Experimental films
26 films
Aferrado
dir. Esteban Azuela
anim2024
Joel roams the city on a motorbike like a character from the 1980s action film. All he wanted to do was to fix cars, but additionally, he cleans up the mess left by his bosses. The animation, pulsating with disco rhythms and set in a glitchy reality, shows a disintegrating man in a violent world.
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The next screenings
Ardent Other (Le Mal des Ardents)
dir. Alice Brygo
dok2022
A stunned crowd faces a fire. The threat has no name, a diffuse anguish spreads. Fear needs to be conjured, fire must be turned into a sign.
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As Long As They Don't Find Us (Żeby tylko nas nie znaleźli)
dir. Maja Górczak
dok2025
A film tribute to one of the first women to study directing at the Łódź Film School, Stefania Świeca. She left behind only one film – a poignant film study in which she tried to tackle the trauma of the Holocaust. What happened with her later on?
Read moreBloodline
dir. Wojciech Węglarz
dok2024
The story of a bison, separated from its herd by the wall on the Polish-Belarusian border, which unintentionally becomes a witness to the dramatic events taking place on both sides. The drama of the animal symbolically resonates with the drama of the people separated from their loved ones.
Read moreAwards:Golden Hobby-Horse
Casting
dir. Rafał Łysak
dok2024
‘I’m looking for a person who wants a film to be made about them,’ – said the casting notice for a documentary. Director Rafał Łysak explores the motivation of people who want their stories to be filmed. What is the reason for their desire to appear in front of the camera?
Read moreChild of their Time (Kind van de Tijd)
dir. Huibert van Wijk
dok2024
In the 1970s, many Dutch families adopted children from Indonesia. Tim is one of them, but despite good intentions, something went wrong. Today, the protagonist resents his adoptive father for taking him to Europe. We witness a family psychodrama, which is recorded by Tim’s brother, the director of this film.
Read moreDear Leo Sokolosky (Drogi Leo Sokolosky)
dir. Weronika Szyma
anim2024
A young girl writes a letter to Leo Sokolosky, a man who was in the Ansbach labour camp together with her great-grandfather. In the film, the past is mixed with the present and animated images are juxtaposed with photographs from the family archives creating a record of an intimate conversation, no longer with the addressee of the letter but with her great-grandfather.
Read moreDom / Home
dir. Aleksandra Powalacz, Julia Powalacz
dok2025
What can you hear in the mountains? Does silence sound the same in the Tatras and in Antarctica? In this poetic tale, stimulating the senses, about journeys to the furthest corners of the globe and journeys into oneself, the guides include, among others, outstanding Polish mountaineers, such as Andrzej Bargiel, Kinga Baranowska and Anna Tybor, and traveller Marek Kaminski.
Read moreDo Painters Die Elsewhere (Dokąd umierają malarze)
dir. Michał Pietrak
dok2025
For Bolesław Gasiński, life and art have been inextricably interwoven. He left behind not only paintings but also abundant audio and video materials. They constitute the main fabric of this documentary, making a visually sophisticated portrait of an outsider.
Read moreD is for Distance
dir. Christopher Petit, Emma Matthews
dok2025
What do memory loss, William S. Burroughs, post-war CIA espionage operations and today’s struggles with a heartless healthcare system have in common? All of them come together in a creative and deeply personal essay. Following Louis, who suffers from epilepsy, we embark on a journey into the world full of paradoxes and emotions.
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Heartbeat
dir. Jay Rosenblatt, Stephanie Rapp
dok2025
Jay Rosenblatt, a master of avant-garde cinema with two Oscar nominations, once again turns the camera on himself. The footage shot 25 years ago is a raw record of a couple’s dialogue as they experience the crisis of upcoming parenthood.
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Life and Other Problems (Livet og andre problemer)
dir. Max Kestner
dok2024
In 2014, the Copenhagen Zoo authorities decided that a giraffe named Marius should be euthanised. The decision provoked an avalanche of global public reaction. With reference to this story, Max Kestner questions popular beliefs about the essence of life, consciousness, and the alleged uniqueness of the human species.
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Mama Micra
dir. Rebecca Blöcher
dok2024
Before she got married, the director’s mother had lived an unconventional life on the road. After returning to Germany and starting a family, she set off again. For 10 years she lived in her car, which meant she hardly ever saw her daughter. Freedom was everything to her, but it came at a high price.
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Monk in Pieces
dir. Billy Shebar, David C Roberts
dok
She is an absolute artist whose vocal and performance work has never lent itself to easy classification. Meredith Monk’s music is said to come from another planet. The film is a collage of her extraordinary activities and personal reflections when confronted with the past and the inevitable passing of time.
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Nice Girls Don't Ask
dir. Jan Krawitz
dok2025
The 1950s in America were the time when schools were flooded with educational films aiming to shape exemplary female behaviour. This story, composed of excerpts from such films, is not only a look at the past ideals of femininity but also a bitter reflection on their contemporary echoes.
Read moreNotes from Sheepland
dir. Cara Holmes
dok2023
The film’s protagonist combines, with some difficulty, her artistic career with sheep farming she took up when she inherited the family farm. She is a committed breeder that proudly wears lipstick but juxtaposes it with the work overalls in which she takes her animals to graze in the field. She eludes the gender stereotypes that have been attributed to Irish women over the years.
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Pacific Vein
dir. Ulu Braun
anim2024
"Pacific Vein" takes us through a painterly panorama of the US West. Assange stands between imperial, Roman fake buildings as a soda maker and ponders the digitalization of our world. Around him, hippies, artists, and homeless people search for meaning while surveillance cameras capture their messages. Media and fiction merge hypnotically with doc-footage. The empire is diligent and nervous, the American Dream glitched into a ghostly autosuggestion. Where is the enemy, who has the image rights?
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Paleontology Lesson
dir. Sergei Loznitsa
dok2025
More than a year after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the war is still going on in the streets, but at Kyiv’s Museum of Natural History children can forget about it for a while. Under Sergei Loznitsa’s watchful eye, they are transported to the world from millions of years ago – free from the reality of war.
Read moreReenactment (Rekonstrukcja)
dir. Marcin Strauchold
fab2025
Anka ends up at a historical re-enactment camp because of her boyfriend. She tries to find her own place in the community, however, it turns out that historical prejudice against women is surprisingly valid. The participants with dedication perform roles from the past, but at the same time, there is a contemporary social game going on between them.
Read moreSurfing Einstein
dir. Meritxell Campos Olivé
dok2024
One hundred years divide Albert Einstein’s prediction of the existence of gravitational waves and the experimental confirmation of these wrinkles of space-time. Scientists from research teams, together with Meritxell Campos Olivé, a director and choreographer, use dance to communicate frustrations and delights as well as failures and successes related to research work.
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The Exploding Girl (La Fille qui explose)
dir. Caroline Poggi, Jonathan Vinel
anim2024
For the past three months, Candice has been exploding every day. Sometimes even 2 or 3 times a day. Her record is seven times. She currently has 192 explosions.
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The Granny & Fishes (Poorzal)
dir. Maria Mavati, Ehsan Farokhi Fard, Ehsan Farokhifard
dok2024
An elderly woman lives in a desolate area ravaged by droughts near Lake Hamun in Iran. She is the only inhabitant of one of the villages evacuated due to the lack of water. Every day, she walks on the sun-cracked ground, collects dried fish and waits for life to return to the area.
Read moreThe Propagandist (De propagandist)
dir. Luuk Bouwman
dok2024
Why did Jan Teunissen, a distinguished Dutch filmmaker, become the ‘tsar of Nazi propaganda’ during World War II? Composed exclusively of archival footage, including many materials unknown so far, the film tells a story of the man who, ‘for the love of cinema’, began collaborating with the occupier.
Read moreAwards:Special Mention
Trains (Pociągi)
dir. Maciej J. Drygas
dok2024
Can a train serve as a metaphor for human destiny? The documentary by Maciej J. Drygas is a historical railway journey through 20th-century Europe composed exclusively of the footage found in archives around the world.
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Whose Woods Are These
dir. Kate Nartker
anim2024
Stepping barefoot on the grass, picking berries and, as dusk approaches, listening to the hooting of an owl and the steps of a wolf – the viewer gets to know a woman who went into the forest but never came back from it. Inspired by the true story of a missing great-grandmother, the film is a poetic tale based on scraps of memory, complemented by imagination.
Read moreWorld at Stake
dir. Susanna Flock, Adrian Jonas Haim, Jona Kleinlein
anim2025
Employing the style of popular video games, such as FIFA, PGA Tour and Dirt Rally, this animation tackles issues that go far beyond sports arenas. Each of the protagonists struggles not only with their rivals but also emotions, expectations and spectators, who constantly judge the players. Is this game about scoring points only?
Read moreAwards:Special Award
