Such a Resounding Silence(2023)

The events and coincidences that led to rapid advances in human intelligence 50,000 years ago.

In Bettina Büttner’s exquisitely lucid documentary Kinder (Kids), childhood dysfunction, loneliness, and pent-up emotion run wild at an all-boys group home in southern Germany. The children interned here include ten-year-olds Marvin and Tommy. Marvin, fiddling with a mini plastic Lego sword, explains matter-of-factly to the camera, “This is a knife. You use it to cut stomachs open.” Dennis, who is even younger, is seen in a hysteric fit, mimicking some pornographic scene. Boys will be boys, but innocence is disproportionately spare here. Choosing not to dwell on the harsh specifics, Büttner reveals the disconcerting manner in which traumatic episodes can manifest themselves in the mundane — a game of Lego, Hide and Seek, or Truth or Dare. Filmed in lapidary black-and-white, Büttner’s fascinating film sheds light on childhood from the boys’ characteristically disadvantaged perspective — one not yet fully cognizant — leaving much ethically to ponder over.

In an increasingly oppressive modern age, the characters of this film are subject to the alienation and meanness that characterizes today’s days.

In today's climate debate, there is only one factor that cannot be calculated in climate models - humans. How can we nevertheless understand our role in the climate system and manage the crisis? Climate change is a complex global problem. Increasingly extreme weather events, rising sea levels, and more difficult living conditions - including for us humans - are already the order of the day. Global society has never faced such a complex challenge. For young people in particular, the frightening climate scenarios will be a reality in the future. For the global south, it is already today. To overcome this crisis, different perspectives are needed. "THE UNPREDICTABLE FACTOR" goes back to the origins of the German environmental movement, accompanies today's activists in the Rhineland in their fight against the coal industry and gives a voice to scientists from climate research, ethnology and psychology.

The ideal of youth is at the centre of this eloquent film, mixing documentary and fiction, art and experimentation. Demonstrating both formal and narrative freedom, Bélanger weaves a deliberately loose weave in which the initiatory journey of two young people, wandering through Montreal in search of a job, unfolds. But not just any job. The two idealists want a job that will satisfy their desire for freedom, peace and respect. Of course, even though the breath of renewal from Expo 67 still floats here and there, the world they encounter does not correspond - by far - to their aspirations. Strangers in this country that tells them nothing, they come across brutally, materialism, violence, and egocentrism.

Since nurseries were opened up to the private sector in the early 2000s, early childhood has become a lucrative business for its voracious players. As scandals involving abuse and embezzlement of public funds multiply, we investigate the excesses of deregulation, which has turned babies into cash machines.

An Oscar nominated documentary about a middle-class American family who is torn apart when the father Arnold and son Jesse are accused of sexually abusing numerous children. Director Jarecki interviews people from different sides of this tragic story and raises the question of whether they were rightfully tried when they claim they were innocent and there was never any evidence against them.

Amanda Montejo is a trans woman, make up artist, Guadalupana and a witch. This documentary portrait explores different facets of her spirituality and fragments of her past, revealing the duality of her being.

Since the renewed Intifada began in 2000, there have been over 75 Palestinian suicide bombings. This is the story of 0ne-the bombing of bus 32 in Jerusalem in June 2002. The film connects the stories of a group of ordinary Israelis-Jews and Arabs. Each of them holds a clue to someone who died that day.