Daniel Zillmann

The group of friends from “Das perfekte Geheimnis” have to ask themselves the question on a chaotic short trip to the south: Is there life after the truth or is their friendship over?

A young orphan boy Jim Button, his best friend Luke and a magical steam engine called Emma travel across the world in search of the truth about where Jim came from. Battling pirates and dragons, outsmarting make-believe giants, they must travel through the Forest of a Thousand Wonders, beyond the End of the World to find the hidden Dragon City.

In the Forest of Hearts, a little, sweepity, swoopity, swappity, sweet unicorn is born. But even though everyone is very lilacly-loving to it and constantly feeds it with sweet lucky clover, the little critter does not behave unicorn-like at all. It just keeps saying no, so soon its family just calls it uNOcorn. One day, the uNOcorn breaks out of its cotton candy world and sets off to NOWHERE. On the way, he unexpectedly meets a raccoon that refuses to listen (HUHcoon), a watchdog that doesn‘t seem to care about anything (SOWHATchdog), and princess that always talks back (PrinceYES). The four of them make a pretty good team. Because even being stubborn is much more fun together.

Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz 1992-2017. The end of the GDR gave rise to new artistic freedoms in reunited Berlin. Shortly after the fall of the Wall, rebel director Frank Castorf was appointed artistic director of the Volksbühne. His way of working altered the public’s perception of this theater. The chronological history of the Castorf era between 1992 and 2017 is told here in excerpts from the productions and in a series of conversations conducted on the long sofa in the theater's foyer.

In order to catch a basketball from the favorite team of his girlfriend's spoiled son, Fred poses as a numb, wheelchair-bound fan. But when he catches the ball, he also catches the attention of young, attractive filmmaker Denise, who wants to feature an invalid fan in an image film for the team. Fred has to keep playing his role, while real invalid and really furious fan Ronny might call his bluff at any moment. Worse, still, love sets in...

A communist kangaroo moves in with an artist in Berlin.

After having a chance encounter with a mysterious character, Wendy, a young working class mother, discovers that she has super powers.

The monkey child Akiko lives in the zoo, but his family sends him on a big mission: he is supposed to go out into the world and get his relatives out of the forest. Together they want to free the animals from the zoo

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.

Vampire sisters Silvania and Daka try to rescue their baby brother, a half-vampire, from the clutches of the evil vampire queen Antanasia, who wants to crown him as her heir.

Ida's friend Miriam visits the school for three months, but a secret threatens to tear them apart. Miriam is entrusted with the tarsier Fitzgeraldo, while Max, deeply in love, is given the owl Muriel. Meanwhile, the sale of the school is imminent, and the future of the magical community is in peril.

To this very day, kids believe that the stories of "The Wild Soccer Bunch" are the best in the world, and that's why Leo, Elias, Finn, Joshua, Oskar and Matze, replay their heroes’ legendary games every spare minute. One day a darkly dressed young man hands them a mysterious map that leads the boys into unknown territory.

The true story of a young woman whose lust for life means she is determined to be so very much more than just another cancer patient.

1980: 19 year old Robert, fed up with Hippy phoniness and bourgeoise narrow mindedness alike, flees the German provinces for West Berlin. A tour de force through the glorious dirt of West Berlin ensues. Full of sex, drugs, love and PUNK.

The cabaret artist Marc-Uwe and the kangaroo are faced with a problem: Lisbeth, the mother of Maria has taken a wrong turn somewhere and is now denying the climate crisis on the Internet. How can she be brought to her senses? The two make a bet with each other: If they don't manage to bring Maria's mother to her senses, they will lose their apartment. So Marc-Uwe and the marsupial embark on a trip to the Conspiracy Convention in Bielefeld and shortly thereafter become part of a tangible conspiracy led by conspiracy guru Adam Krieger and his followers. As the two flatmates talk their heads off, it's no longer just about their apartment for Marc-Uwe and the kangaroo, it's more than that: it's a matter of life and death!

Abahachi, the Apache chief, and his white blood brother Ranger fight tirelessly for peace and justice - but a new, up-and-coming gang is making life particularly difficult for them! They lure Abahachi and Ranger into a trap in order to get their hands on the legendary “Canoe of Manitou”.

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For teenage twins Robert and Elena, a weekend can seem endless yet still fly by. Time almost stands still while discussing philosophy, lying in a blissful cornfield near a remote gas station. They are in their own little world, a twin world of twin games and twin love. A confined world where emotions rise, where pressure mounts into rage… The turmoil of adolescence.

