Rosa von Praunheim

A sensual hommage to Germany's most productive queer filmmaker, Rosa von Praunheim.

To mark the 60th birthday of the multi-talented comedian, singer and author Hape Kerkeling, the two documentary filmmakers André Schäfer and Eric Friedler have created a quiet, thoughtful and entertaining portrait of this often anarchic humorist. The film tells of his rapid rise as a teenager, his time and the blows of fate during the AIDS epidemic, the controversial forced outing, his confident exit from the show business and his new beginning. The film is a sensitive insight into the family history and a fast-paced journey through the career stages of a formative figure in German TV entertainment.

Rex Gildo’s songs and musicals made him very popular. His best-known song was “Fiesta Mexicana” from 1972. Rosa von Praunheim tells the story of his life in the context of the gay pride movement, the normative pressures of the Schlager music industry, and the profound changes currently underway.

From the 1950s onwards, Erika and Ulrich Gregor brought countless film historical milestones to Berlin and shaped cinema discourse in post-war Germany. A look at the life and work of the couple without whom Arsenal and the Forum wouldn’t exist.

Rosa von Praunheim has made 150 films and repeatedly provoked the middle-class to homophobic majority society. But he doesn't spare his own community either by accusing many gays of being conformist soft-spoken people; and by outing some prominent homosexuals against their will, he has made many enemies. For the younger generation of LGBTIQ activists, Rosa von Praunheim is still known as a figure from the early phase of the queer movement, but as a white cis man he hardly gets a hearing there. However, Rosa does not want to argue and theorize, but above all to live out his creativity. Sometimes narcissistic, sometimes angry and combative, sometimes anxious - and always with his own style. Companions such as the comic book creator Ralf König, the producer Regina Ziegler and the New York publicist Brandon Judell pay tribute to the artist and activist Rosa von Praunheim, who calls himself a “lucky child” because he was mostly able to do what he felt like doing.

A collective documentary film, from five european directors asked to witness the revolutions and dramas caused in their own countries by the pandemic. Among them, “Two Fathers”, directed by Julia von Heinz (20’). After the death of his father, Hans-Michael von Heinz, the director finds out the truth about her parent true sexual identity. In order to know more, she starts emailing persons who got to know him over the last years, among them his closest friend, director Rosa von Praunheim.

How gay, how lesbian, how trans is German cinema? A 3sat documentary looks back at 100 years of queer film history.

Julia von Heinz’s 80-year-old father dies completely unexpectedly. From his estate, the filmmaker discovers that the former reserve officer was homosexual and had led a double life. The director seeks out Rosa von Praunheim, an icon of the gay movement, to talk about it. The outcome is the portrait of an extraordinary, lonely man.

The area around Stuttgarter Platz unites the most diverse worlds: It is a celebrity neighborhood, middle-class Charlottenburg and a meeting place for the drug scene. The documentary "Smart Berlin - Der Stutti" is a portrait of this special neighborhood through the eyes of its residents. Because they take over a bit of the direction here - from a selfie perspective.

Lars, a male nurse from Saarbrücken, moves to Berlin with his lover, Roland. They begin to renovate an apartment and their happiness seems almost complete. What Roland doesn’t know is that, while secretly checking out Berlin’s night life, Lars is also experimenting with a deadly poison.