Peter Simonischek

Insults, humiliation, violence, sexual assault - the world behind the camera and the scenes can be a nightmare for many theater and film professionals. Apparently there is a real climate of fear in some film and theater productions. Some directors, but also well-known actors, apparently abuse their power and treat those around them on set or on stage with contempt or even abuse. Individual cases have been known for years, including under #metoo. But are they really isolated cases? Or can directors and actors allow themselves anything because the system allows it? In their three-year research, the documentary filmmakers spoke to more than 200 film and theater professionals about the problems in their industry. How much responsibility do the alleged perpetrators bear for abuse of power and how much responsibility does the financiers, production companies, broadcasters and also the audience bear?

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The close friendship between Arthur and Felix is put to the test when one lends the other his health insurance card. Arthur finds out that Felix is terminally ill, but Felix doesn't know it yet. However, because he doesn't have the courage to break the bad news and bitter truth to his friend, he soon becomes entangled in a web of lies and suddenly the tables are turned: Felix, who is actually terminally ill, believes that the healthy Arthur is actually going to die soon. He selflessly agrees to care for Arthur and give him a good time in the supposedly last days of his life. This actually gives Arthur a new perspective on life and Felix also starts to change: He manages to open his heart and learns to love bit by bit.

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Berlin at the end of the 19th Century. Alexander Hoffmann is an ambitious PhD student of Ethnology. When a delegation of the Herero and Nama tribes travels to Berlin during a ‘Colonial Exhibition’, he takes a special interest in their young female translator Kezia Kambazembi as subject for his studies.

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Kurt (Til Schweiger) and Lena (Franziska Machens) move together into an old house outside the city that is in need of renovation in order to be closer to Kurt's six-year-old son, little Kurt (Levi Wolter), and ex-wife Jana (Jasmin Gerat). But before their patchwork family happiness can really begin, little Kurt is killed in an accident - leaving behind three adults who don't know how to live with this tragic loss.

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Professor Albus Dumbledore knows the powerful, dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald is moving to seize control of the wizarding world. Unable to stop him alone, he entrusts magizoologist Newt Scamander to lead an intrepid team of wizards and witches. They soon encounter an array of old and new beasts as they clash with Grindelwald's growing legion of followers.

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Klaus Kranitz considers "normal" couples therapy to be nothing more than expensive separation counseling. His do-it-yourself approach promises quick results. Whatever the form, or you'll get your money back.

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Charlotte Kler has enjoyed a privileged life alongside her husband, star conductor Walter Kler, but has also jetted restlessly around the world with him. She is delighted that this is now to come to an end and the family will be reunited in Munich. But things turn out differently than she thinks: her husband secretly makes plans to take a job in New York, her daughter reproaches her and her granddaughter is not interested in her. Not a good start for Charlotte. But a chance acquaintance with a former lifeguard brings her back to what really matters in life.

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The plot of Die Fledermaus is woven around a ball given by Prince Orlofsky.

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When world-famous conductor Eduard Sporck accepts the job to create an Israeli-Palestinian youth orchestra, he is quickly drawn into a tempest of sheer unsolvable problems.

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Everything must change, thought Hermann Hesse. In the spring of 1919, he packed his bags and left for Ticino. The horror of the First World War had thrown him off course. The poet hoped that the climate and light of the south would give him a new lease on life and creative energy beyond the confines of bourgeois conventions. With the story Klingsors letzter Sommer (Klingsor’s Last Summer), Hesse wrote himself into a summer-long intoxication that was unprecedented for him. At the precipice, however, doom and death await.

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This documentary tells the story of the creation and cultural impact of the world's most famous Christmas carol, composed in 1818 in Salzburg, Austria, and since then translated into about 140 languages.

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Barents Sea, August 12th, 2000. During a Russian naval exercise, and after suffering a serious accident, the K-141 Kursk submarine sinks with 118 crew members on board. While the few sailors who are still alive barely manage to survive, their families push for accurate information and a British officer struggles to obtain from the Russian government a permit to attempt a rescue before it is late. But general incompetence are against all their efforts.

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80-year-old Ali Ungar comes across a book by a former SS officer describing his wartime activities in Slovakia. He realises his parents were executed by him. He sets out to take revenge but finds instead his 70-year-old son, Georg, a retired teacher. Georg, who had avoided his father all his life, decides to find out more about him and offers Ali to be his interpreter.

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Ricky spent years behind bars after taking the rap for his brother Rafael and his buddy Latif after a failed robbery. Now, Latif wants to express gratitude by letting Ricky in on a coup that will bring lots of money. After some hesitation, Ricky agrees, and gets his brother Rafael on board. Everything runs smoothly, until police officer Diana turns up on the scene. A nerve-wracking cat and mouse game is set in motion. Director Özgür Yildirim’s most recent film offers insight into Frankfurt’s gangster world. As before in CHIKO – which also starred Moritz Bleibtreu – he portrays the daily life of the criminal underground scene in a large German city.

