MATERIAL

Dear friends,
we are very happy to announce that MATERIAL by Thomas Heise won the Grand Prix of the International Competition of FID Marseille 2009.
From the jury's verdict: The film provides its viewer with a rare and unique reflection on both history and film. It does so by its acute attention to discarded footage, that is, by beginning its representation from that which even the director himself had once deemed to the margins. The fall of the Berlin Wall is reflected upon without resorting to its iconic image. The resulting panoramic montage, while it is highly diverse, always presents the spectacle of power and its negotiation and in the moments in which its stability is contested, from the stages of the theater to those of prisoners negotiating amnesty measures. But MATERIAL also reminds us that the spectacle cannot be reduced to its artifice, and that our historical narratives may well be premised on such reductive judgement. This film demands the viewer to assume an active role in experiencing what it presents, and manages to do so in a way that is never sentimental, but is profoundly emotional.

Germany 1988-2009, 164 min

ma.ja.de. filmproduktion in co-production with Thomas Heise and ZDF in collaboration with ARTE funded by Kulturstiftung des Bundes

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