Ten-year-old Asalif and his mother have been displaced from their farmland on the outskirts of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, by the construction of a condominium. To fight back against those casting him out, Asalif taps into a fantasy of becoming his hero: the lion (“anbessa” in Amharic). Asalif uses his imagination to battle forces beyond his control. He must find the strength that resides in him in order to deal with the tides of change that are usurping a community, a country, and his own identity.
Anbessa Anbessa
Through an intimate coming-of-age story, Anbessa captures one boy taking on modernization on his own terms, revealing a unique and magical perspective on the myth of “progress”.
What's On
Yunan Yunan
Ameer Fakher Eldin
Thursday, 18. 09. 2025 / 19:30 / Main Hall
The Hamburg-based director of Palestinian-Syrian descent places the second instalment of his Homeland trilogy on a small, flood-prone island in the Wadden Sea. This melancholic, mood-driven film about exile and the scars it leaves behind features a charismatic performance by the legendary Hanna Schygulla.
Wisdom of Happiness Wisdom of Happiness
Barbara Miller, Philip Delaquis
Thursday, 18. 09. 2025 / 20:30 / Small Hall
With disarming wit, the Dalai Lama reflects on balancing millennia-old Tibetan Buddhist traditions with the contemporary values of our globalised society that now struggles to overcome violence and war while standing on the brink of environmental collapse.
Fiume o morte! Fiume o morte!
Igor Bezinović
Friday, 19. 09. 2025 / 18:00 / Main Hall
On 12 September 1919, a troop of some three hundred soldiers under the leadership of the flamboyant war-loving Italian poet Gabriele D’Annunzio swooped into the Northern-Adriatic port town of Fiume, now Rijeka, wanting to annex the city to Italy. Over the course of the next 16 months, during what is regarded as one of the most bizarre militant sieges of all time his official photography team captured over 10,000 images. A century later, Igor Bezinović orchestrates a direct-action history lesson focused on the siege and its modern-day implications.