Films by Peter Heller

Germany 2024, 72 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

Jean Pierre Felix-Eyoum, a Cameroonian living in Germany, embarks on a journey to find out about his great uncle, the Cameroonian King Rudolf Duala Manga Bell. As a child in the 1890s, Manga Bell went to school in Germany and later, as the king, stood up for the rights of his people. This sealed his fate: in 1914, the German colonial administration sentenced Manga Bell to death. [39 DOK.fest München, Barbara Off]202439 DOK.fest Munich

Germany 2020, 112 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

The palatal invasion from Italy became a legend. The wave of guest workers has infected us with culture. For Germany's children, spaghetti & pizza have become a tradition and staple food. Munich, has thousand Italian restaurants. Old Parma has less, but the old gourmet capital has a industry producing foods: pasta, prosciutto and Parmigiano. Our film tells about development aid and cultural revolution. From waiters and cooks as kitchen partisans and food industry from Parma, which feeds the world healthy by slow food in quality and style. A documentary about waiters who became millionaires in Germany's kitchen asylum, the big food and the two thousand year old Parma

2019, 100 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

Today it‘s called simply 'looted art'! And just a few years ago it was still called 'Art of the Primitive' or 'Tribal Art'. Our museums are full of Ancient art from Africa. But Africa itself has almost no masks left, the acquisition and provenance of collections in the north of the world are controversial, and young African intellectuals invoke with these fetishes of lost past the history of the continent and their own identity. But who does this treasure really belong to? Experts from Africa ask for restitution - But was it all just robbery? Are we facing a freshly disguised colonialism? Or at the beginning of new forms of cultural exchange from South to North at eye level?

Germany 2018, 100 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

The film tells from the personal perspective of the filmmaker the history of the Munich district cinema 'Maxim'. The Maxim was centre of his private and professional life. The cinema had been managed for 40 years by the lone fighter Sigi who persistently opposed all trends. The Maxim was a venue, catalyst and home of political documentary and a birthplace of the Munich International Documentary Film Festival. But the political weapon "Maxim" had become dull time by time. The old cinema corner lost he connection lin technology and audience. The "Maxim" had to die. When everyone had already given up the ancient cinema, a "New Maxim  "reborn in the 104th year by a women's collective. And the legend lives - differently better and further.

Germany 2017, 80 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

A polygamous family group that stretches from Germany to Nigeria – is that possible? For fifteen years the filmmaker Peter Heller follows the Munich fashion designer and owner of Africa & House, Ann Dörr, as she tries to manage an intercultural extended family.

2017, 90 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft), Saliou Sarr, Barney Ruebe

Conceived as a family saga, the documentary follows through ten years two brothers between Westafrica and Europe – the younger on a tiny island in the Atlantic and the elder brother as a hopeless illegal on Spanish mainland. A film about Europe’s values seen through african eyes of poor migrants, about intercontinental trade routes and connected personal hopes. The saga highlightens cultural and family background, by means of very subjective and direct longterm insights.Aspects of leaving but also returning are showing new angles on exile but also on migration of so far anonymous boat-people washed up at South-Europe’s borderline coasts. The film is a longtermcooperation since 2008 between filmmakers in Senegal, Germany and Spain.

2016, 35 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

BARCA OU BASSA takes inside views to reasons of migration from a tiny 'paradise island' at the Atlantic coast of Westafrica to Spain. African experts, activists and scientists research and explain under the aspects of economy, ecology, history and geopolitics the background to the individual story oft he two migrating brothers ( LIFE SAARABA ILLEGAL ) in times the ’Fortress Europe‘ is sealing of.

2016, 52 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

BLACK MARKET’S MASQUERADE is a journey of discovery to the museums next door, to the most beautiful crafts and cult objects, to the mysterious fetishes and masks – the art of our neighbouring continent. We encounter the seemingly 'primitive' art objects from Africa in fancy vitrines of the galleries, in crammed private apartments of passionate collectors and on dusty storage racks of ethnological museums. The collectors have always been tempted by the unusual otherness of the cult objects. In addition the foreign and spiritual aspect of the works enriches the Europeans, serving as a source of inspiration. The art market converts eccentric collectors into speculating rich men. The market for traditional African art is flourishing across the globe. In the past months single objects have been auctioned off for millions. Though ancient African art as an investment is a new development.The film follows the tracks from the poorest carvers in West Africa to the posh trade fair for gallery owners in Brussels and to Paris, where the prices for the art market are made. Nowadays history conscious Africans accuse museum directors of ’art robbery‘.

Germany 2012, 89 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

500 billion US dollars in a half-century - and no end to the aid is in sight. Prominent "do-gooders" of the entertainment industry such as Bono, Bob Geldorf, Angelina Jolie and Madonna, pressure the politicians to pump more development aid into Africa. An ever-increasing number of African economic experts and sociologists have begun to criticise this flood of aid. Our documentary film project follows the voices of protest that are being raised in Africa. Working in cooperation with scholars and journalists from West and East Africa, we will attempt to present the problems of development aid from an "African" perspective.

Germany 2010, 55 min
by Peter Heller (c/o filmkraft)

Nelson Mandela's long struggle against the racist minority regime in South Africa is legendary. In Mandela's shadow there is one of his most loyal fellow freedom fighters – a white South African. The film portrays the life of this campaigner who is less well known in South Africa and worldwide. He was imprisoned for 22 years – sentenced as a bomb maker and terrorist; branded a 'traitor to the white race'. But even the hatred of his fellow white South Africans could not break his spirit. Goldberg triumphed over torture and imprisonment, went into exile in England and as an activist witnessed the birth of the South African democracy. The now 75 year old ANC veteran lives in Cape Town and is as ever involved in the struggle for human dignity in times of turbulent transition.