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In the south-east of Europe lies a natural jewel that is unparalleled: Romania. Bears and wolves still roam its inaccessible forests, in its remote villages people still live in harmony with nature - many things appear as in times long past for us. Romania is still home to animals and traditions that have long been lost in other regions: marmots inhabit the high meadows of the Carpathian Mountains, where shepherds graze their sheep in summer. Colorful bee-eaters live in Transylvania and pelicans fish in the Black Sea. With impressive images, this high-quality nature documentation takes you to surprisingly unknown, wild Romania.

Venereal disease threatens to tear a young couple apart.

The beauty of the Arctic is breathtaking. For as long as we can remember, the Arctic has been associated with inhospitable cold. But the climate is changing, and with it the northern polar region, which begins beyond latitude 66.5 degrees north. Climate change is now happening four times faster north of the Arctic Circle than on the rest of the planet, making the future outlook dire. At the moment it is still possible for polar bears to raise their cubs, but hunting is becoming increasingly difficult on the drastically shrinking pack ice. The disappearance of the ice also affects the marine fauna. The wintry ice bridge between Canada and Greenland is threatened with collapse. The unstoppable melting of the permafrost, which has held the tundra together for thousands of years, is worrying. But the Arctic is still one of the wildest and loveliest regions on earth. A documentary visit to the Arctic - as long as it still exists.

The dancer Fatima is the main attraction of the Oasis Bar. Two villainous couples are planning to kidnap her. Bruno Sukrow, the eccentric Scheherazade of German cinema, was born in Berlin in 1927. Initially working as a machine fitter, he started animating films using the program iClone at the age of 82, following the death of his wife. He died peacefully on Easter Sunday 2022, having directed around 80 films. “Fatima” is his last finished work.

Documentary about a diving expedition in the Red Sea by diving pioneer and marine biologist Hans Hass.

The essay film about the German philosopher Byung-Chul Han encircles the phenomenon of fatigue in our capitalistic societies and its associated symptoms such as depression and burnout. It raises the question of how we want to live today, and what we can oppose to the pressure of an achievement-oriented digital society.

He was a pop star of his time: with his paintings, copperplate engravings and woodcuts, Albrecht Dürer is one of the most important artists of the Renaissance. An obsessive, hedonist, visionary, networker and self-promoter, an eternal doubter and admonisher, a lover and seeker, in short: a modern man who was far ahead of his time. In a sensitive blend of fiction and documentary, the film Dürer tells of the life of the eccentric artist and of the stories behind his famous works.

Rosa von Praunheim creates the portrait of a committed woman, a fighter against homophobia and AIDS. The film, which honors Laura Halding-Hoppenheit, was made in cooperation with the German Aidshilfe.

The people at the centre of this film are lawyers, civil servants, housewives, managing directors and mothers. They are also alcoholics. In her documentary, Carolin Schmitz explores the protagonists’ stories and their strategies for survival: the little tricks they employ in order to try and get through their daily lives – lives which become increasingly difficult to manage the stronger the addiction becomes. Their fear of losing control and being exposed as a drinker create their need to conform, but the protagonists can only cope with this pressure by increasing their alcohol intake.

More than 100,000 individuals will become victims of human trafficking in Europe this year, most of them young women and children. In the face of a never seizing demand and supply, the numbers are on the rise. Human trafficking has become big business in the world of organized crime even without the refugee crisis taken into account. German authorities are talking about every tenth victim being a minor between the ages of 14 and 17, some being considerably younger.

At the age of 64, Margot Flügel-Anhalt gets on a motorcycle for the first time in her life – and gets on and off: It starts in her village in northern Hesse and then 117 days and 18,046 kilometers through Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Documentary that takes you on a journey into the world of birds in Singapore's Jurong Bird Park, where you can explore the understated beauty of crowned pigeons, birds of paradise and other beautiful winged creatures.

Dieter Howahl owns and operates a sausage grill in Hamburg. He does not sell fries.

