Films by Verena Schönauer

Germany 2010, 88 min
by Bertram Verhaag

Árpád Pusztai and Ignacio Chapela have two things in common. They are distinguished scientists and their careers are in ruins. Both scientists choose to look at the phenomenon of genetic engineering. Both made important discoveries. Both of them are suffering the fate of those who criticise the powerful vested interests that now dominate big business and scientific research. Statements made by scientists themselves prove that 95% of the research in the area of genetic engineering is paid by the

Germany 2010, 45 min
by Bertram Verhaag

In 1998, scientist Dr Árpád Pusztai gives an interview, in which he claims that he wouldn’t eat genetically modified food without its harmlessness beeing proved by long-term tests. He himself has made tests where rats fed with GM potatoes suffered serious diseases, damaged immune system and retarded organ growth. Soon he is under attack by the GM food industry: He‘s forbidden to give out any further information regarding his research, his papers are confiscated and he is denied access to his lab

Germany 2009, 65 min
by Bertram Verhaag

Imagine that a storm blows across your garden – and that now, without your knowledge and without your consent, foreign and genetically-manipulated seeds are in your vegetable patch which you have nourished and maintained for many years. A few days later, representatives of a multi-national corporate group pay you a visit at home, demand that you surrender your vegetables - and simultaneously file a criminal complaint against you, resulting in a fine of USD 20.000,00 – for the illegal use of pate

Germany 2008, 52 min
by Bertram Verhaag

The average age of employees at the Vita Needle Company, a needle and tubing factory near Boston, is an amazing 74 years. Anyone who can make it up the front steps gets hired. In their previous lives, Mary, Marion, Paul, Tom, Ann and Rosa were engineers, nurses, bakers and waiters. Now, they’ve decided against spending their sunset years bored, lonely and inactive. At Vita Needle, they’ve come together and found a new home – and the security of a job for life. Not only that, but they’re busy con

Germany 2008, 30 min
by Bertram Verhaag

Visitors to SEKEM come away full of enthusiasm for the things they have seen, heard and experienced. 28 years after SEKEM’s founding, what was once an uninhabited expanse of desert 60 kilometres northeast of Cairo has been transformed into a fertile, organically-cultivated landscape. SEKEM is the brainchild of Egyptian entrepreneur Ibrahim Abouleish, a remarkable visionary but also a realist. Through his project, he has pioneered a system of biodynamic farming according to stringent Demeter sta

Germany 2008
by Bertram Verhaag

The fascination with and enthusiasm for plastic is just as great as the list of problems, risks and studies associated with its use is long. Most types of plastic that we use every day are nearly non-degradable - and as time goes by, they release many of their often hormonally efficacious additives into the environment. Then, spread by wind, water or illegal waste disposal in the ocean, they are found throughout our entire planet – even in oceanic regions far removed from civilisation. Even toda