the future in today

Some days, the black kites lit­er­al­ly drop from the sky—the air pol­lu­tion in Delhi, India, can be so intense that flocks of the birds fall to earth. If they’re lucky, … read more

The vil­lage of Shol­o­gon is locat­ed in the taiga in north­east­ern Siberia. An extreme heat wave ignit­ed fierce forest fires in the remote region two years ago. At first, res­i­dents … read more

This short film explores the entan­gle­ments of smoke and pixels, trees and humans, loss and recov­ery. When the film­mak­er dives into a burnt forest in Oregon, U.S.A., memory and place … read more

Toly­at­ti is the Russ­ian Detroit. Toly­at­ti used to be con­sid­ered the center of the Soviet auto­mo­tive indus­try, with full employ­ment for all and modest pros­per­i­ty. But today, the almost-metrop­o­lis lags … read more

Nestor, Aaron and Ben­jamin are Rafiki’s clos­est friends. They are all study­ing eco­nom­ics at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Bangui. But Rafiki wants to make films and starts doc­u­ment­ing their lives with his camera. After lec­tures, they hang out in front of the uni­ver­si­ty or in their stu­dent accom­mo­da­tion and exchange ideas: about the future of their Cen­tral African Repub­lic home­land, but also about things that imme­di­ate­ly pre­oc­cu­py them in their lives, such as dating and work. They ask them­selves how things are sup­posed to con­tin­ue. As young people with access to edu­ca­tion, they see them­selves as the ones who will shape the coun­try in the coming decades. But how can you manage to reshape a system when so much of your energy goes into your own needs and sur­vival? In his fea­ture-length debut, direc­tor Rafiki Far­i­ala takes us into the circle of his friends, pro­vid­ing an imme­di­ate, poetic and at the same time undis­guised look at the real­i­ty of mil­len­ni­als in Bangui. (Berli­nale) 

Rafiki Far­i­ala, born in 1997 in Uvira, Congo, grew up in the Cen­tral African Repub­lic. In 2013 he pub­lished the piece WHY WAR, which made him known as a musi­cian. In 2017, he par­tic­i­pat­ed in the doc­u­men­tary work­shop of Ate­liers Varan in Bangui and real­ized his first short film Mbi na mo (You and Me) in this framework.

*12.05. on-site, 20.05. via Zoom