Jobst Knigge

United States, September 1st, 2016. American football player Colin Kaepernick kneels during the national anthem, protesting police brutality against black people. Part of the population regards the gesture as an unacceptable affront to the flag. Later, he loses his place on his team. Today, however, he is considered by many as a true hero.

A documentary that offers an intimate portrait of Guido Westerwelle, Germany’s former Vice-Chancellor, balancing his political career with his groundbreaking role as a gay pioneer. Released for the 10th anniversary of his death, the film explores the sharp contrast between his polarizing public persona and his private vulnerability. The narrative anchor consists of never-before-heard audio recordings from 2014, captured in Mallorca by journalist Dominik Wichmann as Westerwelle battled acute leukemia. The movie weaves these raw archives with emotional interviews from his husband, Michael Mronz, and key political rivals. It charts his rise within the FDP, his historic 2004 public coming out, and his legacy as Germany’s first openly gay cabinet minister. The plot highlights the unique diplomatic challenges he faced visiting nations hostile to LGBTQ+ rights, his sudden fall from political grace, and his final fight against cancer alongside Mronz.

It’s a tradition. On the last day of the Frankfurt Book Fair—the world’s largest book fair—the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade is awarded. This anniversary year’s Peace Prize laureate is Salman Rushdie, an author who, like few others, embodies both the power of literature and the fury of its critics. Books stand for freedom of speech—a freedom that is repeatedly threatened around the world. This documentary embarks on a wild journey through time. It explores the new beginning after World War II, literature as a catalyst for democracy, and the interplay of intellect and commerce, as well as successes and scandals. It explores the remarkable role of émigrés after 1945, the protests of the 1960s, bestseller marketing and colonial misdeeds, calls for murder and boycotts, East and West, host countries that inspire and others that terrify.

In 2016, an album containing 250 previously unseen photos of Nazi officials was discovered in the USA by Stephan Hördler, a prominent Holocaust historian, who immediately understood the album's inestimable value. The album brings together photographs of a "group of friends," all from the same region of Germany, all of whom became SS men. From 1928 to 1943, the photo album allows us to follow their journey. Hördler conducted the investigation, comparing the photos in the album with other, better-known ones, the faces of these men with those of concentration camp officials, and ultimately revealed that it was at Lichtencburg that these young men were trained, a "school" for future camp executioners, and the bonds of camaraderie and informal network that would allow them to help each other, even after the war.

With the final shift at the Prosper Haniel coal mine in Bottrop in December, an era comes to an end: the age of Western European coal mining. *DIE STEINKOHLE* brings to life the challenges people have had to overcome over the past 250 years in extracting “black gold.” And it shows, in a moving and surprising way, how German and European history are reflected in coal mining.

With the final shift at the Prosper Haniel coal mine in Bottrop in December, an era comes to an end: the age of Western European coal mining. *DIE STEINKOHLE* brings to life the challenges people have had to overcome over the past 250 years in extracting “black gold.” And it shows, in an emotional and surprising way, how German and European history are reflected in coal mining.

This is the story of death and survival, exclusion and hope told by those who lived through it. 40 years ago an HIV infection seemed like a death sentence.

Udo Kier was a demon, Frankenstein, murderer, lover and six times Adolf Hitler. He has starred in art films, indie classics and blockbusters. Cult directors, superstars and audiences worldwide have fallen for the Cologne native's aura and have given him an incredible career - in Europe and in Hollywood. Now the atypical international star turns 80.