GERMAN CURRENTS 2018 The latest showcase of German cinema brought a wealth of award-winning and cutting-edge movies to Hollywood By Petra Schurmann Consul General Stefan Schneider and Film Festival Director Lien Heidenreich-Seleme Emily Atef and Thomas Kiennast
The annual film festival GERMAN CURRENTS at the legendary Egyptian Theater in Hollywood has always been one of the highlights each fall for the German-American community and for fans of European cinema alike. This year’s edition presented by the Goethe-Institut L.A. in cooperation with its long-time partners American Cinemateque and Friends of Goethe as well as ARRI and media partner Deutsche Welle, offered an especially diverse and well-balanced selection of award-wining German movies. This is certainly in a large part thanks to the new Festival Director Lien Heidenreich-Seleme who has been also at the helm of the Goethe-Institut since March 2018.
Sylvia Viljoen and Tobias Wuerkert, DW-TV, came all the way from Bonn
Thure Riefenstein and Patrica Lueger
While her predecessor Fareed Majari often chose a veritable audience shocker for the Opening Night, Heidenreich-Seleme opted for the quirky road movie “Magical Mystery or The Return of Karl Schmidt” which brought memories of danced through techno-raves of the 90ies back to the mind. With excellent acting by male lead Charly Huebner and female lead Annika Meier, who had come to L.A. to represent this tragicomedy directed by Arne Feldhusen, this was an entertaining kick off of the festival.
Daniel Chaffey with festival guest
The opening night movie was followed by a party at the Egyptian Theater’s unique courtyard where guests enjoyed Warsteiner beer, Underberg and Asbach Uralt Brandy while noshing on yummy German specialties created by the restaurant Julie’s Alps in Thousand Oaks. The festival continued on Saturday with a showcase of German short films and three feature movies, among them a real shocker, “Blue My Mind,” the directorial debut by Swiss writer-director Lisa Brühlmann (Winner of three Swiss Film Awards), and director Thomas Stuber‘s acclaimed “In the Aisles” (Best Actor German Film Awards), as well as
The Film Festval Team Daniel Chaffey, Lien Heidenreich, Simone Meier, Desiree Hostettler, Gwen Deglise (American Cinemateque), and Stefan Kloo (f.l.t.r.) with Annika Meier (2nd f.l.) on Opening Night.
16 | HEIMAT abroad | FALL 2018
