AMOUR FOU Wien

2023, 83 min
by Philipp Jedicke

Vienna, the former music capital of Europe, has become increasingly relevant again. With the wry approach that is typical of this city, the young underground music scene there romanticizes the raw and rabid. Hedonist and nihilist at the same time, the young Viennese artists embody the opposite of self-optimization. They are unadjusted, eccentric characters – and they are filling concert halls not only in Austria, but also in Germany and Switzerland. VIENNA CALLING starts with the aim of being a music documentary. But increasingly, the true protagonist emerges as the city of Vienna itself. Like a flâneur, the camera saunters by day and night through the lanes, bars and casual joints of Vienna, taking diversions, becoming lost only to find its way again. The strolling rhythm is instigated by the music, performed by Viennese artists and their famous charm or "Schmäh". Part documentary, part staged, interwoven with musical performances, the project gradually reveals itself as a mosaic of eccentricity. VIENNA CALLING digs deep into the catacombs of Viennese culture far from the mainstream. With its many performances and semi-fictional scenes, VIENNA CALLING is not a music documentary in the classic sense of the word, but rather a docu-musical. The film provides a stage for Viennese artists like the Turkish-Austrian duo EsRAP, who are first generation immigrants, non-binary rap artist Kerosin95, radical feminist authors Stefanie Sargnagel and Lydia Haider, songwriters Voodoo Ju?rgens and Der Nino aus Wien, and many more. VIENNA CALLING is a poetic approximation to the underground scene of an old European metropolis that experiences the current cultural changes and conflicts of our time. Viennese artists take the room they need for their art in a city that becomes increasingly gentrified. VIENNA CALLING is an homage to daring artists, it is about the hardships of creating art and art's need for space and independence.With: Voodoo Jürgens, Nino Aus Wien, EsRap, Gutlauninger, Kerosin95, Buntspecht a.o.

Germany, Austria 2019, 83 min
by Gesa Hollerbach

The last school has shut its doors, every other house is empty, there are only rapeseed fields as far as the eye can see. The last holdovers in the country are faced with the decision: stay or go?  "All for the Countryside" traces a host of societal phenomena that are caused by changing dynamics in rural areas and follows four individuals over the course of several years, each of whom give unexpected impulses to life on the countryside. The quartet consists of a mayor who's stuck between the front lines when parents resort to illegal protest classes to prevent the closing of the local middle school; a farmer who enters the political sector and tries to exercise political pressure in the EU parliament against the practice of land concentration in Europe; and an astronomer who together with a local restaurant owner fights for the protection of our natural skies by attempting to obtain UNESCO status for an unknown village. While each of the quartet has completely different backgrounds, they are united in their strong belief in the power of the individual and the courage to enter uncharted territory with their actions. The film dives deep into their personal microcosms and shows what can be done to prevent the eradication of the European countryside. The story is a profoundly European one, as all across Europe people living in the countryside are faced with similar challenges

Germany 2013, 80 min
by Angela Christlieb

Marc is a wealthy but critically ill man who is living life to the full one final time. Alongside his ordered existence as a human resources manager in Luxembourg he enjoys a bacchanalic life with young male ‘companions’ in the luxury hotels of major cities whose opera houses happen to be playing Mozart’s ‘Don Giovanni’. This opulently filmed documentary follows Marc on his journeys, accompanies him on his visits to doctors, and allows him to expound upon his personal philosophy of power, money and control over both himself and others. Marc’s life is uncompromisingly black and white. His structured routine is essential to help him ‘keep his head above water’. But then his life begins to unravel when he falls in love with a porn actor and follows him into the world of Berlin’s HustlaBall. Filmmaker Angela Christlieb displays a sense of the bizarre in this intimate portrait of a man who in spite of, or perhaps because of his contradictions, comes across as endearing and vulnerable. The filmmaker’s palpable presence behind the camera develops along the way into one of the documentary filmmaking’s central themes: the relationship between director and protagonist.