Films by Markus Ruff

Germany 2011, 91 min
by Heinz Emigholz

A Series of Thoughts consists of four parts: El Greco in Toledo, Leonardo’s Tears, On Board the USS Ticonderoga and A Museum in Essen. The series comprises a train of thought on the religiously and politically motivated and, in military terms, strategically executed sacrifice of sons. El Greco in Toledo documents, in 2009, the existence of the painting “The Burial of the Count of Orgaz” that El Greco completed in 1588. Leonardo’s Tears combines all views of the Brazilian midfielder Leonardo Nascimento de Araujo that were broadcast from the Soccer World Cup 1998 with a text collage on “Grace Jones” from the year 1986. On Board the USS Ticonderoga retells a photograph that Wayne Miller took on November 5, 1944, on board an American aircraft carrier in the Pacific. A Museum in Essen shows the spaces of the new building of Museum Folkwang by David Chipperfield Architects that were still empty in December 2009, and into which one can imagine the preceding images.

Germany 2010, 90 min
by Maria Mohr

A film dedicated to the brothers and sisters who leave and those who stay – „on earth as in heaven“. BROTHER SISTER is a film about a German nun loving a Spanish saint to-be: Rafael Arnaiz, who died 3 years before Sister Ingrid was born. She only has a piece of his rib as an official relic – and his complete works, that she had translated from Spanish into German. But why a german nun loves a Spanish saint? Sister Ingrid is the filmmaker’s aunt. This allows an intensive look into the world of the Roman-Catholic Church, where she learned to follow her ideas of a rather independent life. Rafael Arnaiz who was suffering from Diabetes already died at the age of 27 lead a life between culture, arts, music, good food and fast cars and his sober Trappist abbey. He was a young, attractive and charismatic young guy who nowadays seems to be a the perfect role model of a “modern” saint. BROTHER SISTER is a very personal reflection on the tightrope walk between wishes and must, between christian humility and the longing for freedom. A film for “happy prisoners” and brotherly/sisterly lovers.