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Eight debut feature films are competing for the prize for best director in the International Debut Feature Film Competition. Internationales Frauen* Film Festival Dortmund+Köln has this year received a record 150 submissions from 40 countries. Worth € 10,000 to the winner, the prize celebrates the innovative and experimental spirit of aspiring women film-makers.

Films from China, Costa Rica, France, Haiti, Romania, Serbia, Spain and the US have been nominated this year and will be screened between March 29th and April 3rd , 2022 in Cologne. The international jury has a prominent line-up with author, playwright and director Tsitsi Dangarembga (Peace Prize of the German Book Trade 2021), cinematographer Christine A. Maier (German Camera Award 2021) and director Ula Stöckl.

The films present stories about major life decisions, challenges and friendships. A filmic journey around the world - covering everything from improvised formats and semi-documentary narratives to a screen-busting masterpiece in black and white - we encounter protagonists with a strength and resilience who thrill and inspire.

»The tradition of feminist counter-narratives to mainstream cinema presents itself here with fresh momentum. This strong year reveals a generation of women filmmakers who are breaking cinematic ground with new confidence«, says festival director Maxa Zoller.

Among these films are many works by actors also enjoying success behind the camera, such as French star Noémie Merlant with Mi Iubita, mon amour. She plays an actress who meets 17-year-old Nino on her hen party trip to Romania. The two of them cautiously get to know each other and young love starts to blossom in the shimmering days of a never-ending summer. By contrast, Haiti's vibrant cultural landscape plays a key role in Freda, a high-energy drama set in a poor Port-au-Prince neighbourhood by up-and-coming Haitian actor Gessica Généus. In Crai Nou, Romanian actor and director Alina Grigore focuses on a protagonist hellbent on escaping the aggressive chaos of her dysfunctional family, eventually turning from victim to perpetrator. In a kitchen thick with cigarette smoke, the party guests in Milica Tomović's debut Kelti drink, flirt and talk politics, painting a picture of Serbian society after the breakup of Yugoslavia with top Balkan humour.Asian-American student Riley is also caught up in party life and everyday banter in Actual People. Director Kit Zauhar captures the millennial mood with authenticity, improvisational verve and quiet humour in a film that is relatable and digs deeper than the archetypal college movie. Emotions boil over in Nathalie Álvarez Mesén's cinematic coup Clara Sola. After years of being controlled and shielded from the world by an oppressively protective and pious mother, Clara's late-blooming sexual desire sparks in her something uniquely wild and fearless. She sets out on a liberating and self-healing journey to find her true nature. In Destello Bravío, Ainhoa Rodríguez delivers a fable portraying the Spanish province as a bizarrely beautiful nightmare, where women have a magical resilience and archaic machismo is doomed.Finally, Queena Li stages her road movie Bipolar as a hallucinogenic pilgrimage. Musician Kun travels from China to Lhasa. Accompanied by a sacred lobster, she encounters numerous oddball characters and slowly finds her way back to reality.

The nominess:

Actual People (Kit Zauhar, USA 2021, 84’)

Bipolar (Queena Li, CN 2020, 110’)

Clara Sola (Nathalie Álvarez Mesén, DE, BE, SE, CR 2021, 108’)

Crai Nou (Alina Grigore, RO 2021, 106’)

Destello Bravío (Ainhoa Rodríguez, ES 2021, 98’)

Freda (Gessica Généus, F, HT, BJ 2021, 99’)

Kelti (Milica Tomović, RS 2021, 106’)

Mi iubita, mon amour (Noémi Merlant, F 2021, 95’)

The Jury:

Tsitsi Dangarembga
Film-maker, playwright and author Tsitsi Dangarembga set up her own production company Nyerai Film in Harare in 1992. She has been involved in numerous Zimbabwean feature films, including classics like Neria (1991), which is based on a story she wrote. She campaigns throughout Africa for women’s rights and actively supports women film-makers. In 2021, the PEN Pinter prize-winner received the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade.

We are showing her film Karé Karé Zvako − Mother's Day (Zimbabwe 2005), a Zimbabwean folk tale adapted for the screen as a feminist-cannibalistic splatter musical about archetypes. Tsitsi Dangarembga will discuss the film's context with film-maker Ines Johnson-Spain.

Christine A. Maier
The well-known cinematographer collaborates closely with directors Barbara Albert, Amie Siegel, Sabine Derflinger, Ruth Mader and Jasmila Žbanić. For Quo Vadis, Aida?, Maier received the German Camera Award in 2021. The film was Oscar-and BAFTA-nominated in 2021 and won the Award for Best Film at the 2021 European Film Awards. Christine A. Maier co-founded the WOMEN CINEMATOGRAPHERS NETWORK in 2018.

She will be Sophie Mantigneux’s guest in a Cinematography Workshop Discussion at the festival.

Ula Stöckl
The auteur film-maker has produced over 20 films with a visual language that has repeatedly defied filmic conventions. They include three feminist classics The Cat Has Nine Lives (1968), Erika’s Passion (1976) and Sleep of Reason (1984, German Film Award). She has been a professor of film at the University of Central Florida since 2002.

In our archive section IFFF REVISITED, we will be screening her film The Old Song, which was one of the first feature films to examine East-West realities after German reunification.

Images of the nominated films can be found in the press area of our website. We will send you printable, high-resolution film stills on request.
Caption for the attached film still: Kelti, director: Milica Tomović, ©Irena Canić

The programme will be available from mid-March at www.frauenfilmfest.com.


Festival venues in Cologne: Filmhaus Köln with the festival office and press centre, Filmforum im Museum Ludwig, Filmpalast, Odeon Kino

Cinema Dortmund: Schauburg