A man decides to sell his grandparents' house when he finds out that the death of his parents seems to be connected to a legend about a murdered child.

After his successful first "case", Allmen decides to make finding lost art objects his profession and thus avoid financial misery in the future.

Stories of the Berlin city life, separated into five episodes. A hopeless impostor. An East German couple who dreams of the big money. Three Turkish teenagers who do everything to have sex. Two hapless Satanists. And gay boys who dream of a better world.

A dusty stretch of desert through which a Bundeswehr tank is struggling. The hungover Martin dozes off inside the vehicle. Suddenly shots ring out, grenades explode, and all of a sudden he is wide awake - and in the middle of a war ... Just a few hours ago, Martin was having a beer with his best friend Maddel, who was actually meant to be a soldier on this foreign assignment. But because Maddel is about to become a father, Martin goes to war for his buddy.

Young Berlin schoolteacher Charlie no longer wants to continue as usual on her chosen path and asks herself what she really wants and needs.

Full of anticipation, the young and ambitious Commissioner Carsten Lanner (Florian Lukas) is moving from Berlin Cloppenburg in Lower Saxony for a further education. However, he did not expect the outspoken chutzpah of the Berliners and, above all, the rude nature of his colleagues, who in no way received him with open arms. And so he slips more accidentally than wanted shortly after his arrival in Berlin in his first case.

In a dystopian 2054, three young rebels go on a journey to find traces of the long lost beauty of nature, hoping to discover what happened to their planet.

Proud Annegret Simon is new to the retirement home. She doesn't particularly like the change of scenery. And rightly so, says Mr. Tiedgen, who would also rather live alone than be looked after. Exercise therapy and reading afternoons are the epitome of boredom for him. When the residents of the retirement home are invited on a sightseeing flight in a propeller plane, Tiedgen has an idea with which he hopes to impress the beautiful Annegret...

Plum out of luck, Swabian farmer Huber’s farm goes under. Then his girlfriend Birgit takes over her father’s newly-acquired firm – in former East Germany. That's reason enough for Huber to bail on his debts and head out on a road trip through southwest Germany.

A day in the life of Berlin cab driver Klaus Grill.

Inexperienced guardian angel, Buddy arrives to assist Eddie with getting his life back on track, but instead only causes more chaos.

No crisis is as disastrous, overwhelming and unjust as that of Alfi Seliger. The Jewish filmmaker, hypochondriac and family man is up to his neck in problems: his pubescent children Romy and Alain find him ridiculous, his wife Helena would be happy if she only found him ridiculous, his bank is going bankrupt and his new film project is finding it difficult to meet with approval. Friend becomes foe, hope becomes paranoia and when even his psychiatrist advises him to end his life, Alfi Seliger attempts a theatrical exit. But as befits a born "Nebbich", a lovable loser, even this fails - he survives and only appears to awaken in his old life...

Marion, a Berliner facing child custody and job loss as her ex Felix oversees her factory’s insolvency, scoffs at the idea of a savior, until Robin Hood appears in her kitchen. Believing medieval justice can fix modern woes, he takes on Felix to help Marion.

An African-German author loses his memory and is used by a modern National Socialist Party as a promotion-figure for more political power over Germany.

Sorted out - and at almost 50! Both professionally and privately, window dresser Tanja feels like she's been left behind. But she bravely sticks her chin out. Of course she can still keep up, and after one order after another falls through, Tanja is eager to start canvassing. An online course is designed to make her digitally fit. She is so preoccupied with herself that she neglects the most important people around her.

Springe, a bourgeois little town in Lower Saxony in the 1970s and 80s. Evelin is caught between shame, worry, and social pressure due to the otherness of her son Oliver, who ultimately escapes to the Kiez quarter of Hamburg. Thanks to a big heart, an irrepressible sense of humour, and the ability to get up every time he’s down, Oliver manages the transformation to Olivia Jones, drag icon, entertainer, and Kiez restaurateur.

The fairy Kräuterweis transforms the boy Jakob into a dwarf. No one recognizes him now. But Jacob does not lose his courage to face life. Because he still has a trump card up his sleeve! When 12-year-old Jacob mocks an old woman at the market because of her big nose, he has no idea that he will soon regret his actions. A short time later, the boy is already a prisoner of the fairy Kräuterweis and is forced by her to cook for her and her guests for several years. And as if that wasn't punishment enough, she then transforms him into a dwarf with a large nose. After this transformation, no one recognizes him, not even his mother Hanne. And so he has no choice but to put his newfound cooking skills to good use with Duke Kunz the Gourmand.

