With SHORT EXPORT – MADE IN GERMANY 2023 once again and for the 18th time, outstanding German short films travel the world. The program is a powerful exploration of what it means to be searching for something: searching for the right words, searching for direction, searching for beginnings, searching for what is left of us. The program takes us on a journey that includes stopping points such as the Platz der Kulturen in Cologne and the Polish-Belorussian border, the oceans of our planet and outer space. In this, its 18th edition, the program is contemplative and lighthearted, frustrating and surprising.
Selected from more than 470 entries to the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival, the six German short films in this unconventional program give us an insight into the broad artistic, esthetic and thematic variety of contemporary German short film.
The project is a Franco-German cooperation between AG Kurzfilm - German Short Film Association, German Films, Goethe-Institut Lyon, Festival International du Court Métrage Clermont-Ferrand and Kurzfilm Agentur Hamburg.
● DIE HÜTER DES UNRATS. EINE KURZE GESCHICHTE DES ABFALLS (THE GUARDIANS OF REFUSE: A SHORT HISTORY OF GARBAGE)
Susann Maria Hempel | experimental documentary | 11'
The possibility of (re)constructing human history now no longer takes place in archives alone; it has instead moved into the realm of garbage. But what if, under modern concepts of an efficient recycling system, there is no more waste?
● I WAS NEVER REALLY HERE
Gabriel Bihina Arrahnio | fiction | 23'
Sam (17, German-Ghanaian) and his mother Rita are awaiting the arrival of their old friend Gifty and her son Kwesi (19, Ghanaian). As Kwesi enters Sam's life, he begins to fall in love with Kwesi and to question his own identity. But their growing connection is threatened by Kwesi and Gifty’s lack of residency status.
● MUSS JA NICHT SEIN, DASS ES HEUTE IST (IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE TODAY)
Sophia Groening | fiction | 8'
Four friends are sitting in a square in the Finkenberg district of Cologne, looking for the right words and punctuation marks for a text message to a girl. The message will never be sent.
● BORDER CONVERSATIONS
Jonathan Brunner | documentary | 30'
In November 2021, thousands of migrants are trying to enter the EU across Poland‘s border with Belarus. Kornelia and Karolina, two Polish activists, receive urgent calls for help via text messages on a daily basis. They try to help, but their support efforts are unsuccessful. A film about facing the limitations of humanitarian aid.
● WUNSCHKIND (PLANNED CHILD)
Laura Solbach | fiction | 17'
Grace (24) is a young mother with Down syndrome. She lives in an institution for accompanied parenting with her two-year-old daughter Milla. But she wants to care of her daughter on her own and spontaneously makes a risky decision.
● HELLO STRANGER
Julia Ocker | animation | 6'
An astronaut lands on an unknown planet. Everything is strange.
For bookings and more information, please contact: soiree@ag-kurzfilm.de
