A living classic of German cinema travels back 55 years and gives a lesson in craftsmanship and love. Russian premiere as part of the contemporary programme of the Festival of Films Regained.
Subject: Filmmaking
- Date:
- 21 Sep 2025,
16:00–17:30
- Age restrictions
- 18+
Filmstunde_23
2024, Edgar Reitz, Jörg Adolph
Germany
89 minutes, German with Russian subtitles
documentary
T
In 1968, director Edgar Reitz was 36 and had just made his first film. But instead of shooting a new one, he went to an all-girls gymnasium for a year to teach its students how to create a movie. This was perhaps the first ever experience of teaching film aesthetics as a subject in its own right. Reitz prophesied what is now called media literacy and tried to awaken the spirit of absolute creative freedom in the teenagers.
Shot form Subject: Filmmaking, 2024
Listening to Reitz speak, it is remarkable how consistent he is, seemingly picking up where he left off in 1968. The same calm authority, the same presence with his listeners, the same belief in the beauty and power of cinema.
— Kees Driessen, Business Doc Europe
In the early 2020s, Reitz met his students again. From their dialogues, from lessons documented back in 1968, from short films made by the schoolgirls that year, minimalistic and surprising Film Lesson_23 is formed.
