when does this present? When can we look, finally, at the now time as a Phase in which much was in motion, but most of it has been re-arranged? A nostalgic longing for the future has taken large parts of the liberal-thinking society. First of all, the CDU, the hopes of a sudden, with Friedrich Merz as a party Chairman in a time vorkatapultieren, in the neo-liberal economic policy, again on a totally different beer mats as a social cleavage.

But the present will haunt us for a long time. Through the movies, currently, and the movies from the past to us through and remind us that history is not in a Moment, but always made is – in the images that we make, and the words that we have for you. “Executive” los is such a Film, the present and the past to each other and each other bite.

“The functionary”

In a world premiere at Doc.Leipzig is shown, outlined by Andrew Goldstein the life of his father, Klaus Gysi, a longtime culture Minister of state, then Secretary of state for Church Affairs in the DDR. Private photographs, crisp, sometimes sharp, sometimes blurred, illustrate a country and a biography, which like the photos: sometimes, not only painful, palpable, sometimes every Declaration depriving.

Goldstein, it is difficult to the father, relying again and again on a killed worker as a primal scene of its politicization, idealism lose weight. To be questionable is the gap in your CV during the Second world war, to the pain on the various relationships and families, which Gysi continued during prescribed (Gregor Gysi is a half-brother gold stone), to the banal, the rates, which he as a party functionary for the majority of his life.

at the same time miss Goldstein to those who define the GDR only on questions of idealism, dare to do it. “Today, the conflicts in the GDR drama will escalate, and throughout on the contrast between Freedom and Repression is reduced,” writes Goldstein in his Film. “You are less of the GDR as a present, the legitimacy of self-and now in these stories as salvation.”

what this looks Like on a large scale, this question of the presence of Legitimize by the insistence on a story, Werner Herzog. With “Meeting Gorbachev” , the year’s opening film for the Leipzig documentary film week, Duke made a interview film with former heads of state and party leader of the USSR for the History Channel and instead of ecstatic truth revisionism barren fabricated.

Moral admiration, a political pity

The most impressive is a quote from the Interviewer: “I love you,” says the Duke, as the conversation turned to Gorbachev’s merit comes from Association with the German again. Otherwise, Duke is carried to the double condescension to admire Gorbachev for Glasnost and Perestroika, him on the other hand, due to the collapse of the USSR as a tragic figure.

To an attitude, or at least a speculation about what has kept the Soviet Union in the Interior, feel the Duke is not obliged. Almost understandable, because it would allow him to extort the balance, whether Gorbachev with Glasnost and Perestroika misunderstood the nature of the USSR and its demise through inability. In his Film, the admiration for Gorbachev remains morally and compassion in political terms. Together the is not thought, only canceled Casinomaxi along with the year 1991, the “Meeting Gorbachev” as the final point behind Gorbachev’s political Impact looks and puts.

Also in another environment, the new documentary by Sergei Loznitsa had a cathartic effect: The intellectual rigour of the choice Berliner pushes resistant to the majority of other filmmakers. However, as “The Trial” , originated solely from archival material, “Meeting Gorbachev,” in distress, is remarkable.

“The Trial”

Cut from a film material, which the Soviet regime of a show trial against six Gosplan officials, 1931, in a left turn, is supported in “The Trial” again and again the symbolic order is recognizable, the Stalinism in Alliance with the terrorist. In one scene, the judge asked the defendant a bribe payment. More than the bribery of interested and outraged the judge, however, is the fact that the defendant should have adopted seem to be the sum in gold coins from the tsarist times and not in Soviet money.

The insight into the authoritarian structures of domination, this scene allows, it is difficult to overestimate. If the symbolic shape of a crime is considered to be as bad as the crime itself, where can then start reforms? Not are, then, transparency and democratisation impulses synonymous with a death knell for the entire Regime?

withdrawal from the “fake game”

The brace, the Doc.Leipzig, for such thoughts is in the German festival landscape unique. Parallel to wisely selected Retrospectives and tributes, the Festival continues under the direction of Leena Pasanen in unconditional dialogue with the present.

The best in the on the institutional and structural level to succeed. With initiatives for greater accessibility and the introduction of a temporary quota for women for the German competition, the is the only section of the Directors under-represented, Doc.Leipzig already demonstrated how Festivals can bring. In the fourth year of office Pasanen has now announced to want to step way from the pressure to present as many of the premieres. This is a “fake game”, which comes at the cost of outstanding films that are already gone to other Festivals.

“Lord of the Toys”

in terms of Content, does the summon time of conformity, however, less. In 2017, the Festival tried with the Pegida-Film “Mondays in Dresden” to a breathless actuality, and had to justify to the heated audience discussions for the presentation of the comparatively non-critical work. The same in 2018 with “Lord of the Toys” : The portrait of a group of Dresdner Youtubers who Express openly racist, sexist and anti-Semitic, has again led to allegations of lack of Distance and forced the Festival to an opinion.

For Friday at noon has recognized the Festival for a special discussion about the Film, in connection to the Masterclass by Ruth Beckermann, dedicated to a tribute. The Austrian Director, who is just celebrating the success of to have success with”forest, home of the waltz”, has given her Masterclass a wonderful title: contemporary management.

That – can be completed such as dealing with the past – never opens up, not the least of Becker’s filmic Work, the Extruded again and again, the collective consciousness and brings it back. Doc.Leipzig, however, is clear: Without the documentaries, you will not accomplish.