Jürgen Jürges

Nikita Nekrasov is a scientist, a theoretical physicist who studies our world and other possible worlds. He refuses to make a choice between mathematics and physics, between one woman and another, as he ponders the existence of the multi-universe. At scientific conferences, attended by eminent foreign scientists and a rising younger generation of physicists alike, Nekrasov gets carried away debating the beauty of string theory. He attempts to explain to all of his women – Katya, the librarian, Zoya, the scientific secretary, Svetalana, the head of department – about the theory of his own polygamy, and the possibility of having enough feelings to satisfy everyone.

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Within the top secret Institute of Physics Problems, the scientist Nikita Nekrasov is visited by his wife and small children. While away from his family the physicist has managed to fall in love with other women. In open conversations with his spouse – in the bedroom, the dining room, and while out walking – he attempts to convince her of the legitimacy of polygamous relationships, and to test the limits of her unconditional love.

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It is 1953, Stalin has just died. It is a troubled and uncertain period for the whole of the Soviet Union, particularly for the state security services. In the Institute, a secret research facility, the scientists continue their theoretical and experimental work. Every night they strain their ears to listen for footsteps in the dark corridors: who have they come for this time? Who has reported on who? Having survived the fear and humiliation of an interrogation, the Head of the Theoretical Department, Andrei Losev, refuses to cooperate with the security services, only to face a new ordeal back in his own home.

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«The Return of the Prodigal Son» is the first volume from the film (novel) of Anatoli Vassiliev’s «Empire» inside the Dau cycle. The story is about inner kinship, which is much closer than blood, about inevitable betrayal, about almost fatherly love and forgiveness. Cigarettes (papirossa), images from «Faust» and «Don Juan», walks in the Soviet Park of culture... And a terrible, narrow gap inside the brutal regime where you have to be skilled enough to survive... Yes! and they also play gorodki (skittles) with childish passion!

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It is 1956. Dau is a distinguished Soviet scientist who meets up with the love of his youth – Maria, a Greek actress – during her three day visit to Moscow. They haven’t seen each other for 25 years. Dau is a successful and prosperous scientist, but feels excruciatingly dissatisfied with his family life. Through Maria he hopes to regain lost harmony and beauty, but reality intrudes when Nora, Dau’s wife, returns home.

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Once just a girl from the provinces, Nora is now married to a successful scientist and lives together with her family within the confines of a secret and privileged Moscow institute. Nora is visited by her mother for the first time since her wedding. Her mother closely observes the atmosphere within the couple's home, trying to work out whether her daughter is happy. During the course of their intimate conversations the complexity of their contradictory relationship is revealed.

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An ongoing experiment, evolving from a biopic about Soviet physicist Lev Landau into a large scale project – part cinematic cycle, part behavioral experiment – involving hundreds of participants from around the world. Combining elements of film, theatre, science, psychology, architecture, visual arts and performance, it has created a complex and absorbing world that has to be lived as much as seen.

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A secret Soviet Institute conducts scientific and occult experiments on animals and human beings to create the perfect person. The KGB general and his aides turn a blind eye to erotic adventures of the director of the Institute, scandalous debauches of prominent scientists and their cruel and insane research. One day, a radical ultra right-wing group arrives in the laboratory under the guise of test subjects. They get a task - to eradicate the decaying elements of the Institute’s community, and if needs be, destroy the fragile world of secret Soviet science.

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Natasha runs the canteen at a secret 1950s Soviet research institute. This is the beating heart of the DAU universe, everyone drops in here: the institute's employees, scientists and visiting foreign guests. Natasha's world is a small one, split between the demands of the canteen during the day and alcohol fuelled nights with her younger colleague Olga, during which the two confide their hopes of romance and for a different future. At a party one evening Natasha becomes close to a visiting French scientist Luc Bige and the two sleep together. The following day her life takes a dramatic turn when she is summoned to an interrogation by the KGB's General Vladimir Azhippo who questions the nature of her relationship with the foreign guest.

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11-year-old Michi lives in a children's home, every day fighting to win the respect of the other kids, till the day he finds his real dad, Tom - who happens to be a dwarf, even shorter than Michi is, the opposite of his idea of manliness and strength. When the kids find out, Michi's life becomes hell and he flees. With nowhere to go, he moves in with Tom, who is new to this fatherhood thing, while Michi tried to hide his embarrassment and shame from his fellow school kids. This forces Tom, who had coped well till now, to confront his handicap head on. As time passes, they discover they have more in common than other sons and fathers, until their relationship is again suddenly put to the hard test...

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Young journalist Sebastian Zöllner is writing an article on artist Manuel Kaminski. Zöllner hopes that Kaminski dies soon, so that he can cash in on his article.

