Berlin, November 2025. As the 41st INTERFILM Festival opens its doors from November 4-9, Arts of the Working Class highlights essential programs that transform cinema into a space for solidarity, resistance, and collective memory.
In times when democracy faces daily tests and freedom of expression comes under pressure, INTERFILM positions film not merely as entertainment but as a lever for change. This year's festival asks crucial questions: How do we preserve stories drowned out by crisis? How do we hold each other up instead of breaking each other down?
Our Picks:
In the frame of: INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION
The focus on international filmmaking. Bold narrative techniques meet emotional stories, imaginative animations alternate with extreme life situations and encounters full of tenderness. The 49 films in the eight programs offer entertainment that broadens horizons: for film enthusiasts and for anyone who is open to strong narratives from around the world.
Kuration: María Cristina Hervás, Tavo Ruiz, Andrea Schwemmer
Fig.1
Categorize... Workplace Atmospheres
Work as a site of revelation. Where activism meets corruption and capitalism confronts environmental rights, these films interrogate the entanglement of labor, power, and morality. From a girl drawing circles that organize strangers to a caretaker shutting down a human farm, these stories explore the sacred bond between humans, animals, and nature.
In the frame of: GERMAN COMPETITION
Stories belong to those who tell them – and reclaim them! These 24 current German short films guide us beyond the realms of the sayable, the real, and the fantastic. They ask questions of familiarity and the unknown. For long, the German short cinema has been international and so coproductions are vital part of the program. In collaboration, we blossom; when we bloom, we grow.
Curation: Vic Atanasov, Tara Balok Herbener, Sarah Dombrink
Fig.2
Closest Strangers
The familiar and the strange are separated by a thread. Mythical creatures venture into Afro-futuristic space, estranged mothers and daughters seek reconciliation, and twin brothers harbor unspoken dreams. These German productions ask: when does the strange become familiar?
In the frame of: DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION
Truth lies somewhere between subjective introspection and committed analysis of the world. The documentary gaze, which captures what is happening, is considered truthful. Whether through a blink of an eye, in a long shot, whether activist, in slow motion or poetic, everything under the sky can gain deserved relevance. You have to look, then you will see!
Curation: Brenda Akele Jorde, Moritz Lehr
Fig.3
On Visibilities and Violence
How do we depict violence without reproducing it? This program examines the power of images as tools of empowerment and weapons against oppressive structures, creating counternarratives that challenge the status quo.
In the frame of: GREEN FILM COMPETITION
The environment and nature are not doing well due to overexploitation instead of sustainability. Twenty-two films—feature films, animations, and documentaries—shed light on the state of our planet, visit hot spots, question what we take for granted, and encourage us to take better action.
Curation: Tim Formella, Felipa Goltz, and Matthias Groll
Fig.4
Earthbound
Roots mean life. As the climate crisis uproots traditions from Greenland to Canada, these films find strength in community and the knowledge that small seeds grow into tall trees.
In the frame of: FOCUS WEAVING TOMORROWS
We don't exist in a vacuum, but in stories, relationships, and networks instead. Our individual selves and our collective identity arise from stories that we share with one another. Interfilm's FOCUS section takes a look at historical situatedness, at traditions, at cultural heritage, at the communities that we have and that we form, and asks: What can we find here to survive the grim era that surrounds us, to strengthen one another and protect cultural identities from erasure?
Weaving Tomorrows counters the capitalist logic of isolation with short films – as a tool to practice solidarity, develop resilience, and weave utopias. We ask: How do film and the short film format help us to preserve traditions, cultural heritag,e and communities? How do counternarratives become sparks of resistance?
Fig.5
Dear Friends, Lovers, and Comrades
Resistance through relationships. When people build bonds across difference through love, care, or fleeting attraction, they open spaces for other stories—factory songs, woodland encounters, raised fists. Someone has to show it.
Curation: Elisa Mohr
Fig.6
They Did Not Recognise Me in the Shadows
Four Palestinian filmmakers excavate pre-Nakba archives assembled and concealed under colonialism. Lost lands, ancestral ghosts, and acts of resistance transform history into a living loop of oppression and liberation.
Curation: Theo Panagopoulos
Film is not only art—it is also a stance. INTERFILM 2025 weaves stories and community into a powerful reminder that even in darkness, we carry each other through.
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For more information and the full program, visit INTERFILM Festival.
- Images
Fig.1 © Film "HUMAN FARM" by Gentoku Yamada
Fig.2 © Obey" by Akira Kawasaki
Fig.3 © "Territory" by Felix Scherrer
Fig.4 © Film "A Future with No More Sea Ice" by Adam Sébire
Fig.5 © Film "Quebramar" by Cris Lyra
Fig.6 © Film "A Silent Protest
