Dang Tuan Anh, Vu Do Quang Minh, Khong Viet Bach, Hoang Ha, Nguyen Bui Khanh Trung, Vu Duc Hanh in Another City von Pham Ngoc Lan

25 films from 21 countries compete for the Golden and the Silver Bear, the Nominee for the European Film Awards and, for the second consecutive year, the Audi Short Film Award worth € 20,000. Los murmullos, from 1976, will be shown out of competition. The short film jury is comprised of the curator and director of the Sharjah Biennial in the United Arab Emirates, Sheikha Hoor Al-Qasimi, the Greek curator and writer, Katerina Gregos and Israeli filmmaker, Avi Mograbi (see press release from Dec 14, 2015).

Among others, the competition will include films from Gabriel Abrantes, Pimpaka Towira, Réka Bucsi, Ben Russell, Mahdi Fleifel, Christoph Girardet & Matthias Müller and Siegfried A. Fruhauf.

“Placed together, the films at Berlinale Shorts 2016 constitute one body of work, a cinematic essay – providing scope for an endeavour that reaches far beyond the individual film: The longing for arrival is reflected in many of the selected films – regardless of where in the world they come from. Everyone wants to arrive,” curator Maike Mia Höhne, commenting on the selection. The new documentary by Mahdi Fleifel even bears that in its title, A Man Returned – after three years in Greece, the protagonist returns to a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon and, unperturbed by drugs or acts of war, commences preparations for his wedding. After winning the Golden Bear for Best Short Film in 2014, the collaborative duo Jonathan Vinel and Caroline Poggi have created a new cinematic look for their film Notre Héritage by combining pornographic archive pictures by Pierre Woodman with computer game aesthetics, thereby casting the old story of a son’s search for his father in a fresh light. In Portugal, shops display clay frogs to keep Romani out. In Balada de um Batráquio, director Leonor Teles finds a way to enter the stores.

The most renowned German experimental film duo, Matthias Müller and Christoph Girardet will present their latest film in competition, personne, about the individual’s search for itself, as reflected in European and American narrative cinema.

Los murmullos by Rubén Gámez from the year 1976 is a caesura in New Latin American Cinema. Unlike his colleagues, who wished to mirror and directly influence society with their “Third Cinema”,  Rubén Gámez allows his protagonists to speak openly, composing an extremely calm film about the conditions of workers and farmers, which in view of current TTIP negotiations, proves to be unsettlingly topical. Equally relevant, the right to sexual self-determination: In Reluctantly Queer by Akosua Adoma Owusu, the film’s protagonist writes a letter to his mother in Ghana.

Berlinale Shorts 2016:

Another City, Pham Ngoc Lan, Vietnam, 25’ (WP)

Bai Niao (White Bird), Wu Linfeng, People’s Republic of China, 30’ (WP)

Balada de um Batráquio (Batrachian's Ballad), Leonor Teles, Portugal, 11’ (WP)

El Buzo (The Diver), Esteban Arrangoiz, Mexico, 16’ (IP)

Das águas que passam (Running Waters), Diego Zon, Brazil, 23’ (WP)

Estate (Summer), Ronny Trocker, France / Belgium, 7’ (WP)

Freud und Friends (Freud and Friends), Gabriel Abrantes, Portugal, 23’ (EP)

He Who Eats Children, Ben Russell, USA, 25’ (WP)

Hopptornet (Ten Meter Tower), Axel Danielson & Maximilien Van Aertryck, Sweden, 17’ (IP)

In the Soldier's Head, Christine Rebet, USA / France, 4’ (WP)

Jin zhi xia mao (Anchorage Prohibited), Chiang Wei Liang, Taiwan, 16’ (IP)

Kaputt (Broken – The Women’s Prison at Hoheneck), Volker Schlecht & Alexander Lahl, Germany, 7’ (WP)

Love, Réka Bucsi, France / Hungary, 14’ (WP)

A Man Returned, Mahdi Fleifel, United Kingdom / Netherlands / Denmark, 30’ (IP)

Moms On Fire, Joanna Rytel, Sweden, 12’ (IP)

Los murmullos (Murmurings), Rubén Gámez, Mexico, 25’ – Out of competition

Notre Héritage (Our Legacy), Jonathan Vinel in collaboration with Caroline Poggi, France, 24’ (WP)

Oustaz, Bentley Brown, Chad, 21’ (WP)

personne, Christoph Girardet & Matthias Müller, Germany, 15’ (WP)

Prelude to the General, Pimpaka Towira, Thailand, 11’ (WP)

Reluctantly Queer, Akosua Adoma Owusu, Ghana / USA, 8’ (WP)

Six Cents in the Pocket, Ricky D’Ambrose, USA, 14’ (IP)

Tsomet Haruhot (Winds Junction), Rotem Murat, Israel, 22’ (IP)

Die Unzugänglichkeit der griechischen Antike und ihre Folgen (The Inaccessibility of Ancient Greece and Its Impact), Gerrit Frohne-Brinkmann & Paul Spengemann, Germany, 13’ (WP)

Vintage Print, Siegfried A. Fruhauf, Austria, 13’ (IP)

Vita Lakamaya, Akihito Izuhara, Japan, 8’ (WP)