IFFMH goes BUGA

As part of the Bundesgartenschau 2023, we will be presenting a unique open-air cinema programme on the Parkschale open-air stage every evening from 9:30 pm from 29 May to 3 June.

For six days, after sunset at 9:30 p.m., a wide variety of films on the BUGA's main themes of environment, climate, energy and food security can be seen in an idyllic atmosphere. In addition to cult classics with powerful images and sound such as the opening film 'Koyaanisqatsi' (Berlinale 1983) and the six-time Oscar winner 'Mad Max: Fury Road', the selection also includes powerful documentaries such as Andrea Arnold's 'Cow' (IFFMH 2021) and the multiple award-winning 'Leviathan' (Locarno 2012). The four-time Oscar-nominated 'Beasts of the Southern Wild' is a postmodern independent feel-good tale and the exclusive closing film 'Captain Volkonogov Escaped' is a radical and hilarious reckoning with Russian history.

• No extra ticket needs to be purchased.
• All holders of a BUGA day ticket for the day in question or a BUGA season ticket can visit the open-air cinema free of charge.

Koyaanisqatsi

Godfrey Reggio's epochal work from 1982 is a visually stunning vision of a world out of balance. Set to a hypnotic score by Philip Glass, 'Koyaanisqatsi' spans the vastness of the Grand Canyon to the hustle and bustle of the modern city, exploring the fate of all humanity in a wordless flow of images. Sweeping, oppressive and of tragic beauty.

Language version: Original version, without dialogue
Monday / 29.5.

Beasts of the Southern Wild

The world of 6-year-old Hushpuppy is shaken by two catastrophes at once: Her father is terminally ill and her village on the Louisiana coast threatens to sink under the onslaught of floodwaters. Benh Zeitlin's acclaimed Southern fairy tale combines visions of doom with joyful exuberance and at the same time paints a portrait of a community unprotected by the force of an uncontrollable nature. All this is carried by the unmistakable voice of the young main character: vulnerable, courageous and full of undaunted curiosity.

Language version: Original with German subtitles
Tuesday / 30.5.

Cow

Empathic and straightforwardly poetic: Andrea Arnold follows the life of a dairy cow in her first documentary film.

Music comes from somewhere, perhaps from a radio. The Pogues are singing "Fairytale of New York". The sound flows next to the clatter of the metal gates, accompanied by the snorting of the cows. In the barn, they go about their daily lives like workers in a factory: eating and being milked, being mated and calving - everything has a purpose here. People only appear on the periphery, they are part of the machinery.

Filmmaker Andrea Arnold accompanied one of the cows over several years: Luma. The camera always stays close to the animal and literally at eye level. During the rare outing in a pasture, but also during the wistful mooing when a calf is taken away from her shortly after birth. Arnold has taken the time to get to know her as a personality and creates empathy for what it means to be a dairy cow without raising a finger.

Language version: Original version, without dialogue
Wednesday / 31.5.

Leviathan

Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Véréna Paravel's documentaries are all dedicated to a common endeavour: to expose the sensual texture behind abstract contexts. In 'Leviathan', the directing duo delves into the world of industrial fishing and gathers impressions of monstrous intensity: the crashing of the waves, the mechanics of the steel winches and, above all, the living mass of marine animals that are sorted, processed and prepared for human consumption.

Language version: Original with German subtitles
Thursday / 1.6.

Mad Max: Fury Road

The fourth part of the 'Mad Max' series is a milestone of action cinema: a permanently rolling forward motion, a symphony of explosions, crashing cars and wild sandstorms. Tom Hardy as Mad Max and Charlize Theron as Imperator Furiosa rush through a post-apocalyptic desert landscape in a rusty tanker, pursued by the motorised horde of clan leader Immortan Joe. In this insanity-driven hell ride, director George Miller also creates a grotesque vision of the future: even after the fall of civilisation, man still craves the last drop of petrol and uses the power of machines only to become a full-blown predator.

Language version: Original with German subtitles
Friday / 2.6.

Captain Volkonogov Escaped

Premiering in competition at the Venice Film Festival in autumn 2021, 'Captain Volkonogov Escaped' is one of the last great Russian films before the Ukraine war. The directing duo Natasha Merkulova and Aleksey Chupov use Saint Petersburg 1938 as a projection screen for their regime-critical analysis of the political self-image of the Soviet Union and its successors.

Fyodor Volkonogov (Yuriy Borisov, Compartment No. 6) is captain of the national security service and thus a ruthless enforcer of the large-scale "purges". When his own team is suddenly interrogated, he takes to his heels. In the middle of the escape he has a vision: Volkonogov is certain of hell. Unless a survivor of his victims forgives him. Time is running against Volkonogov, because his own colleagues are hot on his heels. A mad odyssey begins in the hope of redemption.

Celebrated at numerous festivals around the world and shown for the second time ever in Germany as part of IFFMH goes BUGA!

Language version: Original with English subtitles
Saturday / 3.6.

Site plan BUGA grounds

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