17. Feb

Imitation of Life

Sat, February 17th 2024 – 8:00 p.m. Hackesche Köfe Kino

Films:

SLOW SHIFT

CAMPING DU LAC

HORSE GIRL

Debate

A debate about films that feel like real life, only better: Between myth, experiment, and everyday life, we trace images that seem watertight and explore the question of whether films can be smarter than their makers.

Guests include: Shambhavi Kaul, Éléonore Saintagnan, Khaled Abdulwahed, Tomás Guarnaccia, Natalia del Mar Kašik

[All Guests]

[Tickets]

SLOW SHIFT

D: Shambhavi Kaul, IND/USA 2023, 9 min., without dialogue – EP

In the works of Shambhavi Kaul real landscapes are frequently transformed into otherworldly vistas. Her new film depicts the former seat of the Vijayanagara Empire in the fourteenth century, the medieval city Hampi in Southern India, which today is a World Heritage Site that attracts tourists from across the globe. In SLOW SHIFT, Kaul crafts a ghostly travelogue of the site, unearthing its historical, mythical, geological, ecological and cultural layers. Stately stone monuments, precariously balanced stone clusters and an army of primates taking over the eerily depopulated ruins: The film forges a timeless space beyond humans, reminding us that even the mightiest empires will eventually turn to rubble.

CAMPING DU LAC

D: Éléonore Saintagnan, C: Éléonore Saintagnan, Rosemary Standley, Wayne Standley, Anna Turluc’h, Jean-Benoît Ugeux, DOP: Michaël Capron, BEL/FRA 2023 , 69 min., French Original with English Subtitles

Éléonore’s car breaks down and she ends up stranded on a campsite by a lake. What first appears to be a mishap turns out to be an opportunity: The deeply relaxed life with the people who have settled there opens up unexpected perspectives for the city dweller – on her life and on the world. She begins to record birdsong and hears what is going on behind the walls of the bungalows. Then legends that lay hidden deep beneath the surface of the water come to light. The director herself walks through her own playful film as the heroine, always surrounded by a group of amateur actors whose stories take center stage in a subtle comedy about philosophy, myths, and the magic of the market economy. In her film, cinema becomes not the only question of faith!

HORSE GIRL

D: Natalia del Mar Kašik, AUT 2023, 4 min., without dialogue – WP

The relationship between girls and horses is not without clichés, but there is a special meaning in “playing horse”. Observing and empathizing with an animal body is something that can often be observed in children. Imitation and practicing animal movements take on a new dimension here. Who is copying whom? With joyful, playful exuberance and elegant ease, the horse-girl becomes a human-horse. In HORSE GIRL, Natalia del Mar Kašik follows the movements with a 16 mm camera until the perfect embodiment itself becomes a gesture of devotion. “Don’t dream it, be it!”