Ronald Miehling is a living neighborhood legend. At the end of the 1980s, Miehling was one of the most powerful druglords in Hamburg. Miehling's cocaine business was flourishing and he enjoyed a life of luxury. But the police are always on his trail. A game of cat and mouse begins. At one point, "The Snow King" flees to Colombia, but is eventually caught and convicted. Today Miehling is an open prisoner. He meets up with friends from back then and tries to prepare for life after prison. The film shows an unvarnished picture of the former "Snow King", meeting old companions, friends, detectives and his mother - the inside view of a world that we otherwise only know from the headlines.

This 1983 German documentary by Katja Raganelli features director Joan Micklin Silver; her husband, Ray Silver; and a handful of key collaborators discussing her film work, from her debut feature HESTER STREET through her romantic comedy HEAD OVER HEELS.

Did you know that there are 100 trees for every Berliner or that West Berlin has the newest congress center in the world? This film shows the chocolate sides of the city in the areas of work, living, entertainment, sports and transport. He is one of several "recruitment films" with which the West Berlin Senate specifically wanted to convince new specialists from West Germany to work in West Berlin in the 1970s. Because of the island situation and politically unstable situation, West Berlin was particularly lacking in the influx of qualified workers.

Europe’s most successful public cultural radio station is struggling. The film follows the passionate radio crew over a period two years as they attempt to reinvent their program. Just when the station begins to regain listeners the right-wing government starts to threaten its independence.

First, assembly line work in a printer's. As one, the workmen put together newspapers. Then other hands assemble, punch holes in, and attach together sometimes mysterious materials, using machines of ultimate design. Then there is no more human presence; only a ballet of automated machines. Finally, we are in a foundry, amid sparks and smoke.

TV-documentary about the German painter Carl Spitzweg

An account of the life and work of controversial German orchestra conductor Herbert von Karajan (1908-89), celebrated as one of the greatest musicians of the twentieth century.

The Austrian region of Hallstatt-Dachstein features breathtaking landscapes, crystal clear lakes and a deep historic relevance: During the Hallstatt era, 2500 years ago, the celtics built an empire on the ancient salt-mines of the region. Using the latest CGI techniques, dramatic reenactments and outstanding nature photography director Wolfgang Thaler lets this fascinating region come to life.

A long-term observation from 1977-1980, focusing on the apprentice Gerd and his family. Gerd wants to become an electrician, but after several rejections he accepts an apprenticeship as a lathe operator at Ford. In the first two years he works in an apprentice workshop, in the third year he has to go into production; from now on he is under a lot of pressure, because the company keeps the decision as to whether to take on an apprentice as a normal employee open until the last moment. When Gerd talks about the apprenticeship at home and criticizes the training, his parents reprimand him. They say: You'd better put something away! He shouldn't stand out in the company. The work of a lathe operator is increasingly being taken over by automatic machines. Gerd realizes that he is learning a trade that no one will need any more soon.

A German Tonbild, or 'Sound Picture'.

From 1970 to 1993, the Federal Intelligence Service and the CIA jointly eavesdropped on encrypted communications from more than 100 countries. This is proven by previously unpublished documents written by leading BND and CIA employees.

A documentary essay film about coincidences, shattered lives and posthumous fame. A found footage family film about love and passion, friendship and heartbreak in Berlin between the wars. But ​a film ​also about self-sufficiency and recycling​, about the green movement and the environment​ – before these ​notion​s had yet been properly invented. And it ​touches​ the utopian potential of ideas that have lain buried in the ground of an island for the past 70 years. The film’s protagonist, Martin Elsaesser, was one of the most prominent modernist architects of Weimar Germany.

Although presented as anonymous and confidential, the data collected by mobile apps is in fact sold by brokers on a vast global market. As part of the Data Broker Files investigation, German journalists reveal the inner workings of a lucrative system that operates outside any regulatory framework.

We all know photos with painted-over or cut-out faces. The repeatedly inserted hand that works on family pictures with pens and other utensils seems like a refrain. The attempts at eradication are audible. They are a dissonance transferred to the body. Scratch, distort, remove. Usually a woman’s head.

The 2022 midterms are crucial for the second half of Joe Biden's presidency. The documentary shows the state of the political system.

