14.07.2021

THE JFBB'S NEW DOCUMENTARY FILM COMPETITION

Strong personalities and significant topics

Eight works are competing for the freshly launched Gershon Klein Documentary Award at the 27th Jewish Film Festival Berlin and Brandenburg (JFBB), which opens in one month, on August 12, and runs until August 22 in Berlin and Potsdam. Six of the nominated documentaries will celebrate their German premieres at the JFBB, and with IRMI and SCHOCKEN two documentaries will even have their European premieres.

"The contributions to the documentary film competition each capture history and the present in their own unique way. They explore points of views and perspectives with all their nuances, sometimes subtly, sometimes contemplatively, sometimes also in a controversial way. For the filmmakers, their protagonists, this is sometimes painful, especially when seemingly simple truths are repeatedly called into question. Even when it comes to history and stories that are unfortunately suppressed again and again in new ways," says JFBB program director Bernd Buder. "All the films fascinate with their visual, dramaturgical and investigative creativity. They are cinematic reflections in the best sense, captivating their audiences and making them want to engage with the full complexity of the condition humaine."

JURY

The winner of the new Gershon Klein Documentary Award will be decided by a three-member jury consisting of American Lisa Rivo, co-director of the U.S.-based National Center for Jewish Film, Magda Makarczuk Strehlau from Poland, director of the Warsaw Jewish Film Festival and deputy director of the Los Angeles Jewish Film Festival, and Israeli film editor, dramaturge and screenwriter Amos Ponger (a.o. BIL'IN MY LOVE and FREE FLOW). The Gershon Klein Documentary Award, worth 3,000 euros, is sponsored by the Klein family, which commemorates the cinema legend Gershon (Gerhard) Klein, who died in 1999 at the age of 79.

The list of films can be fully accessed here.