Every year in November, the German-language documentary film scene meets in the heart of the Ruhr region for the Duisburg Film Week. Just as important as the viewing of current films is the discussion about them – and the audience joins in. Special addition 2024: The Goethe-Institut has awarded its documentary film prize.
While it is gradually getting cold and uncomfortable outside, friends of documentary film gather in the beautiful red cinema auditorium of the Duisburg Filmforum to watch films together and then discuss what they have seen with the filmmakers in the adjoining discussion room. For one week in November 2024, the understanding of cinema as a space for discourse will be passionately lived in the heart of the Ruhr region.The fact that the film and the film talk have the same relevance in the festival programme is characteristic of the Duisburg Film Week, which is being held for the 48th time this year. Whether lively discussion, praise or criticism – every film talk is documented and subsequently published and archived.
Around the world
And there really was a lot to discuss. Under this year's motto “Remote Sorting”, the selection committee put together a film programme with current documentary films from Germany, Austria and Switzerland. However, the locations to which the films took the audience were often in completely different places. For example, the opening film Dom by Svetlana Rodina and Laurent Stoop took the audience to the Georgian capital Tbilisi, where a community of Russian human rights activists and journalists fled from the repression in the country.The films sort out distant realities of life and political realities in a wide variety of places: in private film footage, Iranian women dance in an exuberant mood and talk about freedom in the private sphere, which stands in sharp contrast to public life. In the south of Italy, a group of women retreat into a life in harmony with nature. In Zurich, a zoo attempts to spatially reorganise the relationship between humans and animals, while at an art academy patriarchal (gender) orders are exposed that are deeply inscribed in both the place and the institution.
Award-winning film about the decision between child and art
In 2024, the Goethe-Institut's Documentary Film Award was also presented at the Duisburg Film Week. In addition to primarily fulfilling cinematic criteria, the award-winning film should also have a connection to Germany in connection with an intercultural or global perspective. From a selection of eight German documentaries, the Goethe-Institut jury chose the film Reproduktion by Katharina Pethke. The jury praised the multi-generational portrait about the incompatibility of artistic creation and motherhood.The film takes the audience to the Hochschule für bildende Künste Hamburg, where three successive generations of women complete their studies. In a close look at the history of this place, its architecture and the works of fine art that adorn it, Reproduktion makes the prevailing gender orders visible. In the art world, the decision between child and art remains a painful one to this day. Katharina Pethke makes this tangible through the power of formal aesthetics.
The Goethe-Institut Documentary Film Award
Since 2003, the Goethe-Institut has honoured an outstanding film work once a year with the Documentary Film Award. Since 2022, it has been awarded alternately at important German documentary film festivals. After the first award ceremony at DOK.fest Munich and DOK Leipzig last year, this year's award ceremony took place at the Duisburger Filmwoche. Next year, the prize will travel on to the Kassel Dokfest.November 2024