Right on our doorstep there is something that feeds us all: living soil. But this precious resource is under threat – from us humans! Our planet needs more than 2000 years to form ten centimetres of fertile soil. What does this mean for the future?

This is an intimate portrait, made a year before his death, of writer Ludwig Hohl. Born in 1904, Hohl was admired by his peers Max Frisch and Friedrich Dürrenmatt (and later, Adolf Muschg and Peter Handke), but has long been neglected.

While the First World War and its battles on the Western Front are still very much anchored in our memory of history, the simultaneous battle in the East appears now to have been largely forgotten. During the course of this military action, a peculiar, state-like entity was created, a German colony in Eastern Europe, a military utopia: the Land of Ober Ost. The occupied region was to become a productive state, completely under military command; a state that was to serve not least as a deployment zone for the impending war.

Herman Melville's epic ocean adventure "Moby Dick" is an American masterpiece. But was this stirring tale of violence and revenge simply an allegory, or were there real giants of the deep deliberately attacking whaling ships? With the help of centuries old witness accounts and modern day science, we explain how the legend of the great white whale came to be. Then we determine if the multiple sperm whale assaults on ships in the 19th century were indeed premeditated and coordinated.

Sabine, Clais and Orm were children when their fathers were murdered by the RAF. Their childhood therefore ended violently and too soon. In this documentary, they tell how terrorism changed their lives and those of their family forever - and continues to shape them to this day.

Imagine waking up tomorrow and all music has disappeared. Just like that. What will remain when it is all gone: CDs, iPods, instruments?

In Yvonne, the namesake baby and other friends wear hand-knitted garments that play star roles in this humorous narrative. The video evokes a sense of domesticity and the intimacy of the handmade.

For the film “Eating Differently – The Experiment” a field is planted for the first time with precisely those grains, vegetables, fruits, oilseeds and grasses that end up on our plates per person – and which the industry processes into animal feed, among other things. A field of 4,400 m2 is created, the area of a small soccer field that the "average" citizen needs.

Why does everyone want to take part in the Rottweiler Narrensprung, even though the costumes are expensive, the wooden masks uncomfortable and the jesters' rules extremely strict? Can Swabian language tests and video surveillance save the famous Rottweiler Fasnacht from the onslaught of out-of-town jesters? Fool master Christoph has his doubts. But under no circumstances are women allowed to dress up as horses. Filmmakers Sigrun Köhler and Wiltrud Baier (Böller und Brot) spent over three years filming in Rottweil. With their humorous and affectionate view, they take the viewer into an unknown world: a great archaic celebration of life and death in the middle of highly industrialized Germany.

Documentary film about a US with German punk band Die Goldenen Zitronen, Wesley Willis, and hip hop duo Grand Buffet.

A biologist describes her research into various species of frogs in the rainforest of Central America and their mysterious disappearance as if it were a criminal case. Brilliantly animated drawings accompany her vivid scientific analysis.

Johann Sebastian Bach is not only one of the greatest composers of all time, but perhaps also the most mysterious. Who was this inconspicuous man from Thuringia, whose music still deeply touches people from all over the world?

A tribute to friends near and far. S8 - 50D, shot in March 2025, in NYC and Berlin

Tokyo, the largest city in the world, wants to create a new urban culture. It is returning to the urban traditions and building techniques of the small town. The aim is to create a new balance between megacity and small-scale garden city. Tokyo's architects are the driving force. They want to create a new urban culture with revolutionary ideas.

During World War II, 8 million people from abroad were forced to work in Germany, making up 30% of the workforce. By 1993, when a film on this topic was completed, there was little public awareness in Germany of this massive mobilisation of slave labour. The film explores the victims’ perspectives and the perpetrators’ motivations and methods, detailing how the system evolved from recruiting Italian volunteers to deportation, racist oppression, and slave labour. Director Wolfgang Bergmann used archive material from 10 countries and eyewitness accounts from 8 European states. Forced labourers were a visible part of German society, yet their legality and the guilt of those responsible were rarely questioned, even after Germany’s surrender. This chapter of history was largely repressed and forgotten. The film was made after the 1989 changes, during a time when xenophobic crimes were rising, with West German right-wing extremists gaining followers in East Germany.