Majestic Filmverleih GmbH

Germany 2024, 115 min
by Andres Veiel

A captivating insight into the private estate of Leni Riefenstahl, who became world-famous with her Nazi propaganda film TRIUMPH OF THE WILL but kept denying any closer ties to the regime.Leni Riefenstahl is considered one of the most controversial women of the 20th century as an artist and a Nazi propagandist. Her films TRIUMPH OF THE WILL and OLYMPIA stand for perfectly staged body worship and the celebration of the superior and victorious. At the same time, these images project contempt for the imperfect and weak. Riefenstahl’s aesthetics are more present than ever today - but is that also true for their implied message? The film examines this question using documents from Riefenstahl's estate, including private films, photos, recordings and letters. It uncovers fragments of her biography and places them in an extended historical context. How could Riefenstahl become the Reich's preeminent filmmaker and keep denying any closer ties to Hitler and Goebbels? During her long life after the fall of Nazism, she remained unapologetic, managing to control and shape her legacy. In personal documents, she mourns her "murdered ideals". Riefenstahl represents many postwar Germans who, in letters and recorded telephone calls from her estate, dream of an organizing hand that will finally clean up the "shit-hole state". Then, her work would also experience a renaissance, in a generation or two this time could come - what if they are right?

Germany 2024, 109 min
by Alexandra Sell

Back in the swinging 60s young Linda from the streets of South London skipped school for the ice disco and was discovered on the spot, becoming a three-time British Champion in pair skating. Half a lifetime and two cruel twists of fate later, Linda returns onto the ice aged 70 – when nothing less than her life is at stake.Alexandra Sell’s touching documentary ICE AGED follows six men and women from all over the world for the best part of three years, tracing their dedication to training at local ice rinks up to the big performance at the World Hobby Figure Skating Championships at Oberstdorf in Bavaria.ICE AGED shows that the dream of skating is a battle-cry against the march of old age and the glorification of youth. Our well-aged heroes go beyond their limits for that all-important moment. On our way through their years and their tears, we witness deep pain, intense joy and unbreakable courage which takes our breath away.With: Elena Rickmann, Sissy Krick, Roland Suckale, Toos van Urk, Nadia Colbourne, Linda Bernard, David Marzell

Germany 2022, 110 min
by Simon Brückner

The feature documentary A GERMAN PARTY shows inside views of the AfD. It delves deep into the working lives of the party’s politicians and officials. The audience is right in the middle of the political action and experiences the struggles for direction in the party, the rebellion of its supporters against a „decadent establishment“. We experience the AfD’s own antics, its resentments, worlds of ideas and self-dramatizations.The party’s continued drift to the right proves to be just as real as the dream of government participation and coalition capability. Demagogues and tacticians encounter offended conservatives, opponents of the zeitgeist, and political beginners in search of the very different. In the process, an AfD emerges that is not in every respect as the cliché would have it.Director Simon Brückner worked with a 2-man team and got as close to his protagonists over the years of filming as is not possible for journalists in everyday reporting. The extraordinary thing about this film is the exclusive access to numerous politicians and committees at all levels of the AfD. The film works without interviews and does not comment on what is shown, but leaves the classification to the audience itself.

Germany 2021, 99 min
by Torsten Körner

FEMOCRACY tells the story of the women who, from reconstruction after Second World War until today, have unrelentingly fought for and improved women‘s rights in politics and in the country. They paved the way for Angela Merkel, the first female German Chancellor.The female pioneers literally had to fight for their place in democracy with success-obsessed and position-hungry men. Modern approaches to Aids education of a female minister lead to a conservative outcry in the country. Housewives realized that their vote counts and they started to stand up for themselves. Women in politics also brought new issues to parliament. Rape in marriage - which was not a punishable offence until the late 1990s - became officially chargeable. Abortion was subject to renegotiation as well. Still a criminal offence, it was no longer prosecuted. Thus women’s rights were strengthened more and more. Furthermore, topics like the NATO dual track decision were discussed by female politicians from a different perspective and therefore brought a deeper dimension into the debates of the German Bundestag.Undaunted, ambitious and with infinite patience, the female heros of FEMOCRACY followed their path and defied prejudice and sexual discrimination. Female politicians of the past get a chance to speak today. Their memories are bothfunny and bitter, absurd and sometimes frighteningly current. Interwoven with partly unseen archive excerpts, the documentary filmmaker and journalist Torsten Körner (Angela Merkel – The Unexpected) has succeeded in creating an emotionally moving chronicle of West German politics from the 1950s to the German reunification. The images he found unfold a force that allows the cinema to be rediscovered as a place of political self-assurance. An insightful contemporary document that makes an unmistakable contribution to the current debate.with: Herta Däubler-Gmelin, Marie Elisabeth Klee, Ursula Männle, Christa Nickels, Ingrid Matthäus-Maier, Renate Schmidt, Rita Süssmuth u.a.