administrative buildings for the party and the private economy were to be created. The architects involved in the project are interviewed. They reflect their activity and function at that time.

Stranger. Strange country. Strange city. Stranger in this city. Man from Sri Lanka. Distributor of brochures. Homestead in this foreign city?

Tradition and modernity, contrasting ways of life: the master of archival footage has assembled an impressive collection. His serene narration takes us inside the private lives of migrant families in different eras, from the beginnings of film to the present day. This new film from one of the great avant-garde directors is also a powerful tribute to a neglected genre.

Documentary about the making of the 1980 German television series.

Documentary about the terrorist attack on the Berlin discotheque "La Belle" in 1986.

In a makeshift boat, a GDR refugee escapes to West Germany. His newfound freedom is disorienting, and it is only later, with a growing nationalist movement, that he begins to feel at home.

A documentary about dog therapists in a Zurich nursing home.

A train journey from the Alps to the North Sea through post-war Germany.

The remarkable 83-year-old Helga Schubert lives in the remote landscape between Schwerin and Wismar. Her days are filled with the loving care of her sick 95-year-old husband, Johannes Helm, once a professor of psychology and passionate painter. But amidst this rural tranquility, Helga is anything but idle. Every day she dedicates herself to her passion, writing.

German training film from World War II.

Interview with Legends of the german football Club Fortuna Düsseldorf

Go with Armin and the blue garbage can through Munich and discover what happens to the garbage: Let us show you how 365 cans fit into just 16 water bottles. See how new paper is made from an old newspaper. Watch how waste from the organic waste garbage can is turned back into potting soil.