In the motley final-year class 13e at Kepler School in Neukölln, children who have moved to the western part of the city legally as well as border crossers who live in East Berlin but commute to the West every day come together for lessons every day. After the school-leavers had completed their written exams in July 1961, they faced their oral exams after the summer vacation in September. But when the Berlin Wall was built in August, Berlin was divided and torn apart from one day to the next - including class 13e. The students from the eastern part of the city quickly have to make a difficult decision: should they attempt to cross the border or throw their dreams of the future to the wind?

Senta and Thomas are dying to fall in love - just not with one another. Still, when two people - a hopeless romantic and a system analyst - meet, an unexpected amour fou ensues.

Intern Annika gets the chance for a permanent position at the record company "GrandMusic". As a rehearsal, she is supposed to prepare the Finnish boy group "Ripili" for a youth competition in Germany. When the band arrives at the airport, Annika realizes that the band is the third-rate Finnish death metal band.

At seventeen, girls are all about looking good, dressing right and making out with the cutest boys. Or they're like Luka, who's an ace in boxing and couldn't care less about her looks or her appeal to boys. When she breaks a schoolmate's nose, her parents send her off to boarding school to acquire some ladylike manners. There she's mistaken for Frankie, a boy who hasn't shown up, and takes on his identity. With her boxing skills, she instantly wins over her three roommates Chico, Toby and Jo, and strikes up a particularly close friendship with Chico. Her uncompromising honesty and loyalty to her new friends, however, soon get her into trouble with the headmistress and her nephew, the school bully.

Actually, Kathi should be happy: her best friend Caro marries and wishes on top of Kathi as a maid of honor. Would not it be the unspeakable coincidence that the wedding is also Kathi's ex-boyfriend Markus and his new super-girlfriend Maria invited. For Kathi it is clear: She has to find a companion for Caro's wedding. Easier said than done: All conceivable men in their circle of acquaintances are already taken. So Kathis way leads to the brokerage "Datelink". Already at the first meetings she receives illustrious, colorful and absurd insights into a generation of men in search of the woman for life.

Ferdi thinks he's ugly – but likes the fact Jona is interested in him. Maybe because she's blind. What Ferdi doesn't suspect: She's just pretending to be blind to be able to live cheaply in subsidized housing. How long can she maintain her charade? Can love, which is supposed to make you blind, even work out that way? Director Tom Lass takes a closer look, shooting with blind actors and old Berlin buddies, acting the lead himself – paying tribute to a way of life beyond our way of seeing the world.

Rebecca is undecided about what her future life should look like. On the one hand, she is on the path to becoming a teacher, and on the other hand, she doesn't let go of her passion for making films

Marga is a forty-two-year-old actress who seems to have already passed the peak of her career. After starting her career in theater on the country's major stages (Volksbühne Berlin, Berliner Ensemble, Maxim Gorki Theater), it is becoming increasingly difficult for her to find work. Not only in theater, but also in film, it seems to be getting harder to get roles as she gets older and as a woman, especially a woman with a migrant background.

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Far away from the big city, Janine is unwelcome, yet an eye-catcher: a sensual, queer subject of projection with wine-red hair. Jan Eilhardt travels with her to engage with his own rural past, opening old wounds and infiltrating a hostile milieu.

Florian, Matthias and Enrique drive to school full of anticipation: the exchange students are coming today! A bus full of attractive French girls! That means three weeks of partying, fun and coitus! Unfortunately, their rival Henk crosses their path and runs Florian's VW bus off the road with his jeep. Furious, Florian agrees to a bet with Henk: Whoever bangs more French girls gets the car of the losing team - but the girls Sophie and Caro have other ideas...

Love and loss are closely linked in MY SON, an emotional drama about a teenager and his mother who go on a journey together after nearly having lost one another.

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Somewhere in the GDR, in 1988: young soldier Henrik Heidler starts his service in the National People's Army, a whole new world. Together with the weighty troublemaker Krüger, Heidler and his fellow soldiers try to somehow do their time between old hands and bureaucrats. It's not always fun, because the superiors are annoying with socialist propaganda from the day before yesterday, the material and equipment is scarce and not exactly new, while morale is at rock bottom. His relationship with his girlfriend isn't holding up either. But then Heidler meets Marie, the daughter of commander Kalt of all people, and falls in love. And then, at some point, the Wall comes down and everything changes ... for everyone in the NVA!

