Film Editorial Team

The work in the film editorial office continued in this project 2022. Lisa Voelter took the lead, as in the past two years – this time together with Narges Kalhor, who supports the group for the first time. With their 5 participants, their goal was to try producing strong, impactful short films – which are extremely present on social networks in particular.

Social media is a tool with which anyone can become politically active directly and without much effort. This year, the focus was on the form and content of film as a visual medium – and on its impact. The students and volunteers looked at how to deal with certain issues on TikTok and Instagram, how the world today uses hashtags to spread certain messages, and how they can use them as filmmakers. 

Therefore, the Film Editorial Team met in Freiburg during two weekends in november. After getting to know each other the participants learned about the different forms of documentary film, such as the essay and experimental film, and their differences as well as similarities. 

Together they came up with film ideas on the topics of racism and populism and presented them to each other in the group. Filming options were discussed for the realization of the short films, and in the end, 5 special short films were created, each of which presents a story with a new aesthetic and form. The group followed a documentary – experimental approach.

Instructors

Lisa Voelter is an Austrian-German film maker. She works as a camerawoman, editor and film director.

Narges (*1984 in Tehran, Iran) is an Iranian film director, video artist and editor living in Germany. From 2010 to 2019 she studied film directing at the University of Television and Film in Munich in the department of Documentary Film and Television Journalism. Since then, she has made several short films and documentaries, for which Narges was also awarded a prize.

The Film Editorial Team of 2021

Once again this year, camerawoman Lisa Voelter and journalist Margitta Freund are in charge of the film editorial team – and this time they can even work all together in one room! The result: three short films produced by the participants.

Each group agrees on one term that describes (everyday)racism:

White saviourism. A “syndrome” that people from rich industrialised countries develop when they help poor people to boost their egos.

Cultural appropriation. Blues and rap suddenly make real money. But the winners are not Black people who brought this music into the world but white people, like Elvis Presley. Another example for the phenomenon of cultural appropriation: Western pharmaceutical companies patent old, traditional remedies of a culture.

Microaggression: Recurring small remarks, questions, insinuations that make clear: You don’t belong here.

The videos show what it means to take the courage to experiment, improvise and explore the tools of satire. Each group is working differently: one group is having a script which, image by image and sentence by sentence, explains what happens next. Another group is improvising in front of the camera. Others are discovering unexpected forms of expression in the process of editing, resulting in three short, minimalist, poetic and engaging videos.

Last year: Film-making via Zoom

Creating videos together with participants spread all over Europe – France, Germany and even Finland. This was the challenge we had to face last year. Instead of having each participant shooting a video clip with his or her cell phone at home and compiling the clips afterwards, we invented the genre of the “ZOOM film”. The students worked in groups of two to five and shot their videos directly on a Zoom compatible device. Subsequently, they would videoconference with their groups editing the films together. This is how long-distance collaboration was made possible.

One script, one text and many drawings: There was also an anti-racist animated film. The participants could give free rein to their imagination. The result was the production of three very different films with an educational impetus and a strong statement “against racism and populism”. This was only possible thanks to the great commitment of the students, who put a lot of work into the project beyond the workshop time.

Translation Christina Braun