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One year after Stine's husband died, she reclusive lives with her daughter Stephanie in a suburban villa which falls into disrepair. She encounters the charming craftsman Roger, who makes her an offer right on cue: He consents to carry out repairs as much as necessary, which have to be paid back, only when Stine has the ability to. Instead, he just wants to get a warm meal and an shower at times. Eventually one night. Stine accepts that deal despite she risks her daughter's relationship. Written by Anonymous

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When 12-year-old Jonas’ mother leaves to “fight her demons”, he steps up as head of the household, becoming the unofficial guardian to his younger siblings. With food and money running out, the children retreat into a world of their own where, cloaked eerily in black-and-white, their home turns into one of bugs and mysticism – they make saucepan gardens, they take on insects as pets and spiderwebs encroach. Only the friendship of an odd young homeless man gives Jonas hope to survive in an adult’s world.

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A true-story account of a German businessman who saved more than 200,000 Chinese during the Nanjing massacre in 1937-38.

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Thirteen German directors present short films exploring the state of their country.

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A look at the lives of 19th-century composers Clara and Robert Schumann.

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Based on true events, a young man raised in a cruel and oppressive family environment, leaves Albania with the dream of becoming a rock star and living a better life. His reckless character and his youth passions lead him to commit a murder in Athens. Chased by everyone, even by his own self, he is imprisoned under the harshest conditions. With the help of a German doctor, he learns to feel sympathy for others and guilt for his crime. His deep remorse will lead him from darkness to light.

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They want to get away from each other, but they clasp each other even more firmly. They seek to save appearances at all force. The more they laugh, the quieter it gets around them. The cracks in the family picture widen until an inescapable secret reveals itself.

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Ravi and Masha are just children when they were sold into labour by their parents. When they meet, friendship blossoms between them but when the factory manager threatens to sell Masha, possibly into sex slavery, Ravi gives up his hard earned savings to buy her freedom. They agree on a way to find each other once Ravi has earned enough money to buy his freedom but a series of misunderstandings and fear tear them apart. Though they now have their freedom in life, they have to find their way in love.

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Director helmut Dietls and Patric Susskinds illustrate a legendary story of two lovers who cant keep themselves away from death.

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Ozren is raised in Vienna by his mother Silvija, who works as a prostitute, and his aunt and uncle. The film shows the demimonde of Vienna in the early 1990ies and deals with Ozren's finding out that his mother is not a waitress (as he was initially told) and with the way he copes with it.

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A middle-class family flees an unspecified disaster that has struck the city and takes refuge in their country home. They think this will allow them to escape the chaos, but they soon realize that getting away won’t be so easy.

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Shot with striking immediacy by a subjective camera, “Angst isst Seele auf” assumes the point of view of a black actor in Germany dealing with racist abuse as he prepares to appear in a play based on Fassbinder’s film, about the taboo relationship between an older German woman and an Arab man. Sharing the same lead actress (Brigitte Mira), cinematographer (Jürgen Jürges), and editor (Thea Eymèsz) as in Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s 1974 Film “Angst essen Seele auf”, these twin works offer a searing indictment of prejudice within German society.

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Two trouble-causing brothers, who in the second generation after World War II Germany live, are in the center of this German made for TV movie. The movie makes a subject out of their everyday lives and the helpless attempt for them to build a normal life.

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Two young girls who live in a small town in Lower Austria dream of America, men and love. They live in Ternitz, they dream of Tennessee.

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A series of events unfold like a chain reaction, all stemming from a minor event that brings the film's five characters together. Set in Paris, France, Anne is an actress whose boyfriend Georges photographs the war in Kosovo. Georges' brother, Jean, is looking for the entry code to Georges' apartment. These characters' lives interconnect with a Romanian immigrant and a deaf teacher.

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Set against the backdrop of post-unification Germany, the film explores the breakdown of relations in a decaying social structure.

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Two psychotic young men take a mother, father, and son hostage in their vacation cabin and force them to play sadistic "games" with one another for their own amusement.

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Mario, a young, handsome surveyor, arrives in a small Patagonian town to prepare the overland transport of a passenger ship. The inhabitants eagerly await the trek, some hoping it will establish a better link to the outside world, others just sensing an opportunity to make money. No only by falling in love with Gloria, who runs a garment store, is married to a wealthy hacienda owner, but also has an affair with the town's mayor, Mario gets entangled in a tight web of relations.

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Sawdust Tales is a whimsical and timeless parable on survival in hard times and the force of a first love against all odds. In a timeless no-mans land scarred by social decay and imminent war, a circus troupe awaits the arrival of the mysterious Rupert who is to deliver them from danger into a better world. The old and wise tightrope master keeps a watchful, loving eye on his young apprentice who, to his concern, could be drafted into the army at any moment. To make matters worse, the boy falls in love with a mermaid...

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A beautiful 14-year-old girl has just reached marriageable age in a village in Senegal. She has many suitors; however, she is in love a poor student who has returned to the village while the university is on strike. At birth, she had been promised in marriage to Diogoye, who went away to work in France. Diogoye, who supplied her parents with many things over the years, has now sent a dowry, and asked that she be married to him in the village in his absence; she would then be sent to France.

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A rare gem of cinematic storytelling that weaves docudrama, fictional reenactment, and experimental photography into a powerful, reflective work on the early days of German cinema. The film tells the story of the Skladanowsky Brothers, the German-born duo responsible for inventing the "bioskop", an early version of the film projector.

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