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A soap-operatic mini-series about the history of Hotel Sacher in Vienna. It starts with the takeover by Anna Sacher after her husband Eduard dies at age 59. Most of the time, someone high or low in society seems to be kissing (or more) in one of the chambres séparées.

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There are few places on earth that have such a diverse variety of terrain and range of climates concentrated in a relatively small area - temperate coastline, scorching arid deserts and tundra, tropical rainforests and frozen snowcapped mountains. And there are few places that are as heavily exploited by humans, yet remain a wilderness.

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Mimi has her hands full. Her son Felix is hyperactive, her ex-husband Johnny is a mess, her father is a chronic gambler. Then Felix signs her up for a Swiss casting show, because Mimi wanted to be a musician originally. So Mimi decides to head for Switzerland, since it could pay all their debts. But then the whole family wants to come...

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In the 1980s, the Italian Salvatore ends up in a small village in the Alps. Salvatore tells the villagers that he is going on vacation for two weeks. During this time, he befriends the widow Frieda, who is still mourning her husband, who never returned from the war. Salvatore also comforts 40-year-old Romy, as her husband is addicted to alcohol and is in a wheelchair. He even enters into a relationship with Erna. The nurse is forced to live with her father Stockinger, who takes good care of her son but has become embittered himself. What Erna doesn't realize is that Salvatore has a dark secret: he knows that the murderer of his entire family has settled in the small village and is seeking revenge...

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Convinced that his daughter has forgotten how to laugh, a father shows up unannounced while she's living abroad and bombards her with outrageous jokes.

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Emerald Green is the stunning conclusion to Kerstin Gier's Ruby Red Trilogy, picking up where Sapphire Blue left off, reaching new heights of intrigue and romance as Gwen finally uncovers the secrets of the time-traveling society and learns her fate.

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Lou Andreas-Salomé, the woman who enraptured 19th century Europe’s greatest minds, recounts her life to Ernst Pfeiffer in this German film directed by Cordula Kablitz-Post. A published novelist, poet and essayist, Salomé’s desire to live a life free from convention scandalized society but spurred genius and passion in others, including Friedrich Nietzsche, Paul Rée and her lover, the poet Rainer Maria Rilke. Under the tutelage of Sigmund Freud, she became the first female psychoanalyst.

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Georg Riha is and will remain the master of aerial shots. In this series, Riha uses aerial shots only. In shootings that took several years he flew over almost all of Austria and shows the country's most beautiful places from the aerial perspective during the course of a year.

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In winter, a landscape straight out of a fairy tale; in summer, still a region to refresh mind and soul – Rosegger's forest homeland. Deeply snow-covered forests, ptarmigan, snow hares, and majestic red deer in winter; refreshing streams, blossoming fruit trees, and shy fawns in spring; cooling giant trees, lush alpine meadows, and playful chamois kids in summer; otters and noble crayfish in crystal-clear trout streams, and a magnificent display of colors in autumn – all this Peter Rosegger described in his books. More than a hundred years have passed, but what has changed most since then is the people.

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A Kellergasse – the cellar lane – is one of the distinguishing cultural and physical features of the winegrowing region Niederösterreich – Lower Austria. There are more than a thousand of them. Until recently, wine was not only stored in the Kellergasse, but pressed and fermented there as well. Today, the Kellergassen have less to do with occupation and more with recreation. A documentary by Georg Riha follows a year in the life of this valuable cultural legacy.

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Gwen has just discovered, that she's the final member of the secret time-traveling Circle of Twelve. Now she has to juggle with constant trips to the past, her relationships with Gideon and figuring out dark secrets surrounding the Circle.

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Clara Immerwahr and her husband to be Fritz Haber are both young and gifted chemists. Their struggle for acknowledgment in nationalistic Germany during World War I lead to the development and use of the first chemical weapons.

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In order to find each other again, Lena and Andi decide to retreat to a remote holiday cabin deep in the mountains for a long weekend. When Andi finds out one morning that Lena has suddenly disappeared without a trace, the situation escalates. He goes in search of her and penetrates deeper and deeper into a mysterious and dark world of horror...

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Director Gotz Spielmann follows his acclaimed thriller Revanche with this visually captivating character study, in which a family reunion at a mountainside inn lays bare old wounds and reveals long-held secrets.

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After more than 20 years, the marriage of Bevon consultant Thea and car mechanic Rainer has been worn down by years of routine. Thea lacks appreciation from her family and no longer has access to her teenage daughter Janina. Her husband Rainer is still mourning his missed chance of a career as a rock star and is hopelessly at odds with his son Patrick. When Heinrich Bittner, a supposedly close friend of Thea's deceased father, suddenly moves in with the Cronpichels, Thea enjoys his presence and begins to see her life with new eyes. But is the charming and mysterious Heinrich really who he claims to be?

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The film tells the story of Laxenburg from 13th century, when it was used for hunting and fishing trips by the imperial Habsburg family, to modern day, a popular summer resort and a bustling international community. Today Laxenburg is also home to IIASA, the Austrian Film Archive, and the International Anti-Corruption Academy. The film will also feature these organizations, their history, and the important work they do in the field of research and diplomacy that goes far beyond Austria's borders.

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