students' platform

The film patient­ly enters a par­tic­u­lar and sacred space of ritual life in Ukrain­ian soci­ety. It fol­lows and silent­ly observes hun­dreds of people vis­it­ing the graves of their deceased rel­a­tives … read more

Two lives - before and after the return to Cameroon. Romeo is dis­ap­point­ed by Ger­many and wants to fly back home. Demian was deport­ed and has been trying to return … read more

DON’T COME HOME THIS YEAR is a short film about Roman­ian migrants return­ing home from Italy during the Covid-19 pan­dem­ic and get­ting stuck at the Aus­tri­an-Hun­gar­i­an border. The film is … read more

Markus was sex­u­al­ly abused sev­er­al times during his child­hood. Today, the 55-year-old is con­stant­ly on the road with his camper van and his dog “Picas­so” and is long­ing for an … read more

Mechthild, Volker, Chris­t­ian and Chris­tiane want fun above all. They are miss­ing humour in their fam­i­lies, spend hours on Face­book and can still add more sto­ries to 50 Shades of … read more

Thant Zin came to Yangon with his broth­er around three years ago. He may have been twelve years old at the time, but he can’t really remem­ber. After find­ing him … read more

This doc­u­men­tary invites us on a spe­cial jour­ney into the tac­i­turn uni­vers­es of autism. We dive deep into it as we get close to a group of teenagers living in … read more

Irshad migrat­ed with his son Zee­lain from Pak­istan to Por­tu­gal to enable him a better future. As Zee­lain has to write a paper for school about a hero, he choos­es … read more

The Viet­namese couple Bay and Tam have lived in Ger­many for 30 years. With little con­tact to others in the German soci­ety, the two work in empty offices as clean­ers. … read more

Ivan Komen­dan­tov is only 16 years old, but he is a ded­i­cat­ed com­mu­nist and sec­re­tary of ide­ol­o­gy at the com­mu­nist youth organ­i­sa­tion Kom­so­mol in Moscow. He wants to become an … read more

Alia Reslan and Lebanese film­mak­er and friend Sabah Jal­loul meet short­ly before Alia’s visit to her father’s wed­ding in Lebanon. Over pack­ing suit­cas­es, an infor­mal con­ver­sa­tion about coming out, new­found … read more

Some­where on the north­ern coast of Cuba, three chil­dren are swim­ming in the ocean, paint­ing seashells and are amused by a sea slug. As they roam through the city, a … read more

A father is peel­ing an orange, a daugh­ter and mother are sleep­ing in a ham­mock, and a big river is flow­ing by: these are a few snip­pets that immerse us … read more

It starts with sand, the basics of glass and con­crete, and unfolds into a med­i­ta­tion on urban infra­struc­ture, build­ings and sur­faces. Sur­re­al and sen­so­ry images are con­fronting us with a … read more

All over Europe, refugees are being housed in almost aban­doned vil­lages; this is cheap and is intend­ed to coun­ter­act the rural exodus. But how to feel home in a place that others want to leave? TERRA INCOGNITA is part of anthro­pol­o­gist Shirley van der Maarel’s artis­tic research project in the remote Valle di Comino. We meet var­i­ous inhab­i­tants, chil­dren and adults, from Asia and Africa, and also the locals of Valle di Comino, who alto­geth­er, with their multi-facetted back­grounds, gen­er­ate a new life in this half-empty place. TERRA INCOGNITA is more than a doc­u­men­tary, it´s a glimpse into an absurd reality.

Direc­tor, script, cin­e­matog­ra­phy: Shirley van der Maarel
Sound design: Olivi­er Terpstra
Con­tact: hello@shirleyvandermaarel.com
Research project: www.land-unknown.eu

In 2016, Russ­ian Pres­i­dent Vladimir Putin cre­at­ed the nation­al guards, whose legal task is to ensure public order, the fight against ter­ror­ism and extrem­ism. In fact, this organ­i­sa­tion is per­son­al­ly … read more