A look at a Bavarian commune of the Indian Bhagwan cult.

When Momo leaves his small home town to go to university, he is full of enthusiasm and confidence, but slowly the pressures of study and campus living begin to grind him down. Half way through his course he finds himself at a crossroads with both his relationship and studies.

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Tom and Malte are best friends; they make music together, DJ in Berlin clubs, dream of a career together, party until they drop, wait tables at a casting service and yet they are very different: Tom struggles with himself, his life and the future. When one day Mavie, Mitsch's "little" sister from Munich, moves into the Berlin flat share, Tom's emotional rollercoaster begins. Daredevil Malte, on the other hand, seems to have his luck in his pocket: Everything he touches succeeds. Tom sees no other way out than to escape: out of the city and into another life. His friends try to stop him, but even they know: Tom has to make this decision himself if he doesn't want to stand in the way of his happiness forever.

Chris, a student lawyer, is driving towards Hamburg when he is pulled over by the police. The night only becomes more horrifying from there as Chris seeks to survive.

Peter Lindburg played the role of "Kommissar Kämpfer" in the crime series "Blaulicht" for decades. Now the series is to be canceled, which doesn't sit well with the star who has been spoiled by success. Offended, he returns to his hometown in Thuringia, which he once left for the sake of his career. But even here the TV investigator can't let go of crime: when he believes he has witnessed a murder one evening and strongly suspects the highly respected public prosecutor Dr. Eugen von Wangenheim of the crime, Lindburg causes all kinds of commotion with the local authorities. The press also gets wind of the case.

A Neukölln clan boss becomes a climate activist. A gender doll inventor who fulfills her most secret wishes with a fake gun and a new girlfriend in Grunewald. A balcony beekeeper whose bee colony is on speed. And in the middle of it all, a fisherman who wants to conjure up sustainable snacks from invasive swamp crabs. What unites them all? A hot summer in the capital - and waiting for the rain!

Thomas is trapped in a loveless relationship, even though he has already fallen in love again, Anton can't manage to introduce his boyfriend to his parents, who have their own problems, and after a party they all get together.

Alex is a passionate musician. He travels from one gig to the next with his tango band. He can't make a living from his music, but he doesn't really care. This changes when he and his bandmates steal a rocker band's tour bus and there is an accident. Alex's friend Tommy dies and the tango band is finished. Suddenly Alex finds himself without an apartment, a pile of debts and with the grim rockers breathing down his neck. There's only one thing to do: go into hiding.

A social satire in which a chauffeur accidentally becomes the editor of an online newspaper.

The Farmer's Daughter is given a riddle to solve by the king: "Come to me, neither naked nor clothed, neither walking nor riding, nor driving, neither by day nor by night, neither with gift nor without gift." If she solves it, she had proved her cleverness, the king promises not only to release her father from prison, but also to marry her...

Lonely online miracle worker Olli Hermes cannot accept that his favorite show "Dr. Burg - der Herzchirurg" is being cancelled after 35 years. During the last episode, his reality merges with the world of the series. Now Olli is faced with the big question: can he save Dr. Burg from his demise in the feverish finale?

Young people disappear in Berlin's subway shafts, near the "Kill Your Darling" disco.

Viewers of the short film as a real film always in new excerpts. Oskar just doesn't understand why nobody wants to film it. For his friend Benny, however, who works in a video store, the situation is crystal clear: there are simply no highlights. So Benny gradually adds more and more elements that he hopes will be a great success. After all, he wants to help Oskar achieve an international breakthrough: In addition to baby animals and sex, racism and homosexuality must of course not be missing. While Benny lets his imagination run free, Oskar gets drunk. And so Oskar's fine story gradually becomes a cliche monster that doesn't leave much of his original idea.

Professional provocateur and artist Maven Shegula has returned to Berlin after a hiatus in Zürich. She’s back to celebrate her 50th birthday, and to appear on a popular German talk show. As she wanders the streets of Berlin with her girlfriend and friend, it becomes apparent that being an artist in this city is no longer acceptable. The humming nightlife has disappeared, and the vibrant creative community pushed to the margins of society. The film is alive with tension, both sexual and otherwise. As Maven’s story unfolds on live television, we learn about her son, her politics, her heritage, and her alter-ego Rosa who champions radical self-expression and feminism. The interview is dispersed with beautiful volcanic eruptions from Maven that act as both a denunciation of the city’s leadership and a love letter to Berlin.