(Édouard Glissant, Poetics of relation, 1990) 

WE NEED TO TALK is a phrase, an invitation to a moment of confrontation between two parties, at the same time ‘we’ could also mean a collective that wants to speak their voices. This short documentary film program conceptualizes auto-ethnographic process-oriented collaborations across generations for the ESEA diaspora in Germany. Being the archive of marginalized histories, these films rely on the intimate relationality between filmmakers and their elder kin (biological or not). From Tamil Eelam storytelling regarding shame, caste, and white gaze, to Cambodian father’s silence in East Germany, the entangled history of Thai Park in West Berlin, and end with the sci-fi tale of mythology, and act of jumping.

Here kaleidoscopic histories are translated, appropriated, and transformed into their bedrooms and playgrounds. This programme was originally conceived for the “German focus” section of 39th Short Film Festival Hamburg 2023.

The screening will be followed by a conversation between Susheela Mahendran, Marina Kem, Thùy-Hân Nguyễn-Chí, moderated by Will Pham. 

Programme curated by Sarnt Utamachote.

Programme:

My father, electrician; my mother, nurse, dir. Susheela Mahendran, Germany 2022, 7mins

Complicated Happiness, dir. Rosalia Namsai Engchuan, Germany / Thailand 2020, 30mins

Bonne Nuit Papa, dir. Marina Kem, Germany / Cambodia 2018, 31mins

Into the violet belly, dir. Thùy-Hân Nguyễn-Chí, Belgium / Denmark / Germany / Iceland / Malta 2022, 20mins

Total runtime: 88mins