Films by Anika Simon

Germany 2018, 90 min
by Gerhard Schick

Germany’s goalkeepers have been the envy of the football world for decades. DIE NUMMER EINS lets us re-live the unforgettable moments and scandals that have made legends of Oliver Kahn, Sepp Maier, Toni Schumacher, Jens Lehmann and Manuel Neuer. (DOK.fest Munich)

Germany, Netherlands 2017, 90 min
by Karin Jurschick

Shortly after 9/11, the US Congress passed a law to protect US airlines from decades of civil law suits and created a fund for compensating victims of disasters who agreed not to sue. Lawyer and mediator Ken Feinberg had to decide how much money was to be received as compensation. He met family members personally doing thousands of interviews. He thought that the value of a life was an easy calculation: how high is the economic loss? How old was the person, but Feinberg discovered that facing those left behind was far less easy. This is Feinberg’s story of highly emotional dilemmas as told by himself, as he took the role of ‘Playing God.’ MORE ON FILMA film about a charismatic lawyer acting as an interface between capital and justice, about US politics and about people who have suddenly lost their loved ones, their health or their livelihood.Why is the life of a fire-fighter who died a hero in the Twin Towers on September 11 worth on average a million euros less than that of a stockbroker who lost his life in the same disaster? How much money should oil giant BP pay the countless fishermen on the Gulf of Mexico who are fighting for their livelihoods in the wake of the largest oil spill in history? How can hundreds of ailing Vietnam vets be compensated for their suffering, which stems from exposure to Agent Orange? These are questions that almost appear cynical, but not for America’s most famous compensation specialist: Ken Feinberg.After the attacks on 11 September 2001, the US Congress decided to pay compensation to all victims or their families who agreed not to go to court. ONE man was appointed to have sole responsibility for that money: lawyer and mediator Ken Feinberg.In 1984 the Agent Orange case made Feinberg a household name overnight: In the US 250,000 Vietnam veterans sued a number of chemical companies and demanded compensation for death, injury and disease. Feinberg successfully served as special master in the litigation.Hardly a national tragedy has befallen the USA without Feinberg being called upon to play his part. The film takes a close look at Ken Feinberg. Who is this man who is applauded as a modern-day King Solomon and criticised as a heartless Pay Czar? We accompany him on his current high-profile cases. We recall his most challenging cases. We speak with politicians who call in Feinberg when a new disaster strikes, and we interview friends and enemies. We also pay a visit to the victims’ families. Do they feel that they have been fairly treated by America’s “special master”?PLAYING GOD reveals what happens within our Western system of values when economic interests and people’s lives become intertwined by tragedy.

Germany 2014, 40 min
by Georg Nonnenmacher

Hand-luggage is packed in a cloth shopping bag, one last cigarette before there is a knock at the door – inmate Rene is being transported. For a court hearing, he is traveling in a prison bus to another institution in another city. SPACEMEN accompanies him and shows the tedious procedure of the transport from his point of view – an exhausting route full of controls, constant stop-and-go at locked doors and gates, and endless waiting. When the bus is en route, the world passes by through the window in cinemascope format. The view of vastness, life and freedom is paraded before the prisoners’ eyes; a world in which they do not belong. With each stop, each station and each detention center the bus approaches, each change between prison and outside world, it becomes ever more perceptible that the revocation of freedom is simultaneously also the revocation of all means of autonomous action. With insight into their emotions and thoughts, Rene and four other inmates illustrate how the procedure of this 'trip' penetrates their everyday prison routine and at the same time pushes that which has long been suppressed back into their consciousness: desires, emotions, and time.

Germany 2012, 83 min
by Robert Krieg, Monika Nolte

Grandfather Bawo Reinhardt, his son Lulo and his grandchild Sibel are the main figures in the documentary film NEWO ZIRO; joining them is Sasha Reinhardt, the initiator of DJANGO’S HEIRS, a Sinti and Roma Music Festival in the country town Koblenz in southwest Germany. The film provides deep insights into a culture which is among those most discriminated against in Europe. Bawo, Lulo and Sibel live actively in Germany’s majority society without denying their roots. Sasha does not believe in 'new times'. He would rather have everything remain as it is. Either way, real tests are unavoidable.

Germany 2009
by Susanne Jäger, Susanne Jäger

"Black on White: A journey through Germany,” and is the product of famous undercover journalist Günter Wallraff’s year-long odyssey as a black man.