Films by Tobias Tempel

Germany 2023, 77 min
by Andreas Wolff

When the most fulfilling element in your life gets taken away: A professional female snowboarder fights against depression and mistreatment by her federation in order to fulfil her dream of an Olympic comeback.Silvia Mittermüller is in a traumatic conflict with her federation. Being expelled from the national team immediately after her first Olympics participation, she plunges into depression with thoughts of suicide. It takes Silvia more than one year to recover. She dares a comeback and decides to tell her story in this film. But the president of the German snowboard federation tries to intervene in the making of the film. Does Silvia succumb to the threats or does she take the chance to start a new phase of her life?

Germany 2022, 90 min
by Katharina Köster

When it's easier to fight than just to live. Tobi has a heart transplant.On the journey to the clinic, thoughts come to him: “what will I do if I survive this? What comes next?” At that moment he is afraid of all the future possibilities. The heart transplant is a success. Tobias is saved. Katharina Köster accompanies Tobias over a period of 10 years, during which he faces difficult battles with himself and the world around him. [37 DOK.fest Munich, Ina Borrmann]

Germany, United Arab Emirates 2017, 88 min
by Stefanie Brockhaus, Andreas Wolff

Hissa Hilal is the voice from behind the veil. Her weapon is her word. Hissa is a self-taught writer and she says what she thinks. She decides to take part in the Million’s Poet show, an Abu-Dhabi based TV show. It is the Arab world’s biggest poetry competition, and it is dominated by men. Hissa works herself up, becoming the first woman in the finals. In her poems she criticizes the patriarchal Arab society and she attacks one of the most notorious Saudi clerics for his extremist fatwas, live, in front of 75 million viewers. We’ll never see Hissa’s face. Like the majority of Saudi women, Hissa is covered from head to toe. She is not allowed to drive a car. She doesn’t own a passport. And she requires consent from her husband for any sort of activity. Coming out of nowhere, the housewife Hissa is suddenly breaking news in the biggest Western and Arab media. How did she gain the knowledge and the courage to step on stage and risk her life? This is Hissa‘s story.

Germany 2014, 100 min
by Eric Asch

The film's story unfolds in West Berlin in the late 1950's, where my father was part of an undercover intelligence mission in the former US Military Secret Service, the Army Security Agency or the ASA. After moving to West Germany in the early 1970s, my father surprisingly seems to be drawing the attention of American government officials. Later in the 1980's, he makes many new friends in the other part of Germany behind the iron curtain – many of whom turn out to be not such good friends, because he became a victim of eavesdropping and observation by the STASI, the former East German Secret Service. In his STASI file he is identified as an 'agent of an imperialistic intelligence service' and thus receives a code name: 'pirate'. Was my father really a spy? As his son and as a filmmaker I have started a thorough examination of his life. And found myself confronted with a huge pile of material: boxes full of memories, old letters, official and private documents, photos, audio recordings and video tapes. Family events are suddenly intermingled with facts from contemporary history. Conversations with former military buddies in West-Berlin, with friends and possibly girlfriends from the former GDR, with historians, as well as with students, professors or close relatives will hopefully provide answers - or perhaps arouse new suspicions