femme totale
9th International Film Festival
No Place Like Home
2– 6 April 2003
No Place Like Home is the
title of femme totale's
As usual, the femme totale's main spotlight is on women: we show films made
by women from all over the world; actresses will be introducing themselves;
an award goes to the most promising young german woman cinematographer; and
the featured country this year is Afghanistan. Nine programmes and further
special features show the theme’s different varieties.
"There's no place like home" was the formula that Dorothy (Judy
Garland) had to repeat until she was able to return from the magical country
of Oz back to her Kansas home. Whether this is meant to be pleasant or unpleasant
usually depends on the intonation, an ambivalence which may be said to characterise
the festival's themes this year. If the German language relies on the dual
terms of Heimat and Heim, the English term of "home" is a concept
combining place, landscape and tradition as well as beliefs, feelings, people,
friends and clans.
FAMILY AFFAIRS
The festival programme 2003 clearly reflects the cinema's current preoccupation
with family matters. Since the influential Danish dogma films were such a
success, the family as a topic is in again. However, the new films go well
beyond the family values dismissed as reactionary in most Hollywood movies.
If the Indian director Mira Nair drew an affectionate and ironical portrait
of an Indian family clan in MONSOON WEDDING (Golden Lion / Venice 2001), her
latest film HYSTERICAL BLINDNESS takes place in the USA.
She tells the story of three lonely working-class women united by the desire
for stable relationships and the search for a meaning to life. Nair brings
three of America's most interesting actresses together: co-producer Uma Thurman
(Golden Globe 2003) is Debbie, the wonderful Gena Rowlands is her mother Virginia;
and Juliette Lewis, as Debbie's best friend Beth, completes the trio. femme
totale is truly proud to present this German premiere.
A WANDERER BETWEEN WORLDS
The decisions which make someone leave a familiar person or family home are
as varied and as numerous as individual destinies. What are people who depart
their country to live somewhere else actually looking for? And what do they
find? Shot in memorable pictures, SAINKHO is a portrait of
singer Sainkho Namtchylak. Now a traveller in the cause of world music, she
left her homeland, the Republic of Tyva, in her twenties, studied music in
Moscow and has come to combine the Mongolian overtone music traditionally
reserved for the male of the species with elements of Lamaist song techniques
and jazz. This documentary from Erica von Moeller, a graduate of Cologne Academy
of Media Arts, is the record of an uprooted person as she unfolds herself
in her voice and as a performer. At the festival's closing ceremony, femme
totale will be presenting this inimitable artist in a solo concert.
AFGHANISTAN UNVEILED
"Afghanistan gets you like a bug" is how the Iranian-German filmmaker
and author Siba Shakib describes her love for the country and people that
have suffered so much war, destruction and misery over the last twenty years
("God Only Comes to Afghanistan to Weep"). Accordingly, femme totale
has combed the archives for pictures and impressions beyond the usual spectacular
news footage. Films, talks and discussions will illuminate the current situation
in Afghanistan and the attempts at reconstruction - in the media sector too.
AFGHANISTAN UNVEILED (2003) is the very first film made by
Afghani camerawomen. Who better to narrate the reality of life there than
Afghani women? Yet the programme is also a look at the Afghanistan before
the Taliban era and before the Russian occupation: demonstrations by Afghani
women; hippies in 1970s Kabul; women in responsible social positions; and,
even, fashion shows. In addition to other women filmmakers and experts, Nelofer
Pazira, who took the leading role in Mohsen Makmalbaf's JOURNEY TO KANDAHAR,
will be at the festival in person to show her own film RETURN TO KANDAHAR.
In addition to other women filmmakers and specialists, Siba Shakib will be
a festival guest.
Together with Katharina Franck, Ulrike Haage will be presenting live her radio
play GHOSTS OF THE CIVIL DEAD: WOMEN IN AFGHANISTAN in which
she weaves Afghani history with Pashtun women's poetry, hitherto unknown in
Germany.
see also: 
www.sanssoleil.de
BACK ON THE SILVER SCREEN AT LAST!
Since we offer a theme-based festival, femme totale shows works from the entire
history of film. This year is no exception and we will be screening treasures
either long-forgotten or banished to late-night TV. For example: The atmospherically
rich drama SCHORNSTEIN NR. 4 (Chimney N° 4) is the first
film that Romy Schneider made after her return from France
in 1966, brought her to our own Ruhr District. Between colliery pithead and
furnace taphole, she plays the part of Julia, a woman who gives away her illegitimate
child after birth. Years later, she is suddenly driven by the desire to bring
the child back to its natural family and, in doing so, ruins the lives of
the adoptive family and her marriage to Werner (Michel Piccoli).
Alan Dwan's wonderful tragicomedy ZAZA (1923) which gave
Gloria Swanson the opportunity to show the full gamut of her enormous talent.
A once in a lifetime opportunity: The Berlin born chanteuse Cora Frost
and her three-musician combo will be accompanying ZAZA live.
INDEPENDENT MINDED YOUNG WOMEN
In this section of the programme, the limelight is on exceptional German actresses
whose potential for further roles and success is obvious. This time round,
we have invited the Munich-born Jeanette Hain (DIE CELLISTIN /The Cellist;
DIE REISE NACH KAFIRISTAN / The Journey to Kafiristan) to Dortmund, presenting
DAS TRIO (The Trio, Dir: Hermine Huntgeburt). Following roles
in DIE CELLISTIN (The Cellist) and FRAU RETTICH, DIE CZERNY UND ICH (Mrs.
Rettich, Czerni and I), the Munich-born actress was currently seen in the
road movie DIE REISE NACH KAFIRISTAN (The Journey to Kafiristan).
ADVANCEMENT AWARD FOR PROMISING WOMEN CINEMATOGRAPHERS
For the second time since 2001, we will be using the Festival as a backdrop
to announce the winner of the CAMERA AWARD BY E-M-S NEW MEDIA INC.
for up-and-coming young camerawomen. This special prize, the only one of its
kind in Germany, comes with EUR5,000 and is awarded for a
graduation film and/or first or second work produced freelance. The aim of
the award in a branch where women are still extremely underrepresented is
to motivate young camerawomen in the job of their choice. This new biennial
prize is awarded by a special jury made up of international members. The jury
president is Sophie Maintigneux.
Deadline Camera Award:
February 14th 2003.
And finally, as always, it's the mix that counts. Visitors to the femme totale
film festival can expect epic cinema, the pick of films shown at recent international
festivals, movies that have not yet made it to the cinemas circuit in Germany
and, last but not least, important independent productions. femme totale will
follow its theme of NO PLACE LIKE HOME through all genres and all formats.
Not only that: there will be lectures, talks, parties, an exhibition and wide-ranging
discussions with numerous women directors from both Germany and abroad.
For further information, either call
Stefanie Görtz on +49 231 502 5480
or mail her at
goertz@femmetotale.de
Flyer